For those who want a quick introduction to who I am and the overall purpose of this local SEO guide, well…
Welcome to the wonderful world of local SEO. I’m Joshua Thompson—a local SEO based in Boise, Idaho.
I’ve been doing SEO for about 20 years—with the last 5 years spent specifically on local and home service company SEO through my own agency—Brightbeam SEO—based in Boise, Idaho.
How I Started in SEO
I got into SEO when while running my own addiction clinic. This is my gripe with most SEO agencies is that they are created to excel at sales, not at SEO.
Over and over the same experience, talk to someone, get excited, sign a contract, send in the first payment, get transferred to a completely different team, find out the person I was talking to is just a salesman, go through a month of “onboarding,” complete silence, months of wondering what’s happening, get frustrated, wait till the contract runs out, cancel—then wait three months for the wound to heal just to do it all over again.
There are so many things about this I hate. So, after selling the clinic years ago, I started my own SEO agency and vowed to do things differently. Now, I spend my days testing SEO strategies and completely immersing myself in local SEO. That’s why I have such a high success rate.
This Local SEO Guide
That’s where this local SEO guide stems from. It has one purpose: to help you gain a deeper understanding of local SEO and what works to move the needle for your local business.
Through this, you’re going to get a better idea of how I think, and why I have a cost/revenue first approach to everything I do.
That means not only understanding what works, but what doesn’t work—or what doesn’t work consistently.
Remember, local SEO is not easier than traditional SEO, in fact, it’s much harder—because you have to understand two algorithms (Maps and Search) not just one.
Investor Mindset
I come from a household of investors, and one important concept that always stood out to me is “opportunity cost”—meaning you can only do one thing with your dollar, never two things.
You can buy a candy bar or put your dollar in the bank, but you can’t do both.
That’s the same way I approach local SEO in my local city of Boise, or anywhere in the USA is that same. The 80/20 rule, right? If 80% of your success comes from 20% of your actions, how do you figure out what that 20% is and do more of that?
And in local SEO, you can’t do both. It’s too time consuming and expensive. It’s not like you can say, “I want to 100%” without spending massive amounts of money.
But most local SEO agencies and businesses focus on the 20%—perfecting schema, website speed, and other tasks that are important, but quickly offer diminishing returns.
If you do an hour of work on a website, or spend a few dollars on a blog post, or donate to a local charity to get a backlink—that’s it, it’s been spent, and you can’t do anything else with that hour or with that dollar.
So it’s important to figure out what the best use of that time is.
Being Wrong = Being Right
Now let me say this, first.
I have been wrong, a lot.
I want to be wrong, if it means it helps me get closer to being right. In fact, I am constantly testing different approaches to local SEO to see what works and what doesn’t—so I’m bound to be wrong a lot, while figuring out what works.
The majority of this local SEO guide stems from me being wrong years ago, being against the grain, and then testing and finding solid proof of what works and what doesn’t.
This game is serious, and I take it seriously. Make no mistake, people’s businesses can make or break their lives, and any marketer should keep that heavy burden wrapped around their neck like an albatross.
I am obsessed with local SEO. I love doing it, and I’m really happy that I GET to do it most every day of my life.
And I like helping people. If I can in some way help more local businesses or even other local SEOs do better, that’s a win for me.
I like to keep my mental state residing in the land of abundance.
With that, let’s get deeper into this local SEO guide by learning about: