Where do i find Local SEO Clients?
-
Hey,
So i've been doing SEO for a while now and know a lot of tactics and a lot of ways to get my/others sites hire.
I know good software (and have that software with full licenses and know the methods to use it in whitehat ways that will work well), internal content linking, title/description, webmaster tools (both google and bing), sitemaps etc...
I have clients and my own sites that i have managed to get high in google, as well as my own local site that is number 1 in Google for my hometown + SEO, but that only gets about 80 searches a month and gets me very little if any phone calls a week.
I've also just ordered 250 high quality business cards, that i spent ages designing to look awesome.. If these work well i'll print some more and stick all over the place...
I currently have 2 local clients, 1 is a local web agency who every client they have they pay me a specific amount to boost that company in Google and the other is just a family friend who pays me a small amount a month to build links for him.
I'd like to have 10-15+ clients all on my payroll with a nice amount of income that i can live off.
I just finished full-time school and am just coming into the big wide world and have for paid for my new laptop, desktop, 2 monitors, SEO software licenses and SEOMoz account from niche blogs, software and SEO coaching and such..
I've built a brilliant online portfolio for people and have had a lot of great feedback from online clients.
But i can only earn around $10-$110 per online client for SEO and around $8/hour for coaching... I'd like to be able to make that a LOT more.
I do web/graphic design as well and have built a nice portfolio for that as well.
So back to the main question, how did you and how do i get local clients?
Thanks!
-
Hi there,
I'd like to ask if your online portfolio is targeted locally - that is important to local seo. Or do you have your own business website that represents the service you are offering?
I have worked for a client whose business is local SEO. Below are some of the tasks we usually do:
- optimize his business website locally (we usually include the area in the keywords - e.g. local seo consultant+san jose area) to target seo clients from a specific area.
- we submit a complete company profile to leading local directories (yahoo directory, bing local, google places, yelp, etc.)
- and my client usually visits local companies such as those in the manufacturing industry (personal reach out is important in local seo business)
- some of my client's clients are referred locally (recommendation from friends, colleagues)
At present, we are maintaining more than 15 local websites.
Regards,
Roy
-
In the Title of Craigslist, put your city. Craigslist has a LOT of DA and Google puts the listings in the SERPS. Sometimes it only takes an 15 minutes for the crawl. Just do it once and see if it works.
-
I'm in UK now.. Craigslist is TINY in the UK.. no 1 knows about it and there's no big alternative
-
craigslist. that's my answer.
-
Yeh, i will go around handing out the business cards
The only problem with that is, business cards are damn expensive in the UK..
£35 for 250 good quality business cards...
I've already used 250 in a week, i found that if i go to weddings or partys, go and give them to the people who are on your table (make conversation with them) or the people who are standing around the edge bored.. it gives them something to do whilst they're bored.
I got 5-6 phone calls from this and i only went to 3 events
-
really the best thing you can do its go and hand business cards then you not "another one" that calling this places and offer a website, you have the advantage of local use it.
regard Skype, work with Voip company and have you freelancer register to this company for like $50 a month you will make unlimited calls.
-
I found that it takes a LOT of phone calls and/or emails to get even a single result and people tend to feel frustrated by you calling them, i was thinking about hiring an online freelancer and giving them skype credit to call 1,000 businesses and see if i got any leads but then i thought to myself that 1,000 phone calls through skype would be around $500 and the freelancer would probably spend over 1,000 hours researching and calling...
-
hi and welcome to this community
look to me that the problem you heaving it's that you try to target only your local community and it's great as nationwide level will be very hard to target with the competition and the sites that ranking up.
for local i found that the best way to do it it's:
go online look for restaurants, spa, nail salon and many other local bossiness and you will see many coming up in Google maps but in domain location you have Google.maps meaning they don't have a site or didn't claim this listing and here you go call this business , email or if are a good marketing place and you do have the benefit of being local just go there and hand this business cards.
you can also open yp.com and many other directories and again look for business without websites.
hope that help you
Mike
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Community Discussion: The hardest (& most surprisingly valuable) thing you've gone through for your SEO career?
In the comment discussion for Thursday's blog post, An Essential Training Task List for Junior SEOs, there's been mild debate around some of the items, such as having a Junior SEO build a website by hand. It's a fantastic comment discussion (the kind that makes a blog manager's heart sing), and it's got me thinking. We've all gone through the wringer when it comes to boosting our careers. Heck, I was a poetry major and found myself learning SQL last week. What hurdles have you jumped that have been painful and challenging, but have taken your career to the finish line? Maybe even gotten you the gold?* What would you recommend to newbies just starting out (or warn them about)? *Yeah, I got Olympic about it. I went there. 🙂
Industry News | | FeliciaCrawford6 -
Using Google Reviews for non local business
Hi All, We are deciding on what site is best to capture reviews from customers and I'm just not sure what is the ideal option. We are a SaaS business with multiple offices in different locations but the specific geographies are not really relevant to our customers. Is it worth focusing on google reviews so that when our brand is searched there are plenty of nice shiny stars (plus maybe they can be added into adwords adverts as well...). Search volume for the keywords we don't yet rank for are not massive although still important. Alternatively should we be thinking about something like G2Crowd. None of our competitors are doing anything so there's no real need to our muscle them on a review website and I don't think our end user will visit these sites before buying but we would point to them and say 'hey, look at all these great reviews'. Finally I searched my old company recently who and just under news results were facebook reviews. Maybe that's another option. All advice welcome. All advice appreciated.
Industry News | | jafayeh1 -
Do You Work At Home As An SEO Or Have An Office?
I'm curious how many of you all work at home or mostly at home either through an company or freelance. Or are most of you employed at a corporation? My company was recently bought by a very large global company. Recently I found out that all the SEO and web design is contracted through outside sources. With the headquarters in Europe, this being my primary job function I kinda feel well you know.... down.. Websites I put my life into for the last 7 years are going to be handed over to a corporation to do with whatever they feel they should. I know they were never really mine, but when you spend so much of your life to making them the best you can, so much so to attract the attention of a global billion dollar company, you should feel great right? But I feel like my dog just died. I don't have a bad impression of the company but the shift of moving me to the IT guy has begun. Normal web updates I would have done, are now being pushed aside. I don't hate IT I like helping others, but I really loved being able to make a difference through the web. Now I'm left contemplating my future, big corporations have so much bs, I just don't feel comfortable. I would really appreciate you all giving me your thoughts and tell me about any similar experiences you have had in your life. Cheers, Don
Industry News | | donford0 -
Did Google Search Just Get Crazy Local?
Hey All, I think it's a known fact at this point that when signed into a personal Google account while doing a search, the results are very oriented around keywords and phrases you have already searched for, as well as your account's perceived location; for instance when I wanted to check one of my own web properties in SE listings I would sign out or it would likely appear first as a false reading. Today I noticed something very interesting: even when not signed in, Google's listings were giving precedence to locality. It was to a very extreme degree, as in when searching for "web design," a firm a mile away ranked higher than one 1.5 miles away and such. It would seem that the algos having this high a level of location sensitivity and preference would actually be a boon for the little guys, which is, I assume why it was implemented. However, it brings up a couple of interesting questions for me. 1. How is this going to affect Moz (or any SE ranking platform, for that matter) reports? I assume that Google pulls locations from IP Addresses, therefore would it not simply pull the local results most relevant for the Moz server(s) IP? 2. What can one do to rise above this aggressive level of location based search? I mean, my site (which has a DA of 37 and a PA of 48) appears above sites like webdesign.org (DA of 82, PA of 85). Not that I'm complaining at the moment, but I could see this being a fairly big deal for larger firms looking to rank on a national level. What gives? I'd love to get some opinions from the community here if anyone else has noticed this...
Industry News | | G2W1 -
Has anybody used Yext or Universal Business Listings as an automated approach to getting clients into all of the many directories? If so does it work? Or does Google penalize in using these automated services?
I'm trying to figure out if using either Yext or Universal Business Listings is worth it. They have reseller programs for SEO agencies. I just am curious what other SEO folks think of these services as I'm considering using one of them to automate and save time for clients. If you go to Yext.com or universalbusinesslistings.org you can see these. Curious what others say about these. Thanks
Industry News | | SOM240 -
What SEO topics would you cover if teaching a College webdesign class?
Later this month I am guest teaching a class on best SEO practices for web designers at a local College. I wanted to see what topics others would include if you were doing an overview.
Industry News | | BCutrer1 -
Is it OK to discuss SEO for an adult site?
Hey guys, I run a few big tube sites and sales pages that contain adult material. I'm also new to these forums, so before I do anything that might be considered rude or innapropriate, I wanted to know what the stance was on asking for advice related to the SEO of my adult sites and/or posting links. I've read the Etiquette disclaimer, however, I don't actually intend to post images or anything of the sort, only ask for your opinions and preferred strategies. If its completely frowned upon, then I completely understand and will never bring the subject back up again. Cheers and Happy to be amongst you all!
Industry News | | CrakJason1 -
When will Rand put out "Art of SEO 2nd Edition"? (ANSWER: IN ABOUT 2 WEEKS)
First edition was printed in the end of 2009. Great Book. Needs updating of course. I would buy the next edition if it was updated in an awesome way that I know Rand and the others would do.
Industry News | | stubby0