Local SEO Checklist

Search the business name + city in Google Maps and check whether the profile is claimed and verified, claimed but unverified, or missing entirely. A duplicate unclaimed listing is the most common gotcha — note any duplicates so they can be merged or removed during the citation cleanup phase.

Submit the claim through business.google.com and request verification. Most service-area businesses get video verification; storefronts get postcard or phone. Postcard delivery typically takes 5–14 days, so kick this off early.

Primary category drives the lion's share of map-pack relevance. Use PlePer or GMBspy to see what categories top-ranking competitors use for the target query. Add 2–4 secondary categories that match real services, not aspirational ones.

Pick one canonical version of name, address, and phone — including suite formatting ("Ste 200" vs "Suite 200") and whether the phone uses parentheses or dashes. Document it in the brand wiki so every citation, schema block, and footer matches exactly.

Upload exterior, interior, team, and product shots — geotagged using GeoImgr or similar. Add a 30-second walkthrough video. Profiles with photos get materially more direction requests; refresh monthly.

Fill every services entry (these become local-pack ranking signals), set attributes that apply (wheelchair accessible, women-owned, LGBTQ+ friendly, etc.), and confirm holiday hours through the next quarter. Wrong holiday hours surface in Maps as "Hours may differ" — a trust hit.

Pattern: {Service} in {City} | {Brand}. Keep titles under 60 characters so they don't truncate in SERP. Use a city the business actually serves — stuffing five neighborhoods triggers Google's local spam filters.

Lead with the service + location, include a differentiator (years in business, certifications, free quotes), and end with a CTA. Run through Ahrefs SERP simulator to confirm no truncation on mobile.

Use the most specific Schema.org subtype (Dentist, Plumber, Restaurant) instead of generic LocalBusiness. Include sameAs links to GBP, Yelp, Facebook, and industry directories. Validate with Google's Rich Results Test before deploy.

One indexable URL per service-area city, each with unique copy — neighborhood landmarks, local case studies, embedded Google Map, driving directions. Don't spin doorway pages with templated copy; Google's helpful content system flags them.

Footer NAP must match the source of truth byte-for-byte, marked up with schema. Embed the Google Maps iframe pointed at the verified GBP location ID — not a generic search query — so the embed reinforces the canonical entity.

Use BrightLocal, Whitespark, or Moz Local to surface every existing citation. Flag NAP mismatches, duplicates from prior addresses, and listings under former business names. Export the report and attach below.

Submit merge or removal requests for duplicates on Google Maps, Yelp, and Bing. For data-aggregator-sourced duplicates, fix at the aggregator (Data Axle, Foursquare, Localeze) so the correction propagates downstream rather than playing whack-a-mole.

These are the three highest-impact non-Google citations. Apple Business Connect drives Siri, Apple Maps, and Spotlight results — frequently overlooked. Use the canonical NAP and primary category from the GBP setup phase.

Data Axle, Foursquare, and Localeze (Neustar) seed hundreds of downstream directories. A Yext or Whitespark Local Citation Builder subscription handles aggregator submission; manual entry works but takes 30–90 days to propagate.

Vertical directories carry more local-pack weight than generic ones — Avvo for legal, Healthgrades for medical, HomeAdvisor and Houzz for trades, TripAdvisor and OpenTable for hospitality. Pull the relevant set from BrightLocal's industry citation lists.

Trigger a request after the work order closes or the visit is complete — not days later. Birdeye, Podium, NiceJob, or a HubSpot workflow with the GBP review short-link all work. Never gate by sentiment ("if happy, ask for a review; if not, ask for feedback") — Google's review policy prohibits review gating.

Owner responses are a ranking signal and a trust signal. Use the reviewer's first name, reference the specific service, and avoid templated language across responses. For negative reviews, acknowledge, take the resolution offline, and never argue facts publicly.

Reviews from competitors, ex-employees, or non-customers violate GBP policy and can be removed via the report flow plus a follow-up through Google Business Profile support chat. Document the case ID — escalations sometimes take two or three contacts to land.

Set up alerts in your reputation platform or use Google Alerts plus direct platform notifications. Yelp's recommendation filter hides legitimate reviews from new accounts; don't ask customers to copy a Google review onto Yelp — they'll get filtered.

Run a Link Intersect against the top three local competitors filtered to .gov, .edu, .org, and city-TLD domains. Chamber of Commerce sites, local newspaper directories, and university partner pages are usually the highest-ROI targets.

Filter for queries needing local sources or owner expertise. Lead with credentials, deliver the quote in the email body (not as an attachment), and respond within two hours of the query. Local-paper backlinks pass strong topical relevance to the location landing pages.

Sponsor packages typically include a logo + dofollow link from the sponsor page. Confirm the link is dofollow before committing — many event sites default to nofollow. School fundraisers, 5Ks, and chamber events convert sponsorship dollars into citations and links efficiently.

Chamber membership earns a directory listing on a high-trust local domain. BNI and similar referral groups produce both citations and offline word-of-mouth that drives branded search — a compounding signal.

Lead with a topic the publication's readers actually care about — neighborhood guide, seasonal advice, market report. Anchor text should be branded or naked URL on the contextual link, not exact-match commercial keywords. One genuine local guest post outperforms ten generic guest-post-network placements.