If you’re looking for services in your area, you may have seen large corporations with websites across the country pop up in addition to your business. This may feel especially unfair to you, especially considering the possibility that you may be competing with businesses that can afford to spend more on a single ad campaign than you spend on your business in a single year.
However, most small business owners are not aware of the competitive advantages that local searches offer in marketing, advantages that large companies are powerless to overcome regardless of the money to spend on advertising.
You’re Genuinely Local
Simply being local can actually be a major advantage in local search, and means more than you may think. To Google, local searches look more favorably on companies that have a physical business in that particular local area, so even businesses with corporate offices in head offices in one location may end up being unable to compete with your local business. For example, even a large competitor with a head office in London won’t be able to compete with your business with a physical presence in Leeds, because you are more likely to show up to a customer searching for a local service.
In fact, Google created their local algorithms to limit large companies in search results for searches with local intent to protect consumers looking to find and patronize local companies.
You Can Actually Respond
When someone needs emergency help or wants to book a service quickly, there is no chance to miss your call. You or your team are answering the phone as it’s not a call center miles away. You guys even visit the same day service, up to a few hours. You definitely know the area, the street names, and the local problems.
When service is needed, companies send their contractors based on their internal systems. Most of their contractors are different each time a service is requested. This leads to no consistency and no relationships. They suffer greatly, but because of the lack of consistency, they know why they didn’t choose the national brand and go to the local service provider instead.
Local Knowledge You Cannot Fake
You know which areas in your town have older properties with specific problems. You know the local weather patterns and how they affect your trade. You’ve worked in hundreds of local properties and you understand issues that are particular to your area.
Try getting that from a national company. Their website content is generic because it has to apply everywhere. They cannot write authentically about local issues because they’re not from the area. That is local content. It is genuine and something the other companies do not have.
Where Major Brands Actually Struggle
Companies face significant competition regardless of industry. Large companies have massive resources to create impressive websites. However, their marketing campaigns and presence in the community often lack sincerity. Location pages are obviously templated to Google, and customers have the same ad on multiple pages, only differing by the town name. Google will spot these pages, but it is far more important that customers will spot these generic ad pages. Customers want to see personalized ads that speak to their community, and want to see more personalized ads than generic ads. National companies lack the ability to gain truly localized reviews, so their generic ads and a lack of localized reviews won’t motivate customers to visit their business. Customers will visit a national brand location, and when reviewing the location, it will not help give a potential customer a brief overview of the service provided. Your reviews will help give an overview of the service in your community. Customers will provide a comprehensive overview of the service given on Google Business reviews because it will be focused on your specific area.
Concentrate on Your Google Business Profile
Smaller companies will have a personalized, localized presence that national companies lack. National companies may create impressive websites, but their Google Business Profile will lack personalized, localized ads, giving you a competitive advantage. Your Google Business Profile should include pertinent details, a complete overview of your services, community-specific photos of your services, and community-based updates that demonstrate a presence in the community.
Google Business profiles allow smaller companies to interact with customers in the community, which will differentiate the company from a national brand. National brands will not be as responsive and provide the needed services as responsively to the community. The ads will create community-based updates, informing customers regarding the services provided, and will demonstrate a competitive advantage.
Make Your Website Locally Focused
Instead of focusing on contact us pages, make sure you describe local areas where you offer your services, or services you offer. Make sure to use landmarks in your photos and services you offer. Use testimonials that contain reviews that reflect areas you have provided services.
Your website should make it clear that you are a local business. Make sure your phone number is a local one, and that your address is on your website. When potential customers are searching for services you offer, make sure it is clear that you are a local company that can provide those services.
Unique and Local Content
Write about services you provide that are specific to the area and go into detail. Include articles with titles such as, “Common Roofing Problems in Manchester Properties”, or “Why Birmingham’s Clay Soil Affects Garage Door Installations.” The articles should focus on a specific area of service that a larger company would not provide because they don’t have the knowledge of the needed area.
Writing articles about niche services is going to be the best for your local SEO, especially since the competition is not as vast. This is also going to be one of the best ways to show your expertise as most articles people find on the web are going to be more generic, “how to choose a roofer” articles.
Stop Trying To Match Their Budget
Don’t even try to outspend larger companies. They have way larger budgets to spend on marketing tools. Competing on their budget is pointless. Instead, your budget should help you advertise your company as a small, local business. Keep your focus on local searches, your local presence, and your growing local reputation. Help them burn their budget on company-wide ads that don’t perform.
Local Links Actually Help
Mentions from local news websites, local business directories, and local businesses all help your local search engine optimization. Large businesses have links from national news websites, but you can obtain links as a small business that they cannot. Examples include your local chamber of commerce, sponsoring a local football team, and community focused local journalism. Local links signal Google that you belong to the local community and are better for local searches than a generic national link.## Reviews Set You Apart
Request reviews from customers who seem satisfied. Make it convenient by providing them with a direct link to your Google Business Profile. Reviews where customers describe your area of service, along with their experience, are very good social proof.
A customer reading reviews for a nationwide company can tell those reviews describe service for any customer of the company, regardless of location. Your reviews describe service for customers from the same area as your reviews. That’s crucial for customers deciding who to reach out to for service.
Thinking Ahead
You shouldn’t expect to outrank national companies on every search term. Given time, though, you can slowly establish authentic local authority. Improving your local presence, increasing your local reviews, optimizing your content for the locale, and building solid relationships with other local businesses sets your authority.
National companies regularly update their marketing, and that creates a presence. You should focus on building a presence that you can reliably maintain. It may require you to put out less content than your competition, but your content will be better. Your review count may be lower, but your reviews will be more relevant to the local customers you are trying to influence.
The Truth
Big brands have helpful perks that you don’t. Accept it and move on. However, you have benefits that they don’t. You are truly local and can give better local service, which Google’s local search algorithm recognizes.
A person searching for local service providers usually wants to avoid big nationals. They are looking for the one-on-one customer service and community insight that only an actual local business can give. It’s important that your website clearly communicates that you offer that service, and you can effectively compete with their big ad budgets.
Don’t compete with them on everything. Compete with them on local service, because that is the area that you will always win.