Local SEO Checklist: What to Do in One Afternoon

Verify your Google Business Profile and fill in every field correctly, make your website say exactly the same thing, clean up old listings elsewhere, and start asking every customer for a review. That's the groundwork of local SEO for a small business, and it fits in one afternoon if you do it in that order.

The order matters because each part copies from the one before. Your Google profile becomes the master copy of your name, address, phone and hours. Your website matches it, and every other listing matches both.

Before you start

Have these open or written down:

The login for the Google account that manages your Business Profile.
The login for your website, or the phone number of whoever runs it.
Your business name exactly as it's printed on your sign, truck or invoices.
Your phone number, your address or the list of towns you serve, and your hours, including the holidays coming up.
Your services, in the words customers use when they call.
A handful of real photos of your work, your place or your team.

Part 1: your Google Business Profile

Google's page on improving your local ranking says businesses with complete and accurate info are more likely to show up in local search results. That's what this part is for.

Find and verify your profile. Search your business name and city on Google. If the profile isn't yours yet, claim it and start verification. Google says verifying makes your business more likely to show up in search results. Some verification methods take days, so start this first and keep going with the rest.
Check the name. It should be your real-world name, as used on your storefront, website and stationery, per Google's guidelines for representing your business. No town names, no "24/7", no slogans.
Set your categories. One primary category that says what the business is, plus only the few extra ones you really need. We explain how in choosing Google Business Profile categories.
Address or service area. If customers come to you, use your real street address. If you go to them, hide the address and list the towns you serve, as we walk through in service-area businesses on Google Maps.
Hours, then special hours. Set your regular hours, then add special hours for the holidays ahead: Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, New Year's Day. A restaurant that closes early on Christmas Eve and doesn't say so on Google sends people to a locked door.
Phone number. A local number you control, not a call center line, as the guidelines ask. Call it from another phone and make sure it rings where you think it does.
Website link. The full address of your site, starting with https. If you have a page for each location, point each profile to its own page.
Services. Add each service you want calls for: "water heater replacement", "roof leak repair", "office catering", "key cutting".
Description. A plain summary of what you do and where. Google's page on editing your profile caps it at 750 characters and says not to include URLs. The guidelines also say not to focus on promotions, prices or sales.
Photos. Real ones. A shop or restaurant needs a clear photo of the outside so people recognize it from the street. A contractor or plumber needs trucks, crew and finished jobs.

Part 2: your website

Same name, address and phone as the profile, word for word, in the footer and on the contact page. If you hid your address on Google, leave it off the site too.
Your trade and town in the page title and the first heading. "Plumbing repair in Aurora, IL" tells Google and the visitor more than "Welcome to our website".
A phone number you can tap. Open your site on your phone and tap the number. It should start a call, not do nothing.
A page for each main service. A drain cleaning page, a water heater page, a sewer line page, each one saying which towns you do that work in.
A link to your Google listing, so people can read your reviews and get directions without searching again.
Local business data. A small block of code that tells Google your business type, name, address, phone and hours, matching what's on the page. We explain it in LocalBusiness schema markup.
Speed on a phone. Load your home page on your phone over mobile data, not your shop Wi-Fi. If you're waiting for it, so are your customers.

Part 3: other listings and reviews

Search your own details. On Google, search your phone number in quotes, then your old number, then any old address or old business name. Every listing with wrong details goes on a list.
Fix the big ones first. Apple Maps through Apple Business Connect, Bing Places, Yelp, your Facebook page. Then the places for your trade: for a contractor, the manufacturer's "find an installer" page and your chamber of commerce listing. For a restaurant, the reservation and delivery apps you use.
Look for duplicate Google profiles. Search your name on Google Maps. A second profile for the same business, left over from an old address or an old owner, needs to be removed or merged. How to handle each case is in name, address and phone consistency.
Get your review link from your Business Profile and send it to the customers you finished work for this month, with a short personal note. Ask everyone, not only the ones you're sure loved it. Don't offer a discount or a gift in return.
Reply to the reviews you already have, good and bad. Keep it short and calm. Future customers read the replies too.

What to expect afterward

Some of this shows up quickly. Profile edits are usually reviewed within minutes, though Google can take longer. Website changes wait until Google crawls the pages again. Reviews and links from other sites build up over months, as fast as you finish jobs and ask. Nobody can promise you a date for any ranking, and anyone who does is guessing.

The fixes that help customers directly pay off right away, whatever Google does. A number that can be tapped, hours that are right and a service page that answers the question all work the day you make them.

Then once a month

Put a reminder in your calendar for the first Monday of each month:

Check the profile for anything Google or a customer changed.
Set special hours for any holiday that month.
Add a few photos of recent work.
Send your review link to that month's customers and reply to new reviews.

Let the checker do part 2

Our free website checker runs most of part 2 for you: tap-to-call, a quote or contact form, a link to your Google listing, the page title, the local business data and Google's own mobile speed test, explained in plain English. It takes under a minute.