The only businesses that benefit from local SEO are the ones doing it. Despite the prevalence of LLM platforms like ChatGPT, actual customers still use Google to look for things like dental clinics, plumbers, or roof contractors.
Implementing SEO fundamentals can yield significant results if you’ve done little to no local SEO for your business. Let’s look at this orthodontic clinic. Their site was getting between 100 and 150 visits per month, and Google leads were practically non-existent.
And after two months of just doing three things: consistently updating blogs, posting on their Google Business Profile regularly, and getting relevant citations:
- Traffic grew to over 1,400 monthly visits
- They’re getting more patients from Google
- And they’re getting cited on Google AI overviews and ChatGPT
Of course, mileage varies depending on the industry, market competitiveness, and where you are with SEO. But the fact remains that investing in the right local SEO strategy will deliver tangible, compounding benefits.
The Benefits of Basic Local SEO & How to Achieve It
Aside from a website and a Google Business Profile, starting local SEO requires no other prerequisites. For many owners, this is the foundation of effective small business SEO strategies that generate consistent local leads. With today’s AI tools, it’s easier than ever for any business to handle the basics of local SEO and start seeing results like these:
More Eyes on Your Business (Getting High Impressions)
Google likes websites that consistently publish high-quality and valuable content your audience is looking for. If you stick to a consistent schedule (or have higher link velocity than competitors), there’s a good chance Google gets you a position in the top 10 results.
The bulk of the clicks go to websites in the top 4. But for starters, aiming for the top 10 can get you a decent number of leads to your site. One way to get there is to write content about your audience’s most asked questions.
In most industries, these are questions around pricing, services, or what they can DIY. You can use Google’s “people also ask (PAA)” feature to get ideas on what to write about.
With the PAA, you get more content ideas, variations you can play around with, and an exhaustive list of questions related to your original query. Just keep clicking on the drop-down down and more questions will pop up.
Getting Map Pack Visibility
Local SEO has two sides: the optimizations you do on your website and the optimizations you do on your Google Business Profile. Doing both helps you get more visibility on the Google Map Pack. The secret here is helping Google understand what your business is all about.
You must optimize both because Google will look at your site and GBP to gather context. Whatever you have on your GBP should match what you have on your website, which includes the following:
- Have individual service pages for each service you do
- Categories in your GBP can be H2 and H3 headers on your site’s services pages
- Have a consistent name, address, and phone number (NAP)
- Add high-quality photos and regularly update them on your GBP and website
- Collect and showcase reviews on both GBP and your site’s testimonial/reviews page
More Calls, Bookings, and Walk-Ins
The end goal of local SEO will always be to increase the number of people who call, book an appointment, or walk into your office. Achieving this outcome culminates all local SEO efforts, including link and citation building, partnerships, and consistently publishing blogs.
An underutilized strategy for driving even more of these actions is syndication or repurposing content across all your platforms. For example, a popular blog post can be turned into:
- A week’s worth of updates on your GBP
- Posters or graphics for your social media
- Captions for Instagram or Facebook
- Newsletters to subscribers
- Short videos summarizing key points for TikTok, YouTube Shorts, or Reels
Stronger Customer Trust & Reputation
It’s not just Google that likes fresh, updated, and quality content. Your audience does too. Let’s say they find your business while looking at Google Maps. Then, they compare your business to another one just a few minutes away from yours.
One consistently updates its GBP, has fresh staff photos, and has more reviews (and responds to reviews). The other doesn’t really do much. Now, the question is, which one is yours?
At the end of the day, local SEO is just another medium your business can use to engage with your customers. The more you do, the more you build trust.
The most important thing here is not to just respond to the positive. How you react to negative reviews is what sticks. When everything is positive, the human mind looks at the blemishes. Addressing concerns and taking responsibility are what build trust the most.
Get Higher Rankings on Search Results and Map Pack
When your business ranks in the top three organic results or shows up in the Map Pack, you’re in front of most ready-to-buy customers. BrightLocal data shows that 42% of consumers click on businesses in the Map Pack first, and nearly 70% of all clicks go to the first three organic results. Most potential customers will never reach your site if you’re not there.
For example, a homeowner searching “emergency plumber near me” will almost always choose from the top listings in the Map Pack. Ranking higher directly translates to more leads and faster revenue growth, especially in industries where timing and visibility make all the difference.
Getting to the top is one challenge—staying there is another. Beyond the basics of on-page optimization and a complete Google Business Profile, the businesses that dominate the top three positions invest in signals that compound over time. That means:
- Building local backlinks and citations
- Scaling content velocity
- And consistently driving engagement through GBP updates, photos, and reviews.
Advanced Local SEO: The Benefits of Going Beyond The Basics
Local SEO is a necessity. You need to have a GBP and a website, and have both optimized. But if you stay with the basics of SEO, you’ll quickly see that there’s a ceiling you just can’t breach. That’s because when everyone is doing the basics, those who go beyond see better results:
Win More High-Intent Customers
The real value of local SEO lies in attracting people who are actively looking for your service when they need it. Whether it’s a plumber, dentist, or investing in SEO for restaurants, the goal is the same: show up when customers are ready to buy. A customer searching “plumber near me” or “dentist in Bellevue” has already decided to buy. They just need to choose who gets their business.
Ranking higher in the Map Pack and local search results means you’re the first option these ready-to-buy customers see. Instead of chasing awareness-stage visitors, advanced local SEO puts you in front of the leads that are most likely to call, book, or walk through your door today.
- Target high-intent keywords like “near me,” “emergency,” or service + city
- Build dedicated service pages that match each specific search query customers use
- Collect and showcase reviews that highlight fast response, quality, and reliability
- Use local schema markup so search engines understand your services and location
- Keep GBP and website content fresh with updates, posts, and photos to signal activity
Outrank Competitors in the Map Pack
Every local competitor’s goal is to show up in the Map Pack. The difference lies in how much effort they put into maintaining their profile. Many businesses stop at adding hours, services, and a few photos, but Google rewards ongoing activity and engagement.
That’s where the opportunity lies. To truly pull ahead, you need to go beyond the surface-level optimizations and focus on advanced moves that compound faster than what most competitors are doing:
- Backlink velocity for local relevance: Build links from chambers of commerce, local news, sponsorships, and neighborhood blogs.
- Scaling citations at once: Push dozens of listings through aggregators instead of trickling them out slowly.
- GBP posting cadence and CTR signals: Publish frequent, seasonal updates that drive clicks and calls Google can measure.
- Faster indexing: Use tools like GSC’s URL inspection, IndexNow, or strong internal linking to get content recognized quickly.
If you want to scale indexing, you can pay third-party vendors for citations (you can look up people from places like UpWork and Fiverr). Then use tools like SpeedyIndex to get Google bots to crawl your citations faster.
Turn Rankings Into Real Revenue
Think of local SEO as a funnel. Every search impression, every blog your audience reads, and every click on your website should guide them one step closer to becoming a customer. Rankings give you visibility, but the structure of your funnel turns that visibility into revenue.
A well-optimized funnel starts with discovery content, like blogs that answer local questions. Then it should move users toward service pages, and finally into high-converting actions like calls, bookings, or quote requests.
Final Thoughts
It’s cliché to say, but the best time to invest in local SEO was yesterday. The best part is that you can stay competitive with much higher-budget competitors if you have the right strategy and team behind you.
That’s where Spacebar Collective enters the frame. Ready to increase bookings, calls, and walk-ins for your local business? Contact Spacebar Collective today!
