Local SEO and Marketing for National Franchises, Part 2

In part one of this multi-part blog series, we went over some of the initial target audience acquisition methods for national franchise businesses looking to improve their local SEO and marketing efforts. While many such franchises have their national marketing fully under control, they often lack the proper tools or expertise to maintain the same level of interest within individual franchises.

At SEO Werkz, local SEO service and optimization are vital parts of our overall search engine optimization and internet marketing program, which also includes PPC, social media, retargeting and numerous other areas. Today’s part two in our series will focus on a few location-specific themes to consider, including areas to list your locations, the type of website you choose, and some tips on using the proper keywords in your website content to attract the right kinds of leads.

Location Listings

You want to make it simple and easy for potential clients to locate any of your franchises within a given area, particularly if you have multiple in the same city. The first method many people use for this today is a simple Google search, which means it’s vital to register each location you have using Google My Business – this should be one of the first steps you take upon opening any new franchise location.

In addition, every single location you franchise should be listed on Yelp as well. Yelp is a massive review site that many people search when looking into a particular need, and you’ll be costing yourself significant potential leads if even a single franchise in a given city is not listed in Yelp.

Website Type

One important question you’ll have to answer as you build up your local SEO for a given franchise or area: Will you be using a microsite for each location, or a single corporate website?

The former refers to a specific website that can rank for local keywords, plus offer its own promotions and even potentially buy its own pay-per-click (PPC) ads. The latter, on the other hand, involves creating a “locations” page or something similar on your main corporate site, listing basic information for each individual location and potentially a map to help customers find them. Your choice here will depend on several factors, each of which our team is happy to go over with you.

Keywords and Content

Another important area to consider during this process is creating content for your local pages, and a key element here is the keywords you use. These should be location-based in large part, using either specific city names or local destinations, landmarks or regional terms to help define many of the areas people will search for. You might be surprised just how much your visibility will improve through the use of these focused keywords.

For more on crafting optimal local marketing strategies as a national franchise, or to learn about any of our private label SEO services, speak to the staff at SEO Werkz today.