Optimizing Local Landing Pages for Search: 8 Best Practices

For businesses with physical locations, creating landing pages for your city or town is a great way to increase local visibility.

Local landing pages show your potential customers and Google where your physical locations are, the specific areas you serve, and the products or services you offer.

The content on these pages may include relevant information about the specific city or town you are targeting and the business keywords you are trying to rank for.

Location pages can also be used as a Google Business Profile URL or as a PPC ad, email, and even online directory landing pages.

While local landing pages help build trust and authority for your business in the communities you serve.

Let’s talk about some best practices and tips for properly optimizing local landing pages.

1. Avoid duplicate content

Gone are the days when you can use the same content on multiple local landing pages.

With Google SpamBrain and the Useful Content Update, every page must have unique and truly useful content. You can’t change the name of the city or some pictures and then say ok.

As Google’s John Mueller pointed out, these local landing pages with duplicate content can be considered gateway pages, which are against Google’s guidelines.

For example, an H1 like “Best Plumber in Chicago, IL” will be read as a big red flag to Google.

This is especially true if you have other pages with exactly the same content with the word “Chicago” changed to the cities of Evanston, Naperville, Oak Park, etc.

A more useful H1 would be:

“Own a business in Omaha? Then you need an accountant you can trust”

These pages aren’t just because you’re trying to rank higher on Google for your keywords and city name.

If you don’t take the time to create worthwhile content, those pages aren’t worth creating in the first place.

You must bring value on the location page – something the end user will find helpful and useful. (If you do, Google will reward you.)

To begin, let’s look at an example. The lawn care company below included a handy lawn mowing calculator on their local page specifically for the Houston, TX area.

Since estimates likely vary by city and location, this is helpful.

They also included content on the page that specifically explained their services for Houston and the surrounding area and discussed how their quote system works.

Content like this is beneficial to people in the Houston area because they get accurate quotes for their location.

2. Don’t spam your content

Keyword stuffing has been a no-no for a long time, but you still see it in action, especially on poorly designed local pages.

Don’t overuse keywords on your local page. If you use keywords in your H1 like “Best Lawyer” or “Los Angeles Landscaper” it screams spam.

When combined with keyword-stuffed content, it’s a recipe for Google’s SpamBrain and a useful content update to penalize your entire site as “not useful.”

You don’t need to stuff your page with keywords for Google to know what your page is about. He’s smart enough to figure it out with just a few subtle hints.

3. Optimize URLs and images

Make sure you use SEO best practices with your URLs.

When possible, keep URLs as short as possible. But if you can include the product or service i the city, do it.

Maintain proper URL structure and use hyphens to separate words. No funny characters, underscores, squiggly lines or question marks.

Also make sure your images are SEO friendly. Don’t just upload photos with the filename from your camera or smartphone.

Rename each one to meaningfully describe what’s in the image and include the city name (if applicable). Again, use hyphens to separate words.

For example, before uploading a picture of a bathroom remodel you did in Oklahoma City, you might rename it to “bathroom-remodel-oklahoma-city.png.”

Also remember to add alt tags to your photos when you upload them to your landing page.

Use the keywords you’re trying to rank for and the city name, but make sure you’re actually describing the image. (That’s the purpose of the alt tag, after all.)

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4. Enter location-specific information about your business

It is best if you can write details on your local page related to your business. This will sound natural and provide useful information to the reader, which Google will recognize as useful.

One way to do this is to add “Before” and “After” images optimized for keywords and the city name.

The screenshot below is from the local page of a food service company targeting Evanston, IL.

Although they included before and after photos, they failed to mention that these photos were taken at homes in the said area, a missed opportunity.

They could have used an H2 titled “Before and After Flood Cleanup in Evanston, IL” above the images.

Another way to work your content naturally into a local landing page is to talk about the community’s story or how the community needs your particular service.

In the example below, the plumbing company shares the history of the city and how the city was annexed even before gas and sewer lines were needed in homes. Strategically created an anchor text link on your gas line and sewer services page.

In real estate, city pages can highlight area schools, popular restaurants, shopping centers, and grocery stores, among others. Let potential home buyers know what local cities and towns have to offer.

Alternatively, you can use case studies or working examples to include city names on your local pages.

This architecture office shows the work they have done in different towns and cities.

What a beautiful way to showcase your architectural designs and include the names of the cities on your various pages.

Local landing pages don’t have to be boring. Use your creativity when writing content specific to your city.

Learn how to use your targeted keywords and city names naturally.

5. Take original photos of the town

Tour the towns or cities you’re writing about and take your own photos. It could be the town square, parks, Chamber of Commerce, local entertainment, restaurants, schools.

Original images show that you are part of the community rather than using some stock photos. Again, be sure and optimize these photos for search purposes.

6. Highlight the charities and local organizations you support

Everyone likes companies that support the communities where they work and live.

If you support local charities or organizations in the areas you serve, you should mention them on your city-specific pages.

For example, it doesn’t cost much to supply a local animal shelter with 20 bags of cat or dog food every month (and you’d be doing something great).

Just contact the shelter and tell them what you will commit to giving monthly and ask if you can include their logo and information about their organization on your local page.

Also, ask if they should include your company logo on their website and a link to your local landing page as a simple thank you for the donation. Many charities are willing to do this.

Do you like sports and children? How about sponsoring uniforms for a youth football or baseball team? Add your logo to their uniforms and supplement the cost of the uniforms.

Again, include the team logo or team information on your local landing page and see if the sports organization will add you as a sponsor on their website and link to your local city page .

Not only are you showing website visitors that you’re supporting the city, but you’re getting valuable, quality backlinks in the process.

7. Include logos and details about local professional organizations you belong to

Showcase what you’re doing locally, whether it’s your local Chamber of Commerce, your city’s SCORE chapter, or your local newspaper or community business website.

Whenever possible, see if you can get an inbound link.

8. Include your address and embed Google Maps

If you have a physical location in town, be sure to put your address and phone number on the landing page.

Embedding a Google map is also useful. This way, customers can easily get directions to your location.

If you embed the Google Map correctly, the map can also display reviews for your brand and your Google Business Profile.

If you have a service area business, you can also benefit from a Google Map. To insert a Google Map service area, simply search for your Google Business Profile on Google Maps.