There are a few factors that help your website get found locally by search engines, starting with website code. It is important to ensure these elements are included in the code of your website so that the search engines know that your business serves a specific region and provides that to local search results.
Schema
Schema.org is a standard of search results that Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and others have accepted. It helps tell the search engines if you have a physical location, what type of business you provide, if you are sharing a recipe or an event, or many more options. If you have a physical location, you will want to include the local schema markup on related pages. An example of a snippet of schema code would result in this (ideal for a contact page):
[schema type=”organization” orgtype=”LocalBusiness” url=”https://courtneyr.dev” name=”Courtney Engle” description=”Helping Small Business Owners Streamline Social Media, Local SEO, WordPress, and Mobile Marketing” city=”Chambersburg” state=”PA” postalcode=”17202″ country=”US” phone=”6574644837″ ]
If you have a WordPress website, I recommend these schema plugins:
- WordPress SEO with the Local SEO added on by Yoast
- Schema Creator – great for listing organization addresses, reviews, events, and recipes.
- Local Search SEO Contact Page
GeoTags
Geographical identification metadata should be included in media such as a geotagged photograph or video, websites, SMS messages, QR Codes, and RSS feeds. By including this code into your site, you are telling search engines that all your media is based in your location, though it isn’t visible to viewers of your website. You can get your code to embed into the header or footer code of your website from 51blocks. This will help mobile searchers land on your business while they are nearby.
HCard
When visitors to your site want directions to get to your location, you need to provide them with data that their GPS devices can use. Often they will click on this information on their mobile phones to launch Google Maps or Apple Maps.
