Copywriting for Local SEO
If your content is boring, then no one will buy from it.
As Google becomes more interactive and uses AI and its host of data, it also has a better idea of what type of content is uninspiring and which content deserves to be ranked #1 in its index. Google tells exactly what they expect on their webpage here.
Provide a great page experience
However, Google does not use search engine optimisation to sell its products. Google does not have to write copy in 15 different ways to describe the same service.
Focus on people-first content
I’d be very surprised if anyone in Google ever wrote content with a keyword in mind. Google’s content only needs to inform the user of what Google is trying to communicate.
Our copywriters have a much harder task
Vanilla Circus Ltd has two copywriters, Martha and Libby. Our copywriters have degrees in English. As you can imagine their attention to detail, their creative ability in their understanding of how to sell products is exceptional.
Successful SEO content has SIX criteria
- Every page we create has to in some way sell our client’s products.
- It must always have keywords in mind as it needs to generate search traffic.
- It also must be professionally optimised. The pages must rank for the keyword and the location above the competition on the first page of Google or it has failed.
- It must intelligently inform and in under two seconds explain exactly what products or services we are selling.
- It must be persuasive and at some level create an emotional change that is required for the customer to reach out and buy your contact.
- The page needs to be well designed and presented.
- We need to create a feeling of trust with the customer that we will deliver the service or products that we are selling.
Local SEO content has subtle differences
Local SEO content pages are in fact, landing pages we want the user to enter the website via these pages and then click on a link into our product or service section where they can make a purchase. The copy need to be persuasive enough so that the user does not bounce and carries on to the next page, but also believable enough that the user believes that the company is based in the location they have typed into Google.
AI content = Poor Google ranking
We cannot use AI content or pages that are exactly the same with only the location changed. The pages will have a degree of duplication as, fundamentally they are selling the same products and services, just in a slightly different location and using a slightly different keyword. While it is true the local SEO content does not have to be a work of art, Vanilla Circus Ltd has become an expert in balancing the quality of the content and the cost to the client.
Google Friendliness First
If the page does not rank on the first page of Google, then the content has failed. An essential part of writing Geo-targeted content is that the copy is acceptable to Google. You will have read on most digital marketing company websites that quality content is KING. But it is not. It is optimisation, no traffic no sales. Google are aware you are gaming them. If you are prepared to play the game and offer a quality of local SEO content that is superior the competitors, then this represents the bare minimum.
Process for creating content that outranks your competitors
Example Divorce Solicitor + Surrey
The questions to ask are these:
- What does divorce + solicitor really mean?
- How do we define Surrey?
Poor content
You will see thousands of websites that misinterpret this and start telling you that a solicitor is a lawyer, and a divorce is when a marriage breaks down and the Surrey is a home county of 1.19m people in the UK.
These pages have a high bounce rate (people leaving asap) and a low conversion rate; they are talking at the user not answering the query.
This is missing the point.
“I know what a solicitor and a divorce are as I am searching for it in Google. I also know what Surrey is for the same reason.”
The question is how Google defines Divorce Solicitor + Surrey as a search query not how people define three separate words.
Google’s has decided on its own definitions based on what pepoel are searching for semantically. This simply meads around the topic of divorce and soliticor.
It then ranks pages that answer a query far higher than simple factual pages. See here.
So who is the user and what does the user want to know?
Assumptions
- We can assume they are getting divorced and live in Surrey.
- We can assume they want to engage a solicitor
- We can assume that they are currently married
- We can assume they want information about both the process of getting divorced and where a solicitor can help.
- We can also make an assumption of their emotional state
- We can also assume that they are possibly middle-aged.
- They want to engage a professional for help and advice.
The last three assumptions help not only with our content and tone of voice but also with the design of the webpage.
The purpose of all webpages are to make a sale or a connection to gain a lead
To do this the user or reader needs to experience an emotional change.
If they come to the webpage and we fail to interest them or to validate their feelings and needs then it is likely we are going to fail.
In the example of divorce solicitor Surrey, we know that the client will be interested in several things.
- How successful have you been in the past?
- How much does the usual divorce cost?
- How long is the process?
- Can you help me go through something that is difficult?
- Can you clearly explain what my options are and how best to proceed?
- Can I rely on you to deliver what you say?
And lastly to seal the deal and get the user into action…
- What promotions do you have i.e. first hour free et cetera et cetera?
These criteria really are the same regardless of your selling legal services or office stationery . There needs to be an element of trust and belief in whatever you are selling and providing you can deliver it.
Where local SEO differs from normal search optimisation is that there needs to be an element of location.
After all we have no interest in clients in Edinburgh if we have to meet them face-to-face.
Options
A simple way of doing this is to add a Google map.
Another way of doing this is to include sentences that say for example many of our clients come from Guildford, Weybridge and Walton on Thames.
All of those areas are the beginning of defining Surrey but as we don’t sell ‘Surrey’ we are only located in Surrey the important part of the page in our example is of course divorce and solicitor.
Hurry up and wait
The next step of the process is to submit the page to Google via Google search console. This means that the page will be indexed far sooner than if we just leave this up to Google.
Then we have to do study are Google key ranking tools to see where Google ranks the page for divorce solicitor + Surrey.
As the search query is probably quite competitive we may have to write other pages that lurk to target keywords like the cost of getting divorced in Surrey, how long is the process of getting divorced in Surrey, which law courts deal with divorce in Surrey et cetera.
Company founded
Clients Trust Us
Keywords
Industry Leader