Local SEO is the work that gets you appearing when someone searches for a service near them. It runs on different signals to regular SEO, and for most service businesses it produces enquiries faster and more cheaply than anything else available.
The three factors that decide local rankings
Google weighs local results on proximity, relevance and prominence. Understanding which of these you can influence saves a lot of wasted effort.
- Proximity — how close you are to the searcher. You cannot change this
- Relevance — how well your profile and website match what was searched. You control this
- Prominence — how well known you are, driven by reviews, citations and links. You influence this slowly
Your Google Business Profile does most of the work
For local searches the profile often matters more than the website. Category selection in particular acts as an eligibility filter — if your primary category is wrong, you may not appear in the candidate set at all, regardless of how good your site is. It is the single highest-impact local SEO setting and one of the most commonly wrong.
Reviews are the slowest and strongest lever
Review count, rating and recency all feed prominence. It is the factor most businesses neglect because it cannot be bought or automated — it requires asking customers, consistently. Ten genuine reviews typically move a local business meaningfully.
Citations and consistency
Your name, address and phone number should be identical everywhere they appear online. Inconsistency across directories creates uncertainty about which version is correct, and that uncertainty costs you. This is unglamorous work with real returns.
What the website contributes
Location-relevant content, correct local business schema, and pages for the services you offer in the areas you serve. Genuinely useful pages for real service areas help; near-identical pages for every suburb within two hundred kilometres are treated as doorway pages and can hurt.
Frequently asked questions
What is local SEO?
The work that makes a business appear in location-based searches and the map pack — driven by your Google Business Profile, reviews, citations and location-relevant website content.
How long does local SEO take?
Faster than general SEO. Profile and category fixes can show within weeks; review and citation building takes months.
What is the most important local ranking factor?
Proximity you cannot change. Of what you can influence, correct categories give the fastest gain and reviews give the largest sustained one.
Do I need a separate page for every suburb?
Only for areas you genuinely serve, and only with content that meaningfully differs. Near-duplicate suburb pages are treated as doorway pages.
Related reading
Related: 9 signs you need a website redesign, What website automation costs
Worth reading: How to get more leads, What makes a good website?
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If you want a straight answer for your own situation rather than a general one, tell us what you are building and we will give you an honest view.