Free local SEO checklist

An unclaimed profile can be edited by anyone.

Claim it in the Google Business Profile manager. Finish verification before you change anything else.

Adding a city or a keyword to the name is a policy problem.

Use the name on the sign and the invoices. Remove stuffed words.

The primary category decides which searches you can show for.

Pick the closest category. Add secondary categories only for real services.

A suite number on one and not the other splits the identity.

Copy the address from the profile onto the contact page, or the other way round. Pick one.

Wrong hours create bad reviews.

Set regular hours and the next holiday. If you are a service-area business, hide the address if customers do not visit.

A tracking number that never matches the site confuses citations.

Use the main number on the profile and the site. Put tracking in the call reporting tool, not in the name.

A radius that covers a whole country looks spammy.

List the places you actually travel to.

It is not a keyword list.

Write two or three sentences a customer would understand.

The services list is what people tap.

Add the jobs you want calls for. Write a sentence each. Skip the jobs you no longer do.

A shop without products looks incomplete.

Add the main products, with a price if the price is public.

Stock photos of a van you do not own get noticed.

Upload the premises, the team, and the work. Cover, logo, and at least a handful of jobs.

Posts are not a ranking trick. They are a sign of life.

Post an offer, a job, or a seasonal note when you have one. Do not schedule empty filler.

Unanswered questions sit on the listing.

Answer in the profile. If the question is wrong, say so plainly.

Old practitioner listings and moved offices create duplicates.

Search the brand and the phone. Ask Google to merge or remove the extras.

The request works when the work is done and the person is happy.

Send one short message with the review link. One reminder is enough.

A link to a search result makes people hunt.

Use the review URL from the profile. Put it in the message, the invoice, and the site.

A reply shows a person is there. It also lets you add the service and the city in normal words.

Thank them. Name the job if they did. Do not argue in public.

A fight makes the review worse.

Say what you will do. Take the detail offline.

Asking only happy customers, and blocking the rest, breaks the rules.

Send the same link to everyone who completed the work.

Some customers review on Facebook or an industry site.

Claim those profiles. Reply there too if you can.

The footer is the version crawlers see on every page.

Use the same name, address, and phone. Link the phone.

Old addresses linger on directories you forgot.

Check the big ones in your country. Fix the ones that still show the old suite or the old name.

Two phone numbers in schema and in the text is a mess.

Use the same values. One LocalBusiness per location page.

A different number on every directory looks like different businesses.

Keep one public number. Use tracking on ads if you need it.

Changing the address without updating citations drops the listing.

Update the profile, the site, and the main directories in the same week.

Bing feeds other directories.

Claim the listing and copy the same name, address, and phone.

Apple Maps uses its own listing.

Claim it and use the same details. Do not invent a second name.

People still click those profiles.

Update the address and the hours. Link them from the site.

A tagged URL that 404s wastes the click.

Use the clean URL. Track the click inside analytics if you need to.

Swapping the city name is not a page.

Write the area, the jobs, and a proof point that belongs to that place.

An address only inside a map image is easy to miss.

Put the address in text. Then the map.

A page for every town in the country is a footprint problem.

Build pages for places you serve and can talk about.

They should not be a dead end.

Link the relevant services and the neighbouring locations you actually cover.

The place should be visible, not stuffed three times.

One clear title. Check it in the meta tool if you want a length read.

A copied embed from head office is a common miss.

Open the page on a phone and confirm the pin.

A dentist is not a general LocalBusiness if a tighter type exists.

Pick the subtype. Include name, url, telephone, and address or areaServed.

Do not link a profile you do not control.

Add the Google profile, Facebook, and any industry profile that is yours.

Google ended most FAQ rich results on 7 May 2026.

FAQ schema can still help machines read the questions. Do not promise the rich result.

A single site-wide goal hides which town works.

Name the conversion with the location. Check one test lead.

Calls, direction requests, and website clicks are the local numbers.

Note them next to organic clicks. Do not mix them into one vanity total.