Local SEO has a smaller, more mechanical set of levers than broader SEO, which makes it one of the more approachable places to start if you’re new to this. Here’s the checklist we run through, roughly in priority order.
1. Claim and fully complete your Google Business Profile
This is the single highest-leverage item on this list. Verify ownership, fill in every available field (categories, hours, service area, attributes), and add real photos. An incomplete profile caps your local visibility no matter what else you do.
2. Get your primary category right
Google Business Profile lets you pick a primary category and several secondary ones. The primary category especially affects which searches you show up for — pick the one that most precisely matches your core business, not the broadest one available.
3. Fix name, address and phone consistency (NAP)
Your business name, address and phone number should be identical everywhere they appear online — your website, your Google Business Profile, any directory listings. Inconsistencies (even minor ones like “St” vs “Street”) can quietly undermine local ranking signals.
4. Build a genuine, ongoing review-generation process
A steady flow of recent, specific reviews is a direct local ranking factor, not just a trust signal for humans. Build a simple, repeatable process for asking satisfied customers to leave a review — timed right after a positive interaction, made as easy as possible with a direct link.
5. Build location-specific pages if you serve multiple areas
If you serve multiple suburbs or cities, a dedicated page for each — with genuinely local content, not just the city name swapped into a template — outperforms a single generic “service areas” page.
6. Get basic local citations right
Consistent listings on major directories (even just the well-known ones relevant to your category) support the NAP consistency signal above. This matters less than it used to, but it’s still a quick, low-effort item worth doing properly once.
7. Add local schema markup
LocalBusiness structured data on your site helps search engines understand your location and service area explicitly, supporting (though not single-handedly driving) local visibility.
8. Track calls and enquiries back to local search specifically
Set up call tracking or form-attribution that tells you which enquiries are coming from local search specifically, not just overall traffic. Without this, it’s hard to know if the above work is actually producing business, not just visibility.
See our Local SEO service for how we run this as an ongoing engagement, or our SEO Melbourne page if you’re specifically competing in the Melbourne market.
