Why Do Big Brands Struggle With Local SEO?

Despite the fact that local search is widely regarded as such an important part of SEO, there are still many big brands who struggle to get to grips with it.

Local SEO Is VERY Important

The importance of local SEO hasn’t gone unnoticed but it seems that, due to the significant benefits of regional exposure and brand recognition, local SEO has been pushed to the back of the priority list in the past.

Big brands tend to have more money and should probably outrank others because of this but their struggles don’t seem to be going away, so what are the mistakes that big brands are making when it comes to local SEO?

Badly Managed Data

The first big mistake that big brands make is that they don’t manage data well enough. Let’s take retail enterprises for instance. During the co-ordination of names, addresses and phone numbers, they also have to process and confirm images, website URL’s, menus, services, store hours and much more which can severely compound the data management process.

How to Fix the Problem:

The best way to cope with this problem is to put the data management process first and think of better ways to organise it. Store all the information you gather in a secure database, such as a cloud and provide administrators, managers or specialist personnel with the authority they need to update the stored information regularly.

Inaccuracies 

Another big problem is not keeping up-to-date with listings and profiles that you make. It’s important to remember that big brands are widely noticed on a digital basis, so having profiles that are out of date on third-party sites such as Google, Yahoo, Foursquare and Bing can cause serious problems in the long haul.

An important local ranking factor is the normalisation and cross verification of local information. This process helps Google to know what (in relation to retail enterprises) stores to show first in search results.

How to Fix the Problem:

If you’re keen to sort out inaccurate profiles and listings, you need to verify all your locations again. If you’re not quite sure where to start with this, try using Google My Business and simply manually import all the listings. This might seem like quite a tedious process but it is certainly well worth it in the long haul.

There are a few other aspects to consider besides the examples provided above in order to be successful with local SEO. These include:

• Clicks from search results – requires a good meta description or, for franchise brands, structured data mark-up

• Site speed – loading times and positive user experiences are also essential

• Mobile-friendly pages for every location – every page for mobiles should be detailed and again provide a positive user experience

There are many different ways big brands can change to dominate local search listings and some of the most important things to consider are poor data management and inaccurate or older profiles.

Other solutions include fast loading sites, good meta descriptions, accuracy and up-to-date profile listings.