Before I get deep into local SEO and how to do it, I want to share three really important lessons that have shaped my perspective.
I think it’s these lesson, the “how to think about business” that are really important drivers of success in local SEO. Without these core principles, it’s easy to get lost doing a lot of work that doesn’t really matter.
Here are the three most important lessons that I live my local SEO life by.
#1 — Be An Engineer, Not An Inventor
I don’t play baseball, but I think the primary foundation of local SEO is best represented by this baseball analogy.
Say you’re an outfielder, and you’re job is to catch the ball.
When the ball is hit, and it’s up in the air, you don’t have any control over the ball. You have no control how hard it was hit, and what angle, where it’s going, or where it lands.
And no matter how much “effort” you put in, you’re not going to change the trajectory of that ball.
What you DO control is where you run to and where you put your glove. And if your goal is to catch the ball—then you have to adjust to the ball, not the other way around.
This is exactly how local SEO works. You don’t choose what people are already doing or the searches they are making on Google.
Your job is not to invent anything. You’re not here to guess what people want or need.
This is one of my favorite quotes, it comes from a multi-millionaire magazine owner:
“I’m not rich enough to guess.”
The same applies here with local SEO.
The rule is: “Do not engineer, reverse engineer.”
The job here is not to guess, but take the primary ranking factors for local SEO, combine that with keyword research and other data points, and let it show you what to do—which is the bases for my “October Method” for ranking businesses.
Just like the baseball analogy, customers are already searching for specific services in a specific way.
Your job is to position your business, aka your glove, in a way to capture those customers.
#2 — Theory Of Relativity
I’m not even close to Einstein’s level, but this is my theory of relativity—related to local SEO.
And it works!
The rule is, “Everything is always relative.”
Often business owners and SEOs ask, “How much will it cost me to rank?”
Well, taking this to the COST of ranking is nearly impossible.
However, if you want to get a general idea of what needs to happen in order to rank a business locally, then it all starts with understanding the competition.
If you tell a plumber in Dallas doing local SEO with zero reviews you can get him ranking in a few weeks for a couple hundred dollars, he’s going to be sorely disappointed.
But on the other hand, if you charge $5,000 dollars to a plumber who just founded his own city of “Chirpy, Nevada” in the middle of nowhere—well, so sorry, but, he didn’t need you. He has no competition!
The first question before ever getting into any kind of local SEO conversation is, “What’s the competition doing?”
Only then can you really get a handle on what needs to happen next.
#3 — Measurable And Trackable
Lastly, what most local SEOs miss is this:
“Everything must be measurable and trackable.”
For a business, what matters the most is revenue.
But there are so many other elements that can be tracked and measured.
On the other hand, avoid anything that cannot be tracked and measured.
That’s where people get lost.
- Rankings = Trackable and Measurable
- Leads = Trackable and Measurable
- Estimates = Trackable and Measurable
- Sales = Trackable and Measurable
- Revenue = Trackable and Measurable
At the end of the day, everything has to be tracked and measured for SEO to be effective.
As much as so many people hate this, business is accounting.
The best business owners are accountants—not literally, but in how they think about everything.
That’s why tracking so important.
But if it’s not measurable, you can’t track it.
If you want good local SEO results, you need to understand what you’re paying for and whether or not it’s working.
Always have revenue-focused targets with accountability markers along the way so you can safeguard your invested dollars—hard earned dollars that you could have put into the bank.
Track and measure the outcomes so your hard earned dollars produce growth and help your business grow.
Use These 3 Rules
These are the three the primary lessons I have learned from my 20-years of local SEO experience and as the founder and operator of Brightbeam SEO: Local Search Experts, and I try to keep them in mind.
They are what separates those who succeed from those who fail. Because it’s not about how much work you do, it’s about results.
Now, let’s move on to the last important introductory lesson in this ultimate local SEO guide: