Local Service Ads

[Wirenut]

I have a question about Local Service Ads and you SEO professionals. Are you able to get involved with LSA for customers? I ask because the customer themselves need to sign up for it and do the background check. Is there any way for you to use the system as part of your service to the customer?

Also, I am curious if you have any tips or tricks in using it. It's fairly straight forward, but there are always small differences that can be made to make things better.

 

[TomW]

This can vary a lot depending on the business and agency but beyond additional guidance setting up an account and listing, an agency's level of involvement could include assisting with reporting, listening to calls and disputing invalid leads, and keeping an eye out for additional features in the LSA dashboard that could be utilized. Some businesses will want to do this themselves while others won't.

Not all businesses sign up for Local Services themselves. Some agencies have the ability to sign individual businesses up and guide them through the process without using the self sign up form. The businesses will still have to deal with the background check(s) though.

A couple quick tips:

• set your budget high as you probably won't even be able to spend it anyway (this will vary by business, competition and how much you're willing to spend though, of course).
• make sure your coverage area is complete, particularly if you've been in LSA prior to the nationwide expansion. Many businesses weren't able to target their entire service area because not all of the cities they serve were available at the time. After the expansion, many businesses didn't think to go in and see if they could then add more cities.

 

[Wirenut]

Great advice. I was one of those people who went into the service area settings on a whim and found that a lot of towns that I couldn't select during the initial roll-out were now available. It very well might have been a year that I missed out on those towns because I didn't check.