How to Make Your Local SEO Reporting Better

Intro

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When a small-scale brick-and-mortar client comes to your agency, they have one main concern. That is increasing footfall to their store. In other words, they are only interested in data that relates to local customers.

However, this poses a challenge for agencies. You need to create local SEO reports that are both accessible and relevant to these clients.

If you want to Improve SEO performance, you need to change your approach. This means focusing on highly localized data. By doing so, you can strengthen relationships by providing better service to your SEO clients.

But what’s the best place to start? Today we’ll look at ways to improve your local SEO reporting.

Use Google My Business

Google My Business (GMB) should be the starting point for all local SEO reporting. By creating a profile, a business can better manage their presence on Google. The tool enables stores to put links to their websites, as well as business hours, addresses, and more.

GMB means that a store is more likely to show up in local search queries. It also allows customers to get the information they need quickly. Highlighting the tool's importance, local businesses receive 94% of calls from GMB on weekdays.

But once a client has an account, it will need to be optimized.

Use Google Posts

Google Posts enable you to send some content directly to the Google Knowledge Panel (the info panel that appears when you make a search query). They help to increase visibility and allow searches to learn more about a business before visiting. Posts can take many different shapes and forms. Those most relevant to local businesses include:

• Sales that are currently running.
• General information and updates about a store.
• Coupons to give shoppers discounts.
• Links to sign up for a newsletter.

Like GMB, Google Posts are free, easily shareable, and can help your SEO reporting. With shares becoming an increasingly important SEO factor, Google Posts are an essential part of GMB.

Gain more reviews

Like Google posts, reviews appear in the Google Knowledge panel. They are a quick way of demonstrating quality to prospective customers. They also demonstrate that a business is interested in what its customers have to say. But not only that - the more reviews you have, the more you’ll boost your search engine performance

This is because Google sees reviews as a sign of value. Reviews that are widely shared, can form a strong part of your local SEO strategy.

Every time your client receives a new review, encourage them to respond to it. This goes for negative as well as positive reviews. Responses show an eagerness for a business to improve and encourage new reviews.

Set up your NAP

NAP stands for ‘name, address, and phone number’. Including the NAP of your client is an important part of local SEO reporting. Doing so makes it easier for both customers and search engines to find a business.

Important tip: Make sure that the NAP is included as crawlable HTML text on a website. This will help Google when displaying results based on a user’s location.

Use Google Analytics

A key part of SEO is understanding your data so you can make the changes that you need. Google Analytics (GA) is a useful tool that can provide valuable insights. It’s estimated that 74% of the top 10,000 websites use GA. The latest version, GA4 contains many features to help with local SEO, these include.

• The ability to set up local SEO conversion events.
• The ability to track users by specific locations.
• The option to Monitor the performance of individual pages to improve content.
• Detailed reports to help you better understand your audience.

If you’re unsure where to start, there are plenty of online resources to help you Learn Google Analytics.

Simplify your reports

Simplifying your reports is essential when it comes to marketing for eCommerce, as your client may not be familiar with analytics.. Sending highly detailed reports is only likely to cause confusion (this applies to more than local SEO). Instead, it's more important that your reports tell a story. A client should be able to follow along and see how data impacts their business.

To do so, it's better to simplify your SEO reporting. This means doing some of the following.

• Use visualizations - A blizzard of numbers usually won’t help your client. It’s much better to use visualizations to support your data storytelling. Tools like GA enable you to create reports containing visualizations.
• Create sections - It should be simple for clients to differentiate between data. That’s why it's better to create different sections in reports for different data sources. For example, social media data, and keyword data should have their own sections.
• Stay within a reporting period - To avoid confusing the client (and yourself) stay within one reporting period (for example, the previous week).
• Have goals: Reports are much easier to follow if they contain a clear set of goals. Show your progression towards meeting them. Assign a set of metrics that best convey your progress.

Focus on keywords

To truly optimize our reports for local SEO, you need to focus on keywords. By getting familiar with how people are searching locally, we climb to the top of the search engine results.

There are multiple advanced keyword tools available. With the right tool, you can track keywords that are being used in your local area. Keywords can then be uploaded to GA and included in your reports.

When searching for local keywords, try to stick to the following tips.

• Be industry-specific - hone your focus around the industry of your client. What search terms are their customers likely to use? This could include the names of products or services. The more specific you can be, the better. For example, Snow Mad Digital is an agency specializing in wedding venue SEO and they have found that the keyword "outdoor wedding venues near me" has a monthly search volume of 3.3K with zero competition.
• Consider local areas - Searchers will generally use the name of a neighborhood or district in their query. For example, ‘cake shops in Pikeville’. Think about how place names may play a role in your keywords.
• Add modifiers - When people search for services locally, they’ll often add modifiers to their search. For instance, ‘best cake shops in Pikeville’. By adding modifiers to your keywords, you’ll boost your local SEO reporting. Just remember, modifiers take three different forms:
  • Quality modifiers, e.g. ‘best’.
  • Occasion-related modifiers, e.g. ‘wedding or birthday’.
  • Price-related modifiers, e.g. ‘cheap’.
  • Characteristic modifiers, eg. ‘vegan ice cream’.
• Consider autocomplete - Type your primary keywords into Google. What results show up in the autocomplete? Bear these suggestions in mind. After all, these are the kind of queries that customers of your client are making.

Carry out a website audit

Improvements to your SEO reporting mean little if you have issues with your website. Remember that SEO is a continuous process. A website audit is the only way to discover areas for improvement on a client’s site. Carrying out an audit for local SEO can involve several steps. These include:

• Monitoring performance - Is a client’s website running slowly? Does it accommodate mobile users? Remember providing the best user experience is a key part of SEO.
• Checking crawlability - The crawlability of a website will have an impact on its SERP position. Is indexing being carried out successfully?
• Considering on-page SEO - Does a client’s website contain the right on-page SEO elements? For example, backlinks, keywords, and internal links.
• Analyze competitors - Look at some of your client’s competitors in the local area. How do their websites compare? Is the overall user experience better? Do they use more inbound links and create better content? Ensuring that a client’s website is better than competitors, is key to standing out.

Localize your content

Every day, Google’s search algorithm is evolving and improving. Today, it’s much better at finding the kind of content that a user is searching for. In other words, a local customer is more likely to find your client, if the content on their website is relevant.

Remember, with local SEO you’re not aiming to attract the masses. Writing about broad topics might boost traffic but won’t bring customers. Instead, try to be hyper-focused on local topics. That way, a client can become a leader in the local area.

Think Local

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If your agency usually handles larger clients, local SEO may take some getting to grips with. You need to be highly specific and targeted.

As we’ve explored in this article, improving local SEO reporting involves multiple steps. Let’s summarize some of the most important factors:

• Make sure that your client’s Google My Business profile is fully optimized.
• Make the most of Google Analytics 4 features to understand data.
• Provide simple and accessible reports that give clients the info they need.
• Change your focus to local keywords, and invest in the right software.
• Carry out a comprehensive website audit and identify areas for improvement.
• Localize your content to cover local topics.

Improving your local SEO reporting can bring big rewards. You’ll boost your client’s performance, and build stronger relationships. But remember, improvement begins with a new approach. Think local and reap the rewards.