Technology and Software
Best Local SEO Services Compared
Of the seven services we review in this post, Hibu is our favorite local SEO service. This all-in-one digital marketing solutions provider allows you to bundle the specific services you need to improve your brand visibility and boost web traffic. So, whether you’re launching a new business, scaling, or venturing into new markets, Hibu has everything you need to gain a competitive advantage.
Top Local SEO Services: Golden Eggs
Below are our Golden Eggs, our favorite local SEO services that can work for a wide array of needs.
Hibu allows you to bundle local SEO services, PPC management, social media, web design, and anything else you need to dominate local search engine rankings. Schedule a call with Hibu to get started.
1SEO offers managed Google Local services, plus pay-per-lead pricing and month-to-month contracts to maximize ROI. Try 1SEO’s free digital marketing audit tool with no commitment required.
BrightLocal is terrific for implementing a plan to tackle local SEO, reputation management, citation building, local link tracking, and reviews. Try BrightLocal on a 14-day free trial with no credit card required.
Best Local SEO Services Review Process
While we could just list the seven best local SEO services in rank order, our experience with testing and reviewing has led us to a better way to package this information. So, instead, we’ve taken the time to couple the best local SEO service providers with common situations for needing these services based on their qualities and service specialties.
During our research, we identified three prevalent situations for needing to utilize a local SEO service:
Finding the ideal service depends on your specific needs. For example, a retail store might focus more on having an accurate name, address, and phone number (NAP) in online listings, plus social media advertising, customer reviews, and reputation management. Conversely, a plumbing contractor may rely more on professional web design, pictures, location-based keywords, and blogging.
So, this is why we’ve broken up our reviews into categories that pertain to each use case. That way, you can quickly recognize the reviews that pertain most to your situation and zoom in on the providers that will best meet your needs and expectations.
The Best Local SEO Services for Brick-and-Mortar Establishments
Creating a beautiful and responsive website for your restaurant, specialty store, or bar is a standard SEO best practice. However, most potential customers learn about your business from third-party websites like Google My Business, Tripadvisor, and Yelp. While optimizing your business website is helpful, you should find a service provider that helps you focus more on citations or online directories that mention your name, address, and phone number (referred to as NAP listings).
Hibu
Hibu offers almost every conceivable search engine marketing solution to get customers lining up at your door. Don’t have a business website? Their expert designers and developers can create an optimized home on the web for your company based on your specifications.
Don’t worry if you don’t know the first thing about SEO. You’ll work with a dedicated Hibu account manager to create custom marketing solutions. For instance, Hibu can integrate relevant social media accounts into your website. The specifics depend on your business needs and unique optimization requirements.
Hibu offers a host of local SEO services to increase foot traffic to your store. For on-page SEO, Hibu audits your existing site and its experts improve aspects like title and meta tags, loading speed, keyword usage, and voice-optimized FAQs. The experts at Hibu also offer managed off-page SEO, including creating social media profiles and content, ensuring consistent NAP listings across platforms, reputation management, and securing high-quality backlinks.
The best part may be the hands-off approach, allowing you to outsource most of your SEO efforts to Hibu’s seasoned experts. But you’ll still have control via a client dashboard where you can edit your website, manage reviews, and be more proactive in your strategy.
BrightLocal
Not everyone requires fully managed local SEO services. Business owners or digital marketers proficient with local SEO may need supporting software to identify problems and areas for improvement. BrightLocal provides an all-in-one marketing dashboard with a strong focus on local SEO.
Tap into its citation builder to manage your business mentions. You can create new citations, manually check listings to ensure they’re accurate, track NAP inconsistencies, create local listings on aggregators like Bing and Google My Business, and remove duplicate citations. BrightLocal puts you squarely in charge of your citations, so you can quickly fix anything that might hurt your local rankings.
Similarly, BrightLocal also provides a handy reputation management feature to help you sanitize your online image. Track reviews from different sources, including Zillow, Google, Booking.com, Facebook, and most other popular sites for customer reviews. You can also respond to customer reviews from your BrightLocal dashboard.
If you’re not sure where to make improvements, BrighLocal provides local SEO audits, so you know exactly where your site ranks in local search engine results pages (SERPs). It reveals areas where you can make gains, fix inaccurate data and website issues, and capitalize on missed opportunities.
SmartSites
SmartSites is one of the more affordable local SEO services for businesses. The agency primarily offers listing management, content marketing, and citation building, allowing you to get what you need to rank in local searches from one provider.
This is a terrific option for store owners who don’t feel too comfortable with handling SEO concerns themselves. SmartSites will ensure that your business appears on all significant listings and those listings remain accurate and consistent across platforms.
SmartSites also offers citation management to ensure accurate NAPs, plus backlinking services, keyword research, and technical SEO services. You get the full enchilada without you having to educate yourself on these aspects of modern marketing. However, you can still track the performance of your SmartSites marketing plan from your account dashboard.
Best Local SEO Services for Service-Based Business
Service-based businesses require a different digital marketing approach in local SEO, needing more attention on their website so that it properly attracts visitors and potential customers. On-page SEO is critical because you want your site to be visible when someone wants to make an appointment, for example. Furthermore, digital agencies wanting to expand their services with minimal investment may also consider partnering with the right SEO service.
1SEO
1SEO is an all-in-one digital marketing agency that can handle everything from optimizing your website to paid advertising and creative services. The agency has more than a decade of experience working with service-based businesses, including small businesses in the fields of HVAC, healthcare, car dealerships, and home services.
This is a perfect choice if you want to leverage Google Local Service Ads (LSA) to appear on top of search engine results. That’s a critical tool for service-based businesses like locksmiths, electricians, HVAC, plumbers, and more. Plus, you’ll pay per lead (PPL) rather than per click, ensuring a higher ROI on your spending.
After an initial website audit, you’ll work with a 1SEO account manager to define your specific needs. 1SEO can handle social media management, reputation management, content creation, listings, backlinks, citations, and more. And, unlike most other agencies, 1SEO doesn’t lock you into a long-term contract.
The agency also offers white-label services for digital agencies. You can partner with 1SEO to better handle clients’ digital marketing needs and offer them add-on services like SEO and PPC ads. You’ll need to contact 1SEO for a consultation and a quote based on your required services.
WebFX
WebFX isn’t the cheapest local SEO service, but it’s a top choice for businesses willing to pay a premium for guaranteed results. WebFX account managers help you with research, optimization, content, keywords, earned media and links, and testing.
WebFX excels with its link-building, which is crucial for attracting site traffic from local customers and improving your ranking in local searches. WebFX will create a custom link-building plan to help you attract more leads, boost your rankings in local search results, and earn more revenue.
The best part is WebFX offers a free detailed website audit report. The report includes critical local SEO metrics like crawl and indexation analysis, image optimization, site speed analysis, and URL optimization check. The report also includes how to prioritize and fix your website’s SEO issues.
Finally, WebFX offers white-label services for digital agencies. You can outsource most digital services, including web development, web design, and search engine optimization, to WebFX and, in turn, offer those services to your clients.
Best Local SEO Services for Multiple Locations or Franchises
Franchises and businesses with multiple locations have special local SEO considerations. While using consistent branding across locations is crucial, it is equally vital to tweak the SEO strategy to resonate with each local area where a store or franchise location exists.
Blue Corona
Blue Corona has more than a decade of experience helping multi-location businesses and franchises get to the top of local search engine results. This full-service digital marketing agency handles everything so you can focus on your core business. Like all good local SEO services, Blue Corona also provides you with a dedicated account manager and digital marketing specialists to handle the work and communicate results to you.
Blue Corona is particularly helpful for small businesses expanding to new locations but works with companies in the categories of professional services, ecommerce, education, healthcare, and more. You’ll start with a free consultation with a Blue Corona expert to home in on your needs. Then, the agency provides recommendations, a roadmap for marketing your locations, and a custom quote.
Blue Corona also provides detailed monthly reports, so you’ll always know how the agency’s services are working to achieve your goals. And don’t worry about issues if you terminate your contract, as you’ll still own your website, business listings, and other digital assets.
Higher Visibility
Higher Visibility offers multiple local SEO services, including local on-page optimization, link building, and local listing citations. In addition, the agency has more than a decade of experience working with franchises and multi-location businesses, so they can help you whether your company is expanding or you’re making a push to attract new franchisees.
Enjoy a streamlined onboarding process that starts with a team call with a Higher Visibility brand success manager to go over your franchise marketing strategy, goals, and key performance indicators (KPIs). You’ll also get a walkthrough of the Higher Visibility InSite dashboard, where you can track campaign tasks, performance, and strategic insights. The agency also provides quarterly reviews and regular meetings for progress updates, campaign performance, objectives, and upcoming deliverables.
One Higher Visibility strong suit is its in-depth reporting and analytics to determine the actual value of the agency’s efforts. Access the InSite dashboard to track each location’s performance in local searches, then follow the agency’s guidance for improving on-page optimization.
You can also tap into Higher Visibility’s off-page SEO services, such as competitor profile targeting, domain authority improvement, local listing management, and online review monitoring. It doesn’t matter if you’re starting a new location or improving SEO for existing locations, Higher Visibility has everything you need to dominate local search results.
BrightLocal
You don’t always need a fully managed local SEO service if you already have some experience and expertise. BrightLocal can be used as a supporting tool to overcome the typical challenges of local SEO for multi-location businesses, franchises, and enterprises, helping you manage link building, on-page optimization, and citation management without getting overwhelmed.
BrightLocal makes your work easier by providing a unified dashboard for all websites and locations you’re trying to build up. Track search visibility and keyword rankings, then generate roll-up reports to combine all your KPIs into a single report to identify the best and worst-performing sites. Plus, use BrightLocal’s suggestions for appropriate online directories to manage based on where your locations are.
The platform also lets you handle reputation management at scale. For example, BrightLocal’s reputation management section has an enhanced overview feature to aggregate review data from multiple locations. As a result, you don’t need to manually pore through reviews one site at a time.
Further Reading
Managed local SEO services are helpful for busy or inexperienced business owners, letting you SEO to the experts so you can deal with other core concerns. But, it’s just the tip of the larger category of SEO within the wide landscape of modern digital marketing. If you want to educate yourself on these areas to become more confident about what you need and what you can handle yourself, check out some of our related posts here on Crazy Egg, listed below for your convenience.
