What is local SEO, and how would you improve a local business's visibility?
What the interviewer wants to hear
- Visibility in local pack, Maps and 'near me' searches
- Complete, accurate Google Business Profile
- Earn and respond to genuine reviews
- Consistent name, address and phone across listings
- Local landing pages with useful local content
- Local links and mentions
Model answer
Local SEO helps a business appear when people search for services nearby, in the map pack, Google Maps and normal results. Google ranks local results on relevance, distance and prominence. I start with the Google Business Profile: correct name, categories, address, hours, services, photos and regular updates. Reviews are very important, so I help the business ask happy customers for genuine reviews and reply to all reviews, including negative ones. I make sure the name, address and phone number are the same on the website and major directories. On the website, I create clear location or service-area pages with useful local information, not just the city name swapped in. Finally, I look for local links and mentions, such as local news, sponsorships and partner businesses. I track calls, direction requests and bookings, not just rankings.
Can you answer it under time pressure?
Take a timed easy round and get scored on every answer.
More easy SEO Specialist questions
- Explain in simple words how a search engine like Google finds and ranks pages.
- What is search intent, and why does it matter for SEO?
- What are the key on-page SEO elements you check on a page?
- What are backlinks, and what makes a good backlink?
- How do you use Google Search Console in your daily SEO work?
- What are Core Web Vitals, and why do they matter?
- What is the difference between robots.txt and a noindex tag?
- What is structured data, and how do you use it for SEO?
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