subject: Targeting Your Local Area Online [print this page] If you have a business that needs to get in touch with your local community be it rural or urban you need to specifically target that area. This is where SEO (search engine optimisation) can help.
Search engine optimisation ways to help you target this area:
Good selective keywords
Localised social media
Pay per click campaign
Good selective keywords
Keywords are vital for good page titles (seen at the top of each web browser), page descriptions (the article of text found in search engine results pages) and footer (the area of text at the bottom of your website).
If you are trying to localise your traffic then this is very effective. For instance:
You have a company that sells signs to your local area; the area you live and work in is Southampton. Your page titles should include Southampton and other locations covered within and outside of the city. You also have the opportunity to also list your services within the title, this will tell the search engines exactly what you do and where.
To really make an impact ensure every page has a new and creative title. This is also true for descriptions and footers.
Localised Social Media
Using Twitter and Facebook can increase traffic but if done correctly this too can be localised. When following people on Twitter look for people within your local area, you will find quite a few.
This can be football teams, newspapers, local charities and businesses. Then when they follow you back they will be able to see your micro blogs and URLs to click right through into your website. The same can be said for Facebook, set up a business page and encourage friends and family to become friends. They will have friends within the local area that will also become fans thus increasing your local traffic.
Pay per click
Pay per click can be very effective for localised traffic as long as your keywords and adverts are aimed at your local target.
Using good keywords such as Southampton and surrounding areas will encourage local searches to visit your website. Make your advert stand out with a good title and a well worded advert giving away a special offer or service.
Off-line paper advertising
This is very effective, if you are placing an advert be sure to include your URL within it. You could just place your URL in various places across the paper to encourage and intrigue potential customers.
Paper advertising should always be a major part of any marketing campaign when you want to localise traffic and enquiries.
Localised traffic is harder to achieve over national because of how far the internet reaches but with these small tips you can get in touch with your area and achieve good levels of local traffic.
by: Ian Spencer
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