The local SEO checklist we run for every client

Local SEO is won in three places: your Google Business Profile, the consistency of your business details across the web, and the recency of your reviews. Your website matters, but less than most people assume. Below is the order we work through it, and what each step realistically moves.

Most local businesses are competing for a very small piece of screen. On a phone, the three map results sit above every organic result, and a large share of people never scroll past them. The businesses that win those three slots are rarely the ones spending the most — they are usually the ones who did the unglamorous setup work that nobody else bothered with.

Start with the profile, not the website

Your Google Business Profile is a stronger ranking asset than your home page for most local searches. It is also free, and it takes an afternoon.

• Claim and verify the profile. Unverified profiles rank poorly and can be edited by the public.
• Choose the most specific primary category available. "Dermatologist" beats "Doctor". "Ayurvedic clinic" beats "Health spa". This single field has more influence on what you rank for than any other.
• Add every service you genuinely offer as a secondary category, but do not pad the list with things you do not do — irrelevant categories dilute rather than add.
• Upload real photographs. Interior, exterior, team, and the thing you actually sell. Stock imagery is obvious and it reduces trust.
• Fill in hours, including holiday hours. Being marked open when you are closed generates the specific kind of review you do not want.
• Turn on messaging only if someone will answer it. An unanswered chat is worse than no chat.

If you have more than one branch, each one needs its own profile and its own page on your website. Google ranks each location independently, in its own catchment. A single page listing five branches will never rank in five places.

Get your name, address and phone number consistent

Google cross-references your business details across directories, listings and your own site. Inconsistency creates doubt, and doubt costs you position.

The details to align, everywhere they appear:

Field	Common inconsistency
Business name	Trading name on Google, legal name in directories
Address	"Rd" vs "Road", missing suite number, old postcode
Phone	Landline on one listing, mobile on another
Hours	Never updated after a change

Fix your own website first, then Google, then the three or four directories that actually get traffic in your category. Chasing dozens of low-quality citation sites is largely wasted effort now.

Treat reviews as an ongoing programme

Review recency matters as much as review count. Twenty reviews spread over four years reads worse to both Google and a human than twenty reviews in the last four months.

A steady trickle of recent reviews beats a burst of old ones, and a thoughtful reply to a bad review reassures the next reader more than the review itself deters them.

Ask at the right moment

The best time to ask is in person, immediately after the service, while the person is still in front of you — not in an email three days later. Make it one tap: a short link or a QR code at the desk.

Two things to avoid. Do not offer incentives for reviews; it violates Google's policies and the reviews can be removed. And do not buy them — they are increasingly easy to detect and the penalty lands on you.

Reply to everything

Reply to every review, positive and negative, within a few days. For negative reviews: acknowledge, take it offline, do not argue publicly. The reply is not written for the person complaining. It is written for the next person reading.

Then fix the website

Your site still has to do its part, though it is the third priority rather than the first.

1. A separate indexable page for each location, with that branch's address, phone number, hours and a map.
2. Business details matching your Google profile exactly.
3. LocalBusiness structured data on each location page.
4. A page that loads in under two seconds on a mid-range Android over 4G or a mid-tier iPhone — not on your laptop over office broadband.
5. A real tel: link, so tapping the number dials it.

The address block in your structured data should look like this:

{
  "@type": "PostalAddress",
  "streetAddress": "123 Example Street",
  "addressLocality": "Your city",
  "addressRegion": "Your state or region",
  "postalCode": "00000",
  "addressCountry": "US"
}

What to do first, and what it moves

Priority	Task	Effort	Typical time to effect
1	Claim and complete the profile	An afternoon	2–4 weeks
2	Fix name, address and phone consistency	A day	4–8 weeks
3	Start a review programme	Ongoing	6–12 weeks
4	Build location pages	1–2 weeks	8–16 weeks
5	Fix site speed	Varies	4–12 weeks

Almost none of this is expensive. Most of it is simply nobody's job yet, which is exactly why the map results in most categories are still winnable.

Common questions

How long does local SEO take? Map pack movement usually appears within six to ten weeks of fixing the profile and starting reviews. Competitive organic terms take six to twelve months.

Does my business address have to be public? To rank in the map results, yes — unless you are a service-area business that travels to customers, in which case you can hide the address and define a service area instead.

Do I need a separate profile for each branch? Yes. Each branch competes in its own catchment and needs its own profile, its own page and its own reviews.

If you would rather have this run properly than run it yourself, our SEO services page explains how we do it, or you can just talk to us.