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Social Media Tips To Boost Your Beauty Business

The beauty industry took a hit like every industry during the pandemic, but the lockdowns and year of stress have made many people miss their beauty professionals more than ever. Customers cannot accomplish the perfect balayage they see on Instagram at home, and there are plenty of videos showing the results when everyday people try to replace beauty professionals. 

People are more eager than ever to get back to normal, including nail, hair, makeup appointments, or any other beauty service. Your customers need you. As you read this, there are thousands of people near you searching for a “hair salon near me”. Are you excited?

We can see you answering this like “Yaaaas!” 

Beauty business owners also want to get back to their clients and enjoy a bump in profits, but with so many businesses in the space, it can be hard to stand out and attract new customers. 

It’s time to boost your beauty business and that’s how you landed here.

The world we were used to a year ago has changed, and so has the way businesses attract customers. Thankfully, the beauty community has thrived on social media platforms like Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok, and businesses can use those same platforms to give brands a boost. 

You’re up to get a treat, as we are giving you nothing but practical tips with actionable steps. 

Just keep reading!

How Can I Promote My Beauty Salon On Social Media?

I can already see you thinking, can I really use social media for my business? There is more to social media than pretty pictures and young people? Is it truly good for my business if I do TikTok videos?

Yes, you can and should use social media for your professional business, particularly in the beauty industry!  

Promoting your beauty business on social media is not about posting before and after pictures with captions that push your offers directly. That will be considered as advertising content. Your audience doesn’t want you to sell them. They want to get sold.

A golden rule is always to put yourself in your user’s shoes. Flip that coin and assume you’re the follower instead of the business.

What have you wished a beauty business would say? What ads do you want to see? With your own business, you get to decide and use your personality to endear customers to your brand. 

With these tips and tricks for social media, you can get back to doing nail art, playing with makeup, and dyeing fantasy hair for more customers than ever. No matter your specific beauty business, you can use social media best practices to take your business to the next level. 

Everyone wants their business to succeed, so embrace the online world and use every method available to create your personal beauty empire. Unleash your inner influencer and use social media to help your business flourish in the increasingly online world. I can see you enjoying the benefits now; it just takes some work and adjustments to better your business. 

Instagram First Steps And Tactics

So it is time to start marketing your beauty business on social media; where do you start? The most straightforward answer is Instagram. Instagram is one of the largest hubs for the beauty community, and there is no shortage of customers. 

Instagram is a favorite home of the beauty community as most beauty is visual, so the picture-based format shows off beauty trends perfectly. There are massive accounts dedicated to the most beautiful hair, nails, makeup, photography, fashion, and more all fall under the beauty umbrella. There is a high chance that your customers will bring in reference pictures of things they saw on Instagram or Pinterest, so it only makes sense for your business to use those platforms too. 

Instagram for business might sound silly to some people, but the brands that adapt the fastest to the new social media norm get significant results using every social media platform on the market. Sponsored posts, #ad posts, and paid ad slots are all attractive business opportunities, and Instagram hosts some of the most desirable demographics. 

The first step to getting your business on Instagram is to create a business or creator account. You can convert a standard account into a business account or make a fresh one, but be sure you use a business account as it comes with additional features standard accounts do not have. If you convert an old account, ensure the account’s history is professionally acceptable as you do not want your brand dragged down by vacation pictures from years ago. The key to setting your beauty business up for success from day one is to treat your passion-based business like a business. Analytics and backend numbers are critical data to track performance on the app, but those features only come with a business account. 

Once you have an account, it is time to establish your brand presence and personality. You want your brand’s personality to stay consistent across all platforms, and your bio must include essential information or a link to your website, at the very least. You want to make it as easy as possible for customers to like a picture, video your profile, and then transition to your website to see more. Please do not lose your personality on social media, as businesses with humor, wit, and awareness are among the most popular brands because they connect with people. You should keep your posts professional and personable, and inviting, so customers see there is more to your business than just another retailer. 

The ideal flow to create your Instagram strategy would be, “I love that color, I haven’t seen something like that before. Who made it?” then a customer would click your profile and see the link to your website where they can buy the product they just saw. You can also put direct links to your products by tagging the image with backend features. The easier it is for customers to navigate your funnel, the more sales your business will enjoy, and your reputation will grow over time as word spreads. 

Do not be afraid to engage with your audience either. Start a fan photo competition or ask for the funniest caption on a post. You always want customers to engage with your brand and form a relationship that encourages long-term business loyalty. Get silly, be funny, ask questions, but the main goal is to show your human side to potential customers and give your audience a good taste of your brand’s flavor. 

Tips And Tricks To Boost Your Social Media In 2021 (Recap)

  1. Share great content instead of promotions.
  2. Always put yourself in your users shoes.
  3. Unleash your inner influencer.
  4. Optimize your bio to establish a solid brand presence.
  5. Show your personality. 
  6. Draw a journey of your future customers by thinking about their steps they will take when they love something you’ve shared.
  7. Find out-of-the-box ways to ignite engagement within your users.
  8. Don’t be afraid to show your human side.
  9. Use shopping features to add direct links to your products.
  10. Promote your content using Instagram Ads consistently.

Instagram Influencers

Instagram marketing tips and tricks are not complete if we don’t talk about influencers. But what does being an Instagram influencer mean? 

Influencers are Instagram users who have established credibility and an audience; who can persuade others by virtue of their trustworthiness and authenticity. Your brand’s ideal influencers are users that share your brand hashtag and or products who have the largest number of followers, so you can reach as many new eyes as possible. 

Influencers are a relatively new idea in the grand scheme of marketing, but they are highly effective at targeting niche markets and specific audiences. Wouldn’t you be more likely to buy a product if your favorite beauty vlogger suggested it? The power of influence should not be underestimated, and you should partner with influencers to promote your business and or products. Small business owners should reach out to influencers in the same niche or send products for a review to expand your reach. 

It may be tempting to reach out to top Instagram influencers, but small businesses do not get the best return on investment with big names. Top-tier influencers are picky about the brands they partner with and typically have a high price per collaboration, making them a bit of a waste for small businesses. You also do not want to be overwhelmed by too many customers or questions coming from a partner ad if your system cannot handle it. Imagine one person trying to manage all the questions and orders that come in after a top makeup tutorial channel promotes a product; it just is not possible nor desirable. Local and niche influencers are far more helpful to small businesses because the scale and price match for both parties. 

Everyone aims for and wants to reach the top, but the steps along the way are essential. Jumping right to the big influencers will not give you the overnight and long-term success you might dream of, so it is better to take it slow and go through the steps. It is better to go slow and steady than jump in with both feet and no life vest. Start by using similar niche influencers on one platform and get comfortable with that process before adding more to the equation. 

Building your brand is critical for your business, but be careful you don’t put one goal over the other. Your brand is the personality and characteristics of your business, but the business is what makes money. Influencers can contribute to both your brand and business, but it is something to keep an eye on overtime. 

Marketing Is Hard, We Make It Easier

You can read all the guides online, and there will still be aspects of marketing your new business that don’t make sense or take too much time for one person to finish. That is where we come in. 

We are a boutique firm that specializes in helping small businesses get the attention and success they deserve. With forensic marketing tools, we can take an objective look at your current status and work with you to create a plan that will address your unique pain points to get your business where you want it to go. 

Click here to learn about our Instagram Bootcamp & Coaching 

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5 Easy Steps To Drive Traffic To A Brand New Website (And Free)

So you’re here because you just spent hours building a new website (or months, or years). That’s exciting, and you should feel proud!  

Now it’s time to figure out how to let all the search engines know that your website exists so you can get traffic to this brand new website. 

This post will show you exactly how to do that and will cover a wide range of website launch tips that won’t require any code or advanced technical SEO.

True story: 90% of the clients I consult tell me they didn’t know they needed to publish their website after it was done. They handed their website to a web developer or built the website themselves and thought that it was just enough to get website visitors.  If that was the case, everyone could have 1Million visitors per month! 

You have worked so hard to get to this point so we need to get your brand new website some visibility, right away!

Here’s An Overview Of The 5 Steps I Will Cover In This Article:

Step 1: Website settings that can’t be avoided

Step 2: Prepare a launching campaign

Step 3: Fetch and render your website 

Step 4: Announce it on your social networks

Step 5: Google My Business listing

Step 1: Website Settings That Can’t Be Avoided

Your new website might have been installed on WordPress, Wix, or Squarespace. Depending on the platform you use, they all have SEO settings.  If you set up the website on your own, don’t panic. The settings I am talking about are not that complex.

On WordPress, I recommend Yoast SEO plugin. Download it and activate it, following the simple steps they provide. 

On Wix, use SEO Wix and complete the settings by just following the steps. 

Squarespace has a built-in SEO package. It automatically adds meta tags to your site if you complete the SEO settings on each page.

SEO Settings That Each Page Needs 

SEO titles – Creates meta title tags for individual pages and collection items.

SEO descriptions – Creates meta description tags for individual pages and collection items. This increases CTR (click-through rate) which means that people will see your description and will click the link to read more.

Site title – Creates the title tag for your whole site.

SEO site description – Creates the meta description tag for your homepage.

Essentially, everything you have uploaded (pictures, videos, audio) will be published. Google reads it from the “metadata”. So it helps to describe all that media. 

If you’re with Squarespace, here is a very informative article about their SEO package. 

For bloggers, your taxonomy, categories, and tags are gonna be your bread and butter, so make sure you leave these settings ready to use! This article from WP Beginners will turn you into a taxonomy pro!

Lastly, a very common step that is forgotten, remember to add social sharing capabilities so that people can easily share your website with their social networks. Note: this is different than having your handles so you might want to add new plugins. Easy social share is one of many. 

Step 2: Prepare Your Launching Campaign

Assuming all your technical settings are completed, now it’s time to have some fun! Just like having a baby! You announce the gender, share the progress, and when it’s born, you share the big news!

Activate your creativity and plan this website launch just like if you’re planning a very special event. You’ve worked hard! 

Your launching campaign consists, normally, of 3 stages:

  • ✔️ Pre-launch: This is when you create “teasers” coming up soon. Exactly what you see when a movie is coming up. Or even better, when Iphone is launching a new phone. By the way, did you see the new IphoneXI Pro? 
  • ✔️ Launch: The day when your website it’s gonna be born. Again, just like a newborn baby, plan to have headshots revealing the new website. And if you want to get even more traffic, plan about 4-5 blog posts that new website visitors can read once they land. If you’re in Austin, my favorite branded headshot photographer is Jerrel Trulove. He is amazing! He also shoots in other cities!
  • ✔️ Updates:  Keeping up with the same example (the baby), the first week update, the first month, and so on. Plan for those. You want to keep bringing up traffic to your site.

Pro tip: keep creating more content, but schedule it so readers have a reason to come back to your website.

Step 3:  Fetch And Render Your Website 

If this is the first time you’re hearing these words, I’m very happy to be your teacher today!

I know they sound very technical, but it’s just like everything when it’s new. It sounds scary but it’s simple, once you understand. 

The SEO world has cool words like that. For instance, the process when Google reads your website is called “crawling”. So that’s another new word for you.

How Does Google Crawl The Web?

If you’re curious enough, you will want to understand this process. Here’s some amazing guide that Google provides for developers.

Google gets information from many different sources, including: 

  • ✔️Web pages,
  • ✔️ User-submitted content such as Google My Business and Maps user submissions,
  • ✔️Book scanning,
  • ✔️ Public databases on the Internet, and many other sources.

However, this page focuses on web pages.

The short version

Google follows three basic steps to generate results from web pages:

Crawling

The first step is finding out what pages exist on the web. There isn’t a central registry of all web pages, so Google must constantly search for new pages and add them to its list of known pages. This process of discovery is called crawling.

Some pages are known because Google has already crawled them before. Other pages are discovered when Google follows a link from a known page to a new page. Still other pages are discovered when a website owner submits a list of pages (a sitemap) for Google to crawl. If you’re using a managed web host, such as Wix or Blogger, they might tell Google to crawl any updated or new pages that you make.

To improve your site crawling:

  • ✔️For changes to a single page, you can submit an individual URL to Google.
  • ✔️Get your page linked to by another page that Google already knows about. However, be warned that links in advertisements, links that you pay for in other sites, links in comments, or other links that don’t follow the Google Webmaster Guidelines won’t be followed.
  • ✔️ If you ask Google to crawl only one page, make it your home page. Your home page is the most important page on your site, as far as Google is concerned. 
  • ✔️ To encourage a complete site crawl, be sure that your home page (and all pages) contain a good site navigation system that links to all the important sections and pages on your site; this helps users (and Google) find their way around your site.

Google Search Console 

Google Search Console is a free service offered by Google that helps you monitor, maintain, and troubleshoot your site’s presence in Google Search results. You don’t have to sign up for Search Console to be included in Google Search results. Search Console helps you understand and improve how Google sees your site. 

If all your information is ready for new website visitors to check it out, let’s get you on Google Search Console! Click here.

Note that Google Search Console and Google Analytics are not the same. Your developer will install the codes to track your traffic and your digital marketing expert will help you decode what those numbers say. 

Step 4: Announce It On Your Social Network

Making and posting a website for Google to crawl so the internet can find you is only the first step. How do we bring in not only viewers, but active viewers? How can we ensure that those active viewers will turn into real sales opportunities? 

The short answer is: making sure your users are clear about the solution you provide for their needs.

Social media channels are a great to accomplish this goal.

Top Social Media Channels To Launch Your Website 

Your top social media channels will depend on your industry and audience, as you already know. Regardless, at the end of the day, your users want to have a human connection. Whether you like it or not, they will search for you! So we need to make sure they find you and have a great first impression! 

Let’s cut some corners!

Facebook Profile

I’m sure you know this already, but… just in case, your Facebook profile has the “About Me” section. Make sure you edit it and add your website. 

A pro tip: publish a life event!  Life events are great because all your friends receive a notification, so you get to hack the algorithm. Just don’t abuse! Here’s an example of mine.

Expand Your Facebook Network

There’s a good chance that until now, you’ve been using Facebook just to connect with intimate friends. So when you think of Facebook marketing, you think about those friends who can’t stop to share in social media about their products. Well, that’s not gonna be you!

First of all, you can adjust your Facebook settings and organize your Facebook friends by creating lists so your college friends don’t see your business posts!  

Using a list, you can post an update for specific people, like your coworkers or friends who live near you. You can also see updates from specific groups of people (example: close friends, family).

You can add or remove friends from these lists at any time. People won’t be notified when you add them to these lists.

Facebook Business Page

Facebook business pages are great to announce your business. It adds credibility and will for sure help you to reach new connections. That’s great! Complete the settings to have your business page, but don’t expect too much from it, unless you are using Facebook Ads.

Instagram Business Profile   

One of the current best social media platforms out there is Instagram. It’s growing and it won’t stop any time soon! 

How Can Instagram Help You Drive Traffic To Your New Website

A very short version of this complex Insta-world that can help you get it started! 

Where to start on Instagram?

Set up a business profile

This will allow you to see how many people click on your profile and the interactive communications with your viewers.

Make sure your new website is listed on your business profile.

Instagram is all visuals. Build a theme for your Instagram that makes users identifying what you do in less than 2 seconds.

Make sure you plan your visuals so you can meet the audience’s standards. 

Later app is a great tool that is easy to use! It can help you plan your feed in advance and can schedule posts in advance.

Search on Instagram for similar accounts that relate to yours.

This will be helpful to start with the platform. With time, you will notice you don’t need any inspiration anymore, as it will all come from you. Let’s go back to the example of the health coach. By simply typing health or fitness coach, thousands of pages will automatically pop up with the most popular and engaging at the top. Explore these accounts, those following them, and constantly commenting on them. Chances are engaging with these people will bring you new clients!

Remember what we explained in Step 2 (planning your campaign), you will use the content that you planned for this launching campaign.

Notice that brands use Instagram to announce their deals! So you will be doing the same. Build campaigns around your new website.

  • ✔️Share a new offer for new clients only.
  • ✔️Give away 
  • ✔️Collaborate with influencers

Share Your New Website News Via Instagram Stories 

Too many posts on their timeline isn’t pleasing to viewers, so a more effective option is Instagram stories. These allow you to make beautiful and creative posts without spamming the audience. 

The Catch With Instagram Stories

You can’t add website links until you have 10,000 followers or more.  

Can you buy Instagram followers? Yes you can. I wrote an article on how to buy Instagram followers. If Instagram is a great social media channel for you, this one will be a great read.

Step 5: Google My Business

Getting a local business listed on Google My Business (GMB) is one of the fastest and easiest ways to get a local business to start showing up for local search results on Google. Google My Business connects businesses directly with their customers — whether they’re searching on Google Search or Maps.

Most SEOs who work with local clients consider claiming their GMB listing the first step in their SEO strategy. Surprisingly, 56% of local businesses haven’t claimed their Google My Business listing, according to the Local Business Institute.

How To Get Started With Google My Business? Is This Free?

Yes, it’s a free service, which is the irony of this amazing tool. It costs nothing for you to list your business. You can use it, for example, to bring traffic to your blog. Now, to be transparent with you, the listing alone won’t just do magic and take your business to rank on the first page of Google maps or the Google search. 

For now, open your GMB listing. Google might ask you to confirm your physical location so it might take a few days. Claim your GMB listing here.  

A pro tip: optimize your listing for local SEO and get local search ranking using other tools like Google local guides and Google maps so you can have more advantages and visibility. 

Consider reading next: The 7 Key Local SEO Strategies To Improve Google My Business Rankings In 2019 

Now What?

I really hope you go back and follow these 5 steps. When you do, please report back to me! It really helps to know when I can help entrepreneurs like you with just an article. If you wanna chat, hit the connect icon here and you will find me!

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The 7 Key Local SEO Strategies To Improve Google My Business Rankings In 2019

If you’re wondering why your business isn’t bringing in new customers, look no further than your ranking on Google. It can be overwhelming with all the information on the Internet about ranking higher and optimizing your site so your customers can find you. From content creation, SEO (search engine optimization), backlinking, the list of ways to rank higher can feel endless and exhausting. 

As a business owner, you want to succeed, right? 

No one goes into business wanting to fail. It’s important to understand what percentage of small businesses fail–because many do actually succeed. You need to know the facts rather than listening to anyone out there trying to put fear in your mind and convince you to walk away from your dreams.

What Percentage of Small Businesses Fail? The most recent stats from Fundera show:

20% of small businesses fail in their first year

30% of small businesses fail in their second year

50% of small businesses fail after five years in business. 

Before you throw in the towel, you have to remember that many of the reasons why small businesses fail are in your control. For example, ineffective marketing is one of the top reasons why your business may not be getting the attention it needs in order to grow and prosper.

Your marketing is something that you have power over. 

If you don’t really understand HOW to market or WHO you’re marketing to, we’re here to help you. 

Google My Business: How It Works

According to Google, 50% of all the mobile consumers who search for a local business in a day visit it as well. Furthermore, 18% of them end up making a purchase.

GMB is a free tool that lets you manage how your business appears on Google Search and Maps. That includes adding your business name, location, and hours; monitoring and replying to customer reviews; adding photos; learning where and how people are searching for you, and more.

If you’re just getting started with local SEO, your Google My Business listing is a great place to focus your early efforts. After all, when people search for a product or service near them, they’re usually very close to making a purchase — one in two people who conduct a local search (think “watch repair near me”) visit a store that day. So it’s important the information about your business that shows up when people search Google is as accurate, complete, and optimized as possible.

Consider reading: 8 Strategies To Leverage Google Local Guides For SEO (After Google Plus Massive Fail).

Imagine that your exact customer or client has been searching endlessly for a specific product or service. Your business happens to be the solution. And just when they want to give up on trying to figure out which phrases to use to get the answer to their question on Google, YOUR business shows up first in their search results. 

How Does Your GMB Listing Looks Like In Local Results?

Your primary listing at Google that is editable in the GMB dashboard and publicly accessible at 3 locations:

Google Search (knowledge panel) 

Google Maps

Local Finder

Small businesses readily rely on consumers in their own backyards, as opposed to a national audience, to keep their doors open. So what are you doing to ensure everyone in a 25 mile radius knows you exist? If you’re not showing up in “near me” searches you’re likely missing out on a bevy of business and frankly, we’re not happy about it.

When people search using Chrome on their smartphones with an “emoji + near me,” you might be surprised by what they find:

How to optimize your Google My Business listing

You got it! Google knew that I was looking for a great burger joint around my home! 

This is the power of local SEO, also referred to as local search engine marketing. Google has revamped its tools to help local business owners show up effectively to promote and market their businesses online.

What is a “Near Me” Search?

Grab your phone and type in “running store” and you’ll see that Google tries to fill in the rest of the search with “near me”. They figure, whatever you’re searching for you’ll be happier with your search results if it suggests stores that aren’t clear across town from your current locale. Makes sense, right?

Why Should I Worry About Showing Up in “Near Me” Searches?

Think with Google recently reported that “76% of people who search for something nearby on their smartphone visit a related business within a day and 28% of those searches result in a purchase.” There’s also been a 500% increase in “near me” mobile searches that contain some variation of “can I buy” or “to buy” over the last two years. Source: Think With Google.  That’s pretty impressive.

If Google knows your business’ location and the user’s search query is requesting for nearby business’ this is precisely why you absolutely need to invest in local SEO marketing alongside standard SEO.

How To Rank Your Local Business In Google? 7 Strategies To Win Your Local Search Rankings 

There are specific strategies that you as a small business owner can implement after reading this article to start showing up in your Google local listings. 

Number One: Keyword Search (The Magic Starts There!) 

Before you put together your list of targeted keywords, you have to identify who your customers are and what they’re searching for online. After you’ve identified the personal traits of your customers, think about the ways in which they are searching for what you have to offer. This strategy will work when you carve out the time to put yourself in your customer’s shoes. 

You’ll also want to analyze your competitor’s winning keywords. Why? Because the whole point of SEO is to outrank your competitor’s search results. Once again, take the time to identify your competitors and how they rank for the keywords you’re targeting. 

A very simple way to verify your competitors ranking? Use your mobile and search for their services. Let’s say you have a cleaning business. Type “cleaning business near me” and see what comes up! By studying your local competitors using Google search, you will be able to have insights for your local SEO plan for your website.

It’s relatively easy to identify target keywords that will drive traffic to your Google My Business Listing. The key here is to identify the right keywords that will drive the right traffic to your business. There are many popular keywords tools to help with the local keyword search. We highly recommend semRUSH to create your local business keyword plan. 

Pro tip: If you own multiple locations, you can create a keyword plan considering local seo for each location. 

Number Two: Your Services Pages | Product Description Pages

When it comes to your products and services. Don’t be shy! This is an opportunity for your business to stand out using keywords that your target audience is typing into Google. You want your services to shine and be at the top of the query list.

A few things to keep in mind when writing out your services and product pages.

✔️ Focus on the benefits, not simply the features. You want to speak to the results that your customer is going to gain by working with your business. For instance, as a result of your services, will your customers save more money? Make more money? Get more leads? Then spell it out! 

✔️ Create rich, meaningful copy that speaks to your customers. Don’t be stingy with your words. Write detailed information about your services, the benefits, and how your customer can learn more. Remember, skimpy copy = no sale.

✔️ Make sure your website is mobile friendly.

Pro tip: Use your Google My Business Listing to share your products and services. 

Number Three: Frequently Asked Questions Page 

Many small businesses do not take the time to carefully map out their FAQ page. They think it’s a waste of time. However, FAQ content can provide answers to pertinent questions that your customers may have. It’s yet another opportunity to include SEO specific content, thereby increasing your ranking on Google.

Companies like Twitter, YouTube, McDonald’s all have very clean, simple FAQ pages that answer customers’ most commonly asked questions 

Think about it this way. A new customer is always going to have questions. Your FAQ page is a primary way to remove any barriers (lack of knowledge) that will prevent your customers from doing business with you. The page needs to be easy to read. 

When writing your content, remember to keep in mind that not everyone reads at the same level. This is where the Readability Score comes into play.

Factors such as sentence length, scalability, vocabulary, passive vs. active voice are all things that will either guide your customer to make a decision to work with you, or not.

Pro tip: Readability Score is a reliable plugin that you can use to check to determine what level a reader needs to be to understand your content. 

Number Four:  Videos 

Let’s say you’ve already spent a ton of money on strategizing, producing, and editing videos but it just isn’t getting ranked. What’s going on? 

Video SEO is not the same as standard SEO. If you want your videos to rank higher up the SERP (search engine results page) there are key factors to consider such as: 

  • ✔️Transcribing your video script
  • ✔️Making shorter videos 
  • ✔️Optimizing all video metadata such as titles, subtitles, description, and keywords
  • ✔️Creating high-quality thumbnails

Essentially, if you’ve invested time in producing videos for your business, optimize everything related to it as you would with your content on your website. 

Pro tip: use Google Local Guides to share photos and videos! You will activate the power of Google Maps! 

Number Five: Tags and Meta 

Meta tags are small pieces of text that describe a page’s content. The meta tags don’t appear on the page itself, but only in the page’s HTML. Meta tags make it easier for search engines to determine what your content is about, whether it’s relevant and rank it accordingly. Unfortunately, this is where most people fail in the Google local SEO.

Your Google My Business description is a great place to add your tags and meta.

What not to do?

If you’re promoting your pizza restaurant, it’s not like you will be able to write “best pizza in Austin pizza near me best deals to buy pizza order pizza 24 hrs coupons pizza”.   That will be keyword stuffing and will be completely opposite of the results you want!

Make sure you follow the guidelines. 

Business description guidelines (Google is telling you what to do!)

Published content should highlight what makes your business unique. You can use this field to provide useful information on services and products offered, as well as the mission and history of your business. 

This is your opportunity to stand out from the crowd! Don’t take it casually. Hire a copywriter if you need to.

More advice from Google: 

You should be upfront and honest about the information provided, focusing on content that is relevant and useful to your customers to understand your business. 

Content that’s irrelevant to your business or has no clear association with it isn’t allowed. Refer to our overall guidelines for representing your business on Google.

Content published in this field should not:

  • ✔️Be misleading to users. Do not provide inaccurate or false information about your business or the services and products offered.
  • ✔️Display low-quality, irrelevant, or distracting content. For example, misspellings, gimmicky character use, gibberish, etc. 
  • ✔️Focus on special promotions, prices, and offer sale. Examples of content not allowed include, “Everything on sale, -50%” and “Best bagels in town for $5!”
  • ✔️Display links. No links of any type are allowed.
  • ✔️Display offensive or inappropriate content:

The best way to highlight the importance of meta tags is to highlight the Google search process. 

When you search on Google you’ll be shown many results. But how do you pick? You pick based on the preview. The preview is written, not from your web page but from your meta description. This is a fundamental aspect of the optimization process. Always think about how can best promote your content so that people feel excited and curious to read it.

Number Six: Optimize Your Google Maps Search With Citations

A citation is simply a record of your NAP, which is your business name, address, and phone #, and in some instances your website URL as well.

Google uses citations as a way to validate your business location.  Think of citations as the equivalent of backlinks in organic SEO strategy.

The more authoritative and relevant the citation sources are to your business, the more punch that will give you in boosting your Google Maps rankings.

I also recommend going granular with your citations.

This means finding websites and directories that are either specific to your metro area or targeted to your specific business category.

For example, if I’m a divorce attorney in Austin, then publishing your law firm’s NAP on sources specific to metro Austin and divorce lawyers would help increase the relevance factor and improve your overall location authority.

And the more location authority you have in your business category, the higher you’ll rank in Google Maps.

How do you build location authority?

We think of location authority as synonymous to domain authority.

Domain authority is your ranking power in Google organic search results.

Whereas location authority is your ranking power in Google Maps or Google local search results.

Domain authority is built by doing things like acquiring high-quality backlinks to your domain name or key landing pages within your website.

Location authority is built by distributing your local business data – sometimes referred to as your NAP (business name, address, phone #, and website URL) or your location business citation – across the most authoritative local business directories and resources relative to your business category.

In other words, citation distribution is to location authority as backlinks are to domain authority.

If you want to rank higher in organic search results, you need to build more domain authority.

If you want to rank higher in Google Maps or Google local search results, you need to build more location authority.

Number Seven: Include City Pages in Your Main Navigation

City pages should be incorporated into your site’s navigational structure. For example, create an “Areas we serve” link in the main navigation on your homepage. Or in the “Contact Us” link, include sub-pages to each location.

What is a City Page? 😧

In simple terms, it’s all about opening a page inside your website with /city/.  City pages have been a common strategy to improve local SEO rankings. However, there’s a catch! Your page format! Vital Storm has a great template to format city pages!  It might be advanced but some of you, but here it is! 

Title Tag: keep under 60 characters; give every city page a unique title.

Meta Description: keep under 160 characters, write to encourage someone to click, and do NOT keyword stuff, but do try to use the keyword/city once in logical sentence.

Page Name: example.com/city/

Menu Title: [City]

Title Tag: [Main Service] (Ex: Air Conditioner Repair) + (in/for) [City, State] | [Company Name]

Meta Description: Since [year], [Company] has provided prompt and professional [service] to [City] area residents and business owners.

H1/H2: [City] [Service] (Ex: Expert New York Air Conditioner Repair)

Integrate city pages into your navigation

Integrate city pages into the website’s navigation (service area drop-down, footer navigation, somewhere).

Consider using call tracking and contact form tracking for each city page to help gauge their effectiveness. Consider adding city-specific coupons or special offers.

Do You Think You Need a Google Local SEO Expert? 

I get it. This is a lot to wrap your head around. SEO isn’t something that you’re supposed to know when you start a business. It may seem like a lot of work and headache for you, but for us, this is our zone of GENIUS and JOY.

In 45 days, you would be surprised at the results your business will achieve by working with our company. I help business owners just like you who are driven, passionate, and want to provide solutions to their customers.

It may seem like a far reach to rank #1 in Google. We can make it happen together. I would first need to audit your online presence and evaluate your current ranking, and then, set a clear SEO strategy in place.

Request a Free Assessment and let me see what you can’t see! 

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8 Strategies To Leverage Google Local Guides For SEO (After Google Plus Massive Fail)

Google Local Guides are our most popular request these days after Google+ is over.

Google’s official explanation to us is that the shutdown was due to a security breach. Maybe it was.

Google+ was a great component of local SEO strategy. When a Google+ user used their account to share pictures and links, Google would post those links and they would come up in search results within the next hour. This was important to promote business locations.

Marketers who use Google SEO for local business are now looking for other ways to spark those local SEO numbers.

What Is Google Local Guides (GLG)?

Local Guides is a global community of explorers who write reviews, share photos, answer questions, add or edit places, and check facts on Google Maps. Millions of people rely on contributions like yours to decide where to go and what to do.

How To Open Google Local Guides?

When you sign up as a GLG user, you are immediately at Level 1, even if you have no points. At this level, you will receive a monthly newsletter, can join workshops and hangouts, and have the chance to enter exclusive competitions.

Once you have gained five points, you move up to Level 2. This gives you the additional benefits of early access to new Google products and features, and the ability to promote meet-ups on the Local Guides calendar. Google also provides event organizers with resources, including name badges, stickers, and bingo cards.

To reach Level 3, you need 50 points. You will receive an official Local Guides badge, which will appear on the Google Maps app, and you will be able to connect to other Local Guides in Google+. You also have the chance to moderate Local Guides community channels, and may receive invites to events hosted by Google (depending on your city).

With 200 points, you arrive at Level 4. This gives you 1 terabyte of free storage for your Google Drive, and eligibility to be featured on the Local Guides online channels, including Google+, Facebook, and Twitter.

The final level is Level 5, for which you need 500 points. This is a new level — it did not exist when Local Guides was released. Users at Level 5 have the chance to test Google products before they are released to the public and receive invites to exclusive events. Last year, Level 5 members could attend the Google summit.

Local Business Owners Can Get Google Reviews

Research shows that 91 percent of people regularly or occasionally read online reviews, and 84 percent trust online reviews as much as a personal recommendation. And they make that decision quickly: 68 percent form an opinion after reading between one and six online reviews.

GLGs is integrated with users’ Google account, so it’s easy for users to leave reviews, contrary to other reviews platforms like Yelp.

Google Maps Play A Key Role On Local SEO

Google Maps is a useful tool for business owners and consumers alike. It not only helps users find businesses near them but also offers greater visibility for business owners.

Although Google Maps does feature ratings and reviews, traditionally most users would turn to Yelp for a better indication of the quality of a business. This is now beginning to change with GLG.

Can you boost your business with GLG?

If you are starting your business or you want to get more visibility, Google Local Guides will help.

1) Become a user of GLG and make sure your business is visible, listing your products and services clearly.

2) Add your business! Maybe a business just moved in down the street or switched addresses and haven’t gotten to updating their information online. Go ahead and help them by adding their address on Google Maps so it’s easier for people to find them. They’ll be notified and glad that you helped them!

3) Include your Google reviews link and as your customers to leave a review.

4) Don’t forget to update your Google My Business listing (GMB), especially with pictures and opening hours.

5) Put yourself in the users’ shoes!

When you want to find a new restaurant or a reputable auto mechanic, where do you turn to? For most people, that’s Google. Google Search and Maps have become so ingrained in our way of life that to do anything else feels unnatural.

You are not the only one who search Google your service providers. Your potential customers do it too.

97% of people research local businesses online before reaching out to them. That is a big number!

6) Review other businesses, especially those who can be referral partners

When you review other businesses around you, it increases your own online visibility. Each business you recommend will be notified of the review. Then when they go online to search for a local contractor to repair their roof, replace their windows or a host of other home improvement projects they need to tackle on their own home, they’ll recognize your name.

7) Answer questions. You can share helpful information about places you’ve visited by answering easy questions that people are asking online. Go ahead and search for your own business and answer any questions that people have asked.

The best part about Google’s Local Guides program is that Google won’t publish any edit suggestions without your knowledge. As a business, you’re able to verify information that people have submitted about your GMB listing prior to it being published on Google Maps.

8) Users normally search for “best ____ near me”. Some SEO experts recommend adding “near me” on your URL, for more visibility.

Will You Open Your GLG Today?

I hope you do! If you happen to find our business, Marketing For Greatness, make sure you leave us a review!