How To Create Local Landing Pages That Rank (2023 Guide)

Updated
Written by Dalton Luka

A local landing page is a web page that’s created and optimized to generate visibility and traffic in a target locality. For local businesses, this is generally a physical location or service area that targets a specific keyword. This includes the website that is linked to from your Google My Business listing (now called Google Business Profile).

Use this local landing page guide to improve on-page SEO and increase rankings for local searches.

Follow this checklist and examples to optimize on-page SEO for local landing pages:

Pro Tip: To determine which local landing pages to create, use this keyword research template to identify valuable keywords for your business.

Page URL

Google uses on-page signals such as the URL to rank webpages.

Include the target keyword and/or location in the page’s URL (ultimately, what to include will depend on the niche).

Example for a plumber with several locations in Arizona:

✔️ example.com/phoenix/

✔️ example.com/phoenix-plumber/

❌ example.com/plumber-plumbing-company-in-phoenix-arizona/

Note: For many local businesses, this will be the website’s homepage and URL modifications will not apply.

Title Tag

Another on-page signal is the page’s title tag.

An example of an SEO title tag on a local landing page

This should include the target keyword (or variation) and the target locality. Also, the title tag of the page should be under 60 characters in length.

Example:

✔️ Phoenix Plumbers - 24/7 Services - Master Flow Plumbing

❌ Plumber Phoenix AZ - Best Plumbing Company & Plumbing Services

Pro Tip: Use this guide on title tags for Local SEO to get more insights and information about title tags including what they are, how to use them, and case study findings.

Meta description

Although the meta description itself isn’t a notable ranking signal. However, click-through rate is a strong ranking signal and is impacted by the web page’s meta description.

An example of an SEO meta description on a local landing page

The local landing page’s meta description should include the target keyword or variation in addition to the target location. The character length should be less than 160 characters (see complete meta description guide & checklist).

Example:

✔️ Master Flow Plumbing of Phoenix provides professional residential and commercial plumbing installation and service 24/7.

❌ As a Phoenix plumber, our residential and commercial plumbing company is available 24/7 for emergency plumbing installations & repairs, water heater installations, and drain cleaning services.

Pro Tip: The local landing page should contain unique and localized content that is focused on a specific service category or subcategory.

H1 and heading tags

A local landing page should also have an optimized h1 tag. This should include the target keyword or variation and not include excessive keywords.

Example:

✔️ Phoenix Plumbers - 24/7 Services

❌ Phoenix, AZ Plumber & Best Plumbing Company

Related terms may also be included in other headings such as H2 and H3 tags

Pro Tip: In addition to on-page SEO, there are dozens of other ranking factors outlined in this Local SEO checklist that can also help generate more visibility, traffic, and customers for your local business.

Intro content (first 100 words)

Keyword prominence is a ranking factor, meaning that the target keyword should appear in prominent locations of the web page or local landing page In addition to the URL, title, and h1 of the page, this should also be applied to the first paragraph (within the first 100 words) of the page.

Example:

✔️ Master Flow Plumbing of Phoenix provides professional residential and commercial plumbing installation and service 24/7.

❌ As a Phoenix plumber, our residential and commercial plumbing company is available 24/7 for emergency plumbing installations & repairs, water heater installations, and drain cleaning services.

Pro Tip: I strongly recommend including the intro content in the page’s viewport if possible.

This should match or be VERY similar to the page’s meta description.

General content guidelines

Outside of the intro being highly relevant to the query, the rest of the page should sufficiently cover the topic. Depending on your niche and target keyword(s), this will vary.

Follow these general guidelines to create content for local landing pages:

  • Accurately describe the local service / product
  • Showcase the product or service with quality images
  • Include relevant reviews or customer testimonials
  • Incentivize action with appealing calls-to-action and / or offers
  • Add a frequently asked questions (FAQ) section
  • Link to other relevant pages (such as related services or FAQ pages)

Pro Tip: Get content ideas for each page by performing a SERP analysis for each target keyword. You can organize your findings and notes in a word document, spreadsheet, or content outline to hand off to a writer to create the content with Surfer SEO.

Relevant images

As media consumption has risen over the last decade, it has also become more correlated with ranking factors, making image optimization a key element for any Local SEO strategy. To ensure your local landing page is optimized, include at least one unique JPG image with the relevant keyword and location in the file name and alt text.

Example:

✔️ <img src="/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/master-flow-plumbing-phoenix.jpg" alt="The plumbing technicians at Master Flow Plumbing in Phoenix" >

❌ <img src="/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/phoenix-plumbing-company-plumbers.png" alt="Phoenix plumber" >

Pro Tip: This image should also be used as the og:image meta property and image for open graph social sharing.

Additionally, your local landing page should feature your Google My Business logo and cover photo (or similar image).

NAP & business hours

Include the business name, address, phone number, and business hours of the location on the local landing page. This information should be included in the main content, footer, or both, depending on the number of physical locations.

Pro Tip: It’s also important for NAP info to be consistent when it comes to off-page SEO. This means ensuring correct NAP info on social profiles, and other local profiles and citations like Bing, Apple Maps, and Yelp – this can all be automated with a NAP audit.

GMB / Maps embed

The local landing page that represents the primary business category (see full Google My Business category list) should also include an embedded Google map.

Here’s how to embed a Google Map:

  1. Perform a Google Search for your business
  2. Use the Google Maps element
  3. Click the Share button
  4. Choose the Embed a map option
  5. Select Copy HTML
  6. Embed this HTML on the local landing page
An example of a Google Maps embed

GMB Reviews

The local landing page should also include reviews that are local and keyword-specific.

Example:

✔️ Mike with Master Flow Plumbing was the best. He helped us with a new installation, and was completely transparent with the whole process. - Andy G.

❌ Would highly recommend!

Social media profiles

On average, social signals carry less weight than on-page and Google My Business, and review signals, they shouldn’t be overlooked.

Your brand should have all relevant social media profiles created, optimized, and linked to from relevant local landing pages. This helps search engines like Google to add social media profiles to your Google My Business Listing.

For most businesses, this will include the following profiles:

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • YouTube

Having your business established on each of these platforms can help increase trust signals and create a set of foundational social media links to your website.

Surfer SEO score

One of the most important factors for local landing pages is that their overall on-page score is competitive when compared to top ranking pages in Google search.

Surfer SEO provides a data-driven on-page SEO score for how your local landing page stacks up when compared to local competitors.

Here’s how to get your on-page SEO score:

Surfer's content score and guidelines

Pro Tip: For most niches and local landing pages, a Surfer Score of 70 will be sufficient. Additionally, be sure that niche and general directories like Yelp! are excluded from your analysis.

LocalBusiness Schema

Once your on-page has been optimized with Surfer, add Local Schema Markup to the page.

Example:

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "http://schema.org",
  "@type": "Plumber",
  "name": "The Fang Law Firm",
  "url":"https://masterflowplumbing.com/phoenix/",
  "description": "Master Flow Plumbing of Phoenix provides professional residential and commercial plumbing installation and service 24/7.",
  "logo" : "https://masterflowplumbing.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/master-flow-plumbing-logo.jpg",
  "image" : "https://masterflowplumbing.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/master-flow-plumbing-phoenix.jpg",
  "telephone": " (123) 456-7891",
  "priceRange": " Free Estimate",
  "openingHours" : "Mon - Sunday: Open 24 Hours",
  "hasMap": "https://goo.gl/maps/abdcedefghijklulz",
  "address":
    {
      "@type": "PostalAddress",
      "streetAddress": "1234 Street Name",
      "addressLocality": "Phoenix",
      "addressRegion": "AZ",
      "postalCode": "85020",
      "addressCountry": "USA"
    },
  "sameAs":[
  "https://www.linkedin.com/company/master-flow-plumbing/",
  "https://twitter.com/master-flow-plumbing",
  "https://www.facebook.com/master-flow-plumbing/"
  ]
}
</script>
Error free schema markup

After LocalBusiness Schema has been added to your local landing page, it’s important to test that it’s working by using Schema’s Structured Data Testing Tool (SDTT).

Mobile friendly

Since the majority of local searches are performed via a mobile device, it’s important to make sure that your local landing pages are mobile friendly.

Here’s how:

  1. Head over to Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test tool
  2. Enter the URL of your local landing page

If your local landing page is mobile friendly, you should see this result…

Google's mobile-friendly test

If your page is not mobile friendly, it suggests that there may be an issue with your website’s theme, and SEO web design may be needed.

Indexation

Once updates and optimizations for your local landing page are completed, submit it for indexation via Google Search Console.

Google Search Console indexation request

Afterwards, be sure to analyze the impact of optimizations.

Pro Tip: To ensure your local landing pages get indexed, include at least 2-3 internal links to them and include the page in your XML sitemap.

Local Landing Page Examples

Let’s take a look at some good (and not so good) examples of local landing pages…

Here’s a good example of a local landing page…

A good example of a local landing page

Here’s why it works:

✔️ Includes noticeable CTAs

✔️ Has a link to specials / offers

✔️ Includes target keywords in prominent places

✔️ Page is responsive across all devices

✔️ Links to other relevant location pages in surrounding areas (not pictured)

✔️ Features social proofing with customer reviews & completed projects (not pictured)

As a result, this page ranks quite highly in search for its target keywords.

Here’s a not so good example of a local landing page…

A bad example of a local landing page

Here’s why it doesn’t work:

❌ Features extremely large image in viewport

❌ Page has an overall poor heading structure

❌ Most prominent CTA is hiring-related and not customer-centric

❌ Overall inconsistent branding with an unsettling color palette

❌ Does not showcase customer reviews

As a result of these mistakes, this page ranks quite poorly in search results.

With this guide and local landing page checklist, you should be able to effectively create and optimize any local business landing page and improve rankings for local searches.

Happy SEO-ing 🙂

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