This entire course is a project. Here are the to-do's from each video lesson to follow along with me.

Intro Video:

Here are some local SEO stats to keep in mind and to use for motivation:

46% of all Google searches are looking for local information. (Source: GoGulf)
72% of consumers that did a local search visited a store within five miles. (Source: HubSpot Marketing Statistics)
97% of people learn more about a local company online than anywhere else. (Source: SEO Tribunal)
88% of searches for local businesses on a mobile device either call or visit the business within 24 hours. (Source: Nectafy)
61% of mobile searchers are more likely to contact a local business if they have a mobile-friendly site. (Source: HubSpot Marketing Statistics)
By 2021, mobile devices will influence more than $1.4 trillion in local sales. (Source: Forrester)
18% of local smartphone searches led to a purchase within a day, whereas only 7% of non-local searches led to a sale. (Source: Think with Google)
78% of location-based mobile searches result in an offline purchase. (Source: SEO Tribunal)
“Near me” or “close by” type searches grew by more than 900% over two years. (Source: Chat Meter)

What Is SEO Key Takeaways:

Search engines scan the internet to find the best content for users searching the web.
Search engines like Google, Yahoo, Bing, and Duck Duck Go, are all made up of algorithms and have the same objective. To get users the most relevant and best search results based on what they searched.
We create content that is the best content for users searching for keywords we want to rank for.
There are over 200 ranking factors that Google bots consider when they scan content.
By using those ranking factors and aligning your content around the desired keyword, you can rank for that keyword.

On-Page OptimizationStep 1: Title and URL

Title Examples

Service + Target Location + Value + Year (only if there is enough room)

Keep the title under 60 characters

Tanning Salon Denver (#1 Rated in 2020)
Carpet Cleaner Wichita (5 Star Service | #1 Rated In 2020)
Best Residential Electrition In Clarksville (100% Guarantee)
Massage Therapy Tucson (Best Value | #1 Rated In 2020)
Wedding Caterer St. George (Most Affordable | Best Value)

To-Do’s

Create a page (or blog if you can’t make a page) with a URL structure like this: www.domain.com/Search-Term-Or-Keyword. Note: Keep the title in the URL as close to your domain as possible. Not to do Example: www.domain.com/1234/pages/services/Search-Term-Or-Keyword
Make your title with H1 tags <h1>title</h1>
Make sure your title is your #1 service or product + your desired target location + value.
Use a specific service rather than a general term for your business. For example: Instead of a title like, “Best SpaCrescent City (Highly Rated)” A better title would be, “Best Swedish Massage Therapy Crescent City (Highly Rated)
Make sure your page title and search results title are the same. By default, they should be.

On-Page OptimizationStep 2: Your Sales Pitch and CTAPlus Adding Content To Your Page

Key Takeaways

Write a paragraph pitching the service you are trying to rank for. Talk about the value and benefits or any unique selling points that distinguish your service.
Make sure there is a clear CTA (Call To Action)
- Call now to schedule an appointment
- Click Here To Get A Free Quote (link to contact form or quote form)
- Visit us at 723 w. Kennedy Drive (Embed Google Map)
Add an image related to your service and edit the image’s title, description, and alt text with your keyword (service+location)
Add a caption to your image that has the service and location in it in some way.
Add reviews or recommendations under the image.
If you have a physical storefront, embed a map from google maps of your address under the image. If you don’t have a storefront, you still want to embed a map of you address that matches your target location, but put it at the bottom of your content.

On-Page OptimizationStep 3: Adding 2k+ Words Of Content & Linking

To-Do’s

Write 2,000 words or more of content to your page. Here are some ideas for content:
1. Your business’s story, vision, mission, why you started
2. Talk about your service, what to expect, how it works
3. Mention other services
4. Use case studies, examples.
5. Write hypothetical situations with a problem and solution related to your service
6. Value, what makes your business different and better than other options
Use h2 and h3 tags. Use titles for sections and paragraphs wrapped in <h2>title</h2> tags. And sub titles in <h3>sub-title</h3> tags.
Use 3 external hyperlinks for every 500-1,000 words. Links pointing to other sites that are related to your content but not competitors.
Use 3 internal hyperlinks for every 500-1,000 words. Links pointing to other parts of your website.
Make sure to use images (.jpeg, .png, .gif) and that they are optimized around your target search term (alt text, description, caption, title).
If you have a video, embed it on your site. Make on on your cell phone talking about the service and embed it on the page. Make sure it’s optimized the same as the images.
If you use WordPress or Shopify or can do this on your website builder, add a featured image to your page. Make sure the image is optimized with your exact target search term.

Bonus: Setting Up Your Local Search ListingsGoogle My Business, Bing Places, Apple Maps

To Do’s

Set up your Google Search Console account and add your sitemap.
- If you are not sure how to find your site map, research how on youtube for your specific website platform. Most website platforms such as WordPress, Wix, Shopify, and Square Space will have ways to do it that will all be a little different.
Set up your Google My Business, Bing Places, and Apple Maps business profiles with all your business information. It will take a little time but once they are set up once they will help people find your business for years to come.

Off-Page SEO Domain Authority + Backlinks Part 1 And 2

Key Takeaways

Off-page optimization means DA (domain authority) and backlinks.
The two main factors that determine your DA is the age of the domain (how many years the domain has been online) and how many quality Do-Follow links are pointing to your domain.
Backlinks are a huge ranking factor to help your content get ranked.
Backlinks must have the “Do-Follow” attribute for search engines to count them. For example, social media links are no-follow so they don’t count.
- Use this chrome extension tool to see which links are do-follow and no-follow on a page.
Backlinks that come from domains with a higher domain authority than your site are the best kind of backlinks and help increase your domain authority.
- For example: If your site has a da of 15, you want to get backlinks from sites with a DA of 16 or higher. Backlinks that are a lower DA than your site are weighted way less valuable by search engines.
Use the Moz Bar tool and sign up for a free Moz account to see your site DA, and PA (Page Authority), how many links are counted on your page, and other websites Off-Page SEO stats.
Page Authority is specific to a page and can be higher than your DA. To increase your DA, you can increase the majority of your pages and they will lift your DA.
- For example: Your DA can be 15 and your home page authority can be 20 while the rest of your pages authority can be 10. To increase your DA which will help all of your rankings, increase your pages 10 PA to 16 or higher and your DA will follow suit.

To-Do’s

Add your info to this shared local business Google Sheet
Create a blog titled, “My Favorite Local Businesses Around The Country” Or something similar. “Our Favorite Local Businesses in The US”.
Place the other business descriptions in your post as a new paragraph for each business.
Hyperlink to each business with its URL. This will give everyone a backlink from each other and help each other’s content get ranked.
Optional: For the best results, check out this paid backlinking service: https://www.fiverr.com/
1. Message the seller and say “adrianhallberg” (that’s my Fiverr username) referred you for a discount.
Reach out to local business owners and managers and ask to do a guest post on their site and put a backlink to your content. Ask if they would like to do a guest post on your site as well. Post for Post, a link for a link.

Top Ways To Get Backlinks To Your Page

1. Guest Posting

A) Reach out to local businesses in your area and ask them to do a guest post. Write a blog for their site-specific to their business and mention something about your business in the first couple of paragraphs and link to your page. You can usually find a business owner’s contact info from your local government’s business directory website. Use Google maps to find local businesses or local business directories to find locally owned businesses.

B) Write a guest post for a site I manage, athleticeventsupply.com. Write an article that is at least 500 words or more about athletics, events, trade shows, sports, or marketing and I’ll post it, optimize it, and make sure your page gets a few do-follow backlinks.

Message me to get a quest post started.

Put “Guest Post On AES Site” as the subject line and link to or attach your post as a .doc in the email.

Include hyperlinks to your page in your blog.

2. Local Business Directories

Local business directors can be a great way to get your business found and get links to your page. Here is a list of the top ones I’d recommend signing up for.

https://www.hotfrog.com/

https://www.yellowpages.com/

https://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/local

http://business.foursquare.com/

https://aboutus.com/

https://www.chamberofcommerce.com/

https://www.superpages.com/

https://www.bbb.org/

https://nextdoor.com/

https://www.elocal.com/

https://www.dexknows.com/

https://www.alignable.com/

https://www.local.com/

3. Write a local resources blog and let local bloggers and businesses know about it and ask them to link to your post.

Some topics you can write about: Local events, Highlight other businesses, History of your town, fun facts about your town, fun things to do in your town.

You can begin to gain backlinks by creating local resources, such as a round-up of events and things to do in your area. This can be in the form of a blog post.

In your article, share information that would be valuable to local searchers, but also ties in with what you offer.

At the end of the piece, add an internal link to your local landing page with optimized anchor text. That way, anyone reading the article has a call to action, and search engines can recognize that you’re covering the topic in-depth (making your site more valuable).

Now, it’s time for a bit of research.

Can you find any bloggers in your area? How about the event coordinators of the events you’ve shared?

Finding local influencers can help you to promote the article while gaining backlinks from local sites and boosting the volume of visitors to your site in the meantime!

Find local bloggers and get their email. Make a list.

Give a special offer to their readers which will give them a discount at your local store
Offer to share their website on social media
Partner with the company and sponsor them

4. Write and publish a blog post featuring other local businesses.

Then reach out to them and let them know you’ve made the post and ask them to share it and link to it from their site if they wish.

5. Use Fivver.com to buy a guest posting and backlinking service.

Before You Schedule Your Call With Me

Make sure you spend some time on the backlinking section and get at least 6-12 backlinks before we have our call
You should have at least sent me a guest post for the athleticeventsuply.com site to place 3 backlinks.
Make sure you’ve done everything you can to boost your ranking. Search for your target search term and click through each page of the search results until you find your ranking. Each search results page has 10 results per page. If you’re on the second or third page of Google, try adding more text to your page to help the ranking. Do a competitive analysis with the Moz Bar tool to see how other rankings are more optimized than yours and list the ranking factors to work on to help boost your page.
Make sure you have used the shared Google sheet to add other’s pages and links to your blog and that you have backlinks on other sites as well.
Wait 2 weeks before scheduling our call to see where your page lands on the results pages.
At this point schedule, our call, and I’ll review everything and provide an in-depth analysis. After you apply my recommendations to help your ranking, we can meet again and reassess your results.

Visit this link to schedule a call with me.
https://calendly.com/hallbergmarketing/consultation

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