Local SEO in Major Cities

[seaniaaa]

Hello all. So, I've noticed that in large metro areas that a a business with low review count and traffic ranks very poorly for citywide searches like "business law attorney houston tx" in local pack/finder results. But they rank much better for searches that target the neighborhood or city region that they are in. Should those businesses adjust the on-page SEO geotargeting to point to the name of the neighborhood or region they are in instead of the city as a whole? Or should they stick with the major city in hopes that overall ranking will grow over time?

 

[seaniaaa]

Ex. Should a business in Houston, who ranks well for searches for Southeast Houston, adjust H1 and other on-page SEO data points to Southeast Houston?

 

[JoyHawkins]

Optimizing for Southeast Houston should also optimize you for Houston so I don't see why not. I would always go for the big city though because it will get way more search volume.

 

[seaniaaa]

Optimizing for Southeast Houston should also optimize you for Houston so I don't see why not. I would always go for the big city though because it will get way more search volume.

Thanks for the feedback! Part of the consideration for our clients is drive time. They often provide in-person services, so I think that maximizing ranking within a certain radius might be beneficial compared to ranking 45 minutes out in order to maximize conversion. It's been my experience that our target users tend to be less likely to travel further in metro areas. Unless of course the client has an exemplary GBP and overall rep that's attractive enough to pull people from all over. But, like you said, on this one it works for both more targeted searches and citywide.

 

[cfazio]

For my industry, it is highly competitive (in regard to the number of competitor listings - nearly one on every corner) - so we always go for the hyperlocal neighborhood/city region.

For example, we have a client in the "energy corridor" of Houston. We optimize for the long tail of "energy corridor + houston tx" to capitalize on the lower difficulty lower volume kws that are energy corridor specific (surprisingly that gets a ton of searches), and it still lets us work at the short tail "houston" variations over time.

Depending on your industry, if you don't have thousands of competitors in Houston, you may be on the outskirts of town and still rank well for "____ houston tx" and related keywords.

 

[cfazio]

So yes, what Joy said but with a picture lol.