Hiring a Local SEO Expert: Everything You Need To Know To Make the Right Choice

Hiring a local SEO expert can greatly benefit your business by improving your online visibility and attracting more local customers, especially if you run an online business and physical office or store together. When offering specific services to a particular location, it’s important to run an SEO strategy alone or simply hire a local SEO expert to handle the challenges you face. 

Theoretically, publishing the phone number and address of your physical location works fine enough to appear on Google Maps results and featured local ranks. Still, if you want to beat the competitors and prove worth for the local target audience, you need to invest in localized optimization, grabbing the traffic, attention, and surely, the trust. 

But how to find the right expert in local search engine optimization? What to look for? What qualities to consider? What to expect? When is the best time to start with local SEO? How much time does it take to “work” and rank you locally? We’re covering everything you need to know to make the right decision. 

1. Understanding of Local SEO

Local SEO is different from so-called international SEO. Instead of targeting a wider audience, you’re focused on a group of people with similar interests, history, backgrounds, traditions, and culture. That’s why you need to find someone who understands this aspect but also:

• Knowledge of Local Search Algorithms: Ensure the expert understands how local search algorithms work and what it takes to show up in the “near me” or specific location results.
• Local Keywords: They should be adept at identifying and using relevant local keywords. That way, a business ranks for relevant queries on local results.
• Google My Business (GMB): Familiarity with optimizing GMB profiles is crucial to setting the strategy and accomplishing the desired results.

Still, it doesn’t end with these three elements. The best local SEO expert will navigate a local competition analysis, discovering opportunities for quick wins and filling up some industry gaps.

2. Experience and Track Record

Experience is essential in running a successful local SEO campaign. Whether you hire an agency or a freelancer to handle the strategy, ask for:

• Portfolio: Ask for case studies or examples of previous local SEO campaigns they’ve managed.
• References: Request references from past clients to gauge their satisfaction and the results achieved.
• Reviews and Testimonials: They’ll probably have them public on their website or online portfolio.

Why would you need it? While it doesn’t always mean an experienced SEO expert will deliver guaranteed results, the proven track record enhances the trust between involved parties. Remember, each business is different and has unique aspects, but proven experience helps you trust the process until the first successful results.

3. Assess the Services Offered by the Local SEO Expert

Schedule a meeting with the preferred agency or individual and openly discuss the aspects you want covered. Ask them what services they offer, and negotiate the cost depending on how long you’ll collaborate together. If this is your first online business and you don’t know much about any kind of SEO, we’re here to guide you through the points you need to address during these meetings:

• Local On-page SEO: Optimization of your website’s content and structure, which also includes mapping localized keyphrases and queries through the pages’ copies. .
• Off-page SEO: Building backlinks and managing online reviews. True experts know how to attract or find natural opportunities for backlinks or brand mentions and track the performance.
• Technical SEO: Resolving a website’s technical problems is a must, no matter what areas you cover. Ensuring your website is fast, mobile-friendly, and easy to navigate is a priority for each business, whether they operate locally or not. 
• Local Listings Management: Consistency across local directories and citation building is another task the hired local SEO expert should handle. It ensures exposure and online presence, especially when potential customers research similar businesses around.

Additionally, they may cover aspects like content writing, guest post writing, blog management, social media profile maintenance, or even sending newsletters to enhance the local SEO and marketing game.

4. What Tools and Techniques The Local SEO Expert Uses

These days, it’s almost impossible to run an SEO campaign without appropriate tools like Ahrefs, Semrush, SE Ranking, Screaming Frog, etc. These tools set some benchmarks to follow when deciding what to do next. Also, they’re great at tracking the KPI progress as more actions are taken on your website. So, remember this:

• Talk About the SEO Tools: Check which tools they use for keyword research, analytics, and monitoring. Suggest some tools you find appropriate for your business. Or, you can let the expert do their magic using the preferred toolset.
• Discuss the Techniques: Understand their approach to both on-page and off-page SEO. Talk about the processes of keyword research, website audit, content planning and publishing, off-page activities, etc. Even if you’re not proficient in SEO, they should explain the steps in the simplest terms so everyone can understand what’s happening. 

Remember that with no tools or procedures, the strategy doesn’t have KPIs to aim for. While it’s quite possible to reach some nice results, the local SEO requires quality and consistency only the right experts can provide. 

5. Understanding of Your Industry

Talk openly to the potential SEO hires, to estimate their knowledge in your industry. For example, if you offer online and offline law consultations, the SEO expert should be familiar with the matter, so they can plan the strategy accordingly. So, what to check on?

• Industry Knowledge: An expert familiar with your industry can tailor strategies more effectively. They can learn more as time goes by, but ensure that they know your industry or that you have enough resources to educate them initially. 
• Local Market Insight: They should understand your local market and competition, too. It gives a competitive advantage, letting the experts get more and more familiar with your products or services. 

This aspect is very important, because the lack of understanding may lead to targeting wrong keywords or reaching out to a broader audience that won’t appreciate your value. 

6. Communication and Reporting

A SEO expert must be open to communicate and elaborate on their processes, approaches, and decisions. They need to turn the technical jargon into understandable language everyone can grasp on. Not every client is familiar with alt tags, GMB profiles, or similar terms. Try to explain it during the meetings and when reporting on the progress.

• Regular Updates: They should provide regular reports on progress and results. Schedule weekly or monthly meetings to discuss progress and adapt the strategy if needed. 
• Transparent Communication: Clear explanation of strategies and results without jargon. Great local SEO experts will explain each step, without using complex expressions, so the client knows what’s happening, maintaining trust.

Communication is a crucial part of each collaboration, so focus on being transparent and regularly report on the progress, or the issues that arise.

7. Budget and Pricing

Prices are often the main factor in making decisions about whether to hire a local SEO expert or try to figure out the strategy yourself. Since you’re here, you probably need to hire an individual or a whole agency to help you with the business. 

• Cost Structure: Understand their pricing model (hourly, monthly retainer, project-based) to easily make the right choice. Negotiate some terms to get the most out of the collaboration.
• Return on Investment (ROI): Consider the potential ROI when evaluating their fees. If the strategy brings more local clients and office or store visits, the investment pays off in the early implementation stages.

Yes, the local SEO expert’s price and your budget must sync in order to make the whole strategy work. Also, you have complete control over your expenses, so choose wisely and make sure you can trust the offer, too. 

8. Considering the SEO Ethical Practices

SEO is not an exact science, as it’s based on experimenting, testing, adapting, and trying even harder to deliver the best quality strategy to the client. So, avoiding spam backlinks, PBNs, keyword stuffing, and low-quality content is the first thing that a great local SEO expert does. All the unethical practices may bring quicker results, but they’re not worth the penalties and deindexing you risk to face. So, look for an expert who can deliver:

• White-hat SEO: Ensure they use ethical, white-hat SEO techniques to avoid penalties from search engines. Delivering quality over quick results is an SEO priority
• Transparency: They should be transparent about their methods and strategies. Hire a local SEO expert who can easily explain the steps they take to position your local brand appropriately.
• Value-oriented: Number one ranks don’t mean a lot out of context. So, make sure the expert you work with understands the value you offer so they can bring it closer to your target audience. 

9. Customized Strategy and Approach

Each business is different, even in the same industry. For example, if you have local competitors who offer custom-printed clothing, the same as you – you’re still different. Your styles and messages are different, the target audience, and even the very product is apart from each other. So, recognizing the value and potential is essential in delivering value and results. 

A tailored approach ensures the local SEO expert understands your goals to attract customers to your physical stores and even sell printed clothing online. They should offer a customized strategy tailored to your specific business needs and goals. Even if they worked with a similar business, it doesn’t mean the same strategy will work perfectly.

So, consider a red flag if they say, “Yes, I’ve worked with a similar business, I can nail this,” without a prior audit. A true SEO expert will review your website, analyze the competition, consider all the business aspects, and come up with the best-tailored approach matching your company.

10. Questions to Ask Potential Local SEO Experts

Let’s say you’re already interviewing local SEO experts, and you need to narrow your search to a few of them. While the above tips are golden, here are some questions to ask them that will help you make the best decision:

By considering these factors and asking the right questions, you can find a local SEO expert who will effectively improve your local online presence and drive more targeted traffic to your business.

Final Words on Hiring a Local SEO Expert

While keyword targeting is similar to the so-called global SEO, local SEO also requires understanding in culture, tradition, language, and local values, so the business resonates with the audience. Optimizing the Google Business profile and getting into the local listings is just the beginning, as it only places you on the map for local searches. 

Researching the local market, the people’s demands and pains, and the ways to promote the product or service, make the local SEO expert suitable for the hire. So, take your time to coordinate the collaboration, but even more important, be patient with experts’ recommendations. That’s the best way to position your business locally in a long run, instead of grabbing instant result chances that won’t deliver ongoing value.