Last modified on: April 15th, 2024
Local search engine optimization (SEO) tools can help you gain valuable insight into your online visibility and uncover opportunities to get your business in front of nearby potential customers to generate more leads and sales.
The best local SEO tools include a variety of features. Examples include audits, finding keywords, managing listings, tracking rankings, and collecting customer reviews.
This post explores the best tools for local SEO based on 11+ years of experience managing local SEO campaigns and extensive research.
Learn more about the best SEO local tools including key features and pricing below.
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Top Local SEO Tools Overview
Here is an overview of the top tools for local SEO (described in detail below):
- Google Business Profile – Free Google Business listing creation.
- SE Ranking – Best low-cost all-in-one SEO software.
- BrightLocal – Affordable local SEO tools and services.
- Semrush – Premium SEO software with local add-on features.
- Moz Local – Reputable local search tools and services.
- Whitespark – Free and paid local SEO services and tools.
- Nightwatch – Accurate local rank tracking software.
- Mangools – Beginner-friendly SEO toolkit.
- Screaming Frog – SEO site crawler and audit software.
- Google Analytics – Free website traffic analysis tool.
Find out more about these top local SEO tools and their features below.
What to Look For in Local SEO Software
Consider these factors when choosing the best local SEO software for your needs:
- Capabilities for tracking keywords based on the locations you serve.
- Tools for analyzing competitor site rankings and backlink profiles.
- Features for managing and updating local business listings and citations.
- Features for monitoring brand reputation and online reviews.
- Ability to analyze website traffic and content performance.
- Ability to create SEO reports to track your local search progress.
There are many excellent local SEO tools on the market. Some are more specialized, niche tools, while others are more complete software platforms. You might need to use more than one SEO tool depending on your local search needs and goals.
| Local SEO Tool: | Key Features: | Starting Price: |
|---|---|---|
 |
| Free Google Business Profile Site |
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| $29.40 per month (14-Day Free Trial) SE Ranking Site |
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| Varies by product/service (14-Day Free Trial) BrightLocal Site |
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| $119.95 per month (7-Day Free Trial) Semrush Site |
 |
| $14/mo per location (Moz Pro offers 30-Day Free Trial) Moz Local Site |
 |
| Varies by product/service (Free Account) Whitespark Site |
 |
| $39 per month (14-Day Free Trial) Nightwatch Site |
 |
| $49 per month (10-Day Free Trial) Mangools Site |
 |
| £149.00 per year (Free Version) Screaming Frog Site |
 |
| Free Google Analytics Site |
What Are the Best Local SEO Tools?
Based on testing and reviewing these software tools for managing SEO campaigns, here are the 10 best local SEO tools:
1. Google Business Profile
Google Business Profile (formerly Google My Business or GMB) is Google's business listing service.
Google Business Profile lets you create a free profile for your business and offerings.
This listing can appear at the top of relevant local searches on Google Search and Google Maps.
Features
- A Google Business Profile gives your local business the ability to collect and respond to Google reviews. You can also receive messages from customers and prospects.
- A verified listing is necessary to get found in Google's local search results. This includes the map pack (location-based results) and nearby Google Maps searches.
- Edit the business information that appears on your Google listing. Add an address, phone number, website URL, business categories, and business description.
- Share photos of your business and publish short posts. Post about product and service updates, announcements, job offerings, events, or special offers.
- Get local insight on your business listing. See the number of visits, local keywords your business is appearing for, mobile calls, direction requests, and more.
Having an updated Google Business Profile with positive reviews can help your business get found in Google Search and Google Maps when people search for information about your company or the local products or services you offer.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- A free profile to improve your local Google Search presence
- Share details and images of your business for Google users to see
- Ability to collect Google reviews which can boost your rankings
- Get data on website clicks and calls through your listing
- You can manage listings for more than one business location
- Service area businesses can target multiple areas served
Cons
- New changes to a listing may not be reflected right away
- Lack of phone support to assist and educate business owners
- It can take time to verify a new listing if Google requires sending a postcard with a verification code to your business address (most arrive within 5 days)
Pricing
It's free to create your business profile on Google. You just need to sign into or create a Google Account to set up your profile.
2. SE Ranking
SE Ranking is an all-in-one SEO software that includes many helpful tools for small businesses to enterprise-level, local SEO, and SEO in general at an affordable price.
Features
- A marketing plan feature that offers suggestions and local SEO insights.
- In-depth website auditing and on-page SEO checker tools.
- Keyword rank tracker tool to monitor your local ranking performance.
- Monitor your off-site optimization factors including backlinks.
- Competitor analysis tools for SEO and Google Ads keyword research.
- Powerful report builder to create custom reports and track local SEO progress.
SE Ranking is one of the best SEO platforms on the market for an affordable, yet powerful set of features for growing local businesses.
Check out this SE Ranking review covering features in more detail.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Most affordable all-in-one SEO software on the market.
- Accurate local position tracker with solid tagging options.
- Large database of local keyword and competitive data.
- Option for daily keyword rank updates with plans.
- Flexible plan options for adjusting pricing.
Cons
- The user interface can feel somewhat disorganized.
- Can take some time to learn all provided features.
Pricing
Monthly SE Ranking pricing starts as low as $23/mo. Save 20% with annual billing.
SE Ranking offers a 14-day free trial. No credit card is required.
3. BrightLocal
BrightLocal provides an affordable toolkit of local SEO tools that help local businesses manage and scale their local search efforts for one or multiple business locations.
Features
- Local search audits covering on-site SEO, online listings, links, and reviews.
- Audit GMB listings, monitor local ranking signals, and gain more GMB insights.
- Simple ranking checker for tracking Google & Bing keyword positions.
- Track local keyword rankings with a unique top-down grid view across your area.
- Create, update, and submit your local citations across relevant directories.
- You own your listings and they are not removed if you decide to end services.
- Hand-off manual submission of business info across top data aggregator networks.
- Tools to create review campaigns, monitor online reviews, and showcase reviews.
BrightLocal's affordable tools and services can help you expand your listing presence, earn more online reviews, and improve local search engine rankings.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- A low-cost way to create and update local listings and online citations.
- Can select specific citations to have built by Brightlocal's team.
- Useful tools for performing SEO audits and generating reviews.
- Simple and convenient local search tracking for sites and clients.
- Visually appealing and insightful review and reputation reports.
Cons
- Done-for-you citation creation service can take several weeks.
- Lacks backlink data and in-depth competitor research tools.
Pricing
BrightLocal monthly plans start at $29 per month. Annual billing includes 2 free months.
The Multi-Business plan for $49 per month is required for white-label reports.
The SEO Pro plan for $79 per month provides access to Google mobile rank tracking and competitor tracking.
Citation building starts at $2 per citation.
You can also pay just for the reputation manager features for $8/mo per location.
BrightLocal offers a 14-day free trial. No credit card is needed.
4. Semrush
Semrush is a complete search engine optimization (SEO) toolkit that includes a variety of helpful local SEO services, local listing management tools, and other features for traditional SEO.
Features
- Automatically distribute your business data to business directories (over 80 for the U.S. and over 40 for other countries), edit your information in one place to update all sites, and suppress duplicate listings with Semrush's local listing management tool.
- The local listings management tool shows your local ranking trends, compares your position to other local businesses in Google Maps, lets you organize GMB & Facebook listings, and provides reports on how your listings perform.
- Additional local listing tool features include the ability to collect and respond to reviews on your GMB & FB listings directly from Semrush, see ratings from various sources, and get notified when a user suggests changing the information on one of your online listings.
- Monitor multiple business locations in one place and get recommendations for better local search results including a progress report.
- As a complete SEO toolkit, Semrush also provides site audits, rank tracking, keyword research, backlink analysis, competitor analysis, content gap tools, and local SEO reporting features that are valuable additions to local marketing efforts.
Semrush is a top choice for growing local businesses. You get a complete SEO platform with first-class features for keyword research, rank tracking, backlink research, competitor analysis, listings management, and review monitoring all in one place.
Check out this Semrush review exploring features in more detail.
Semrush Local Listings Management Tool
Scan and check your listings for free with the local listings management tool here.
This is a super useful tool for both businesses and local SEO experts who want to quickly submit business information for many listings and/or locations.
You can also use the citation finder tool to discover where to submit your business information and fix data inconsistencies across listings.
It allows you to update your business, name, address, phone number, and other listing data across 70+ local directories in the U.S. from one dashboard. You can also connect your Google business profile and sync your data with Facebook.
Example directory sites include Google Maps, Bing, Apple Maps, Amazon Alexa, Citysearch, Foursquare, Yelp, YP.com, Yahoo, Facebook, TripAdvisor, Factual, HotFrog, and a lot more.
The local listings tool also provides features to monitor reviews across major review sites including 70+ directories and analyze your star rating progress. Further, you can respond to Google and Facebook reviews directly from the tool.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- An array of feature-rich tools that are helpful for managing local SEO efforts.
- Update your business listings and citations for over 70 directories.
- Track daily local keyword rankings and create detailed SEO reports.
- Monitor local competitor rankings side-by-side with the position tracker.
- One of the largest databases of local keyword research and link data.
Cons
- The Guru plan is required for historical data and content marketing tools.
- Can be expensive for multiple users and tracking many websites.
Pricing
Monthly Semrush pricing starts at $119.95 per month. You can get a discount of up to 17% off with an annual plan.
For local listings management, a basic location costs $20/mo per individual location.
A premium location (includes local ranking heatmap and review management features) costs $40 per month for each business location.
Semrush offers a 7-day free trial and free account with limited feature access.
5. Moz Local
Moz Local SEO tool offers automated listing management, updating and organizing business location data, and features for managing online reputation and reviews.
Features
- Manage, sync, and optimize business listings from a single dashboard.
- Automatically distribute business location data to key directory sites and data aggregators, including automated removal of duplicate listings.
- Monitor, read, and respond to online reviews written on local review sites from one dashboard, get alerts of new customer reviews detected on major sites, and analyze review sentiment, keywords, and customer feedback over time.
- Publish local listing information and related updates to your Google and Facebook listings directly from Moz Local with Google and Facebook integration options.
- Reporting tools with insights into local search visibility such as an online presence score, profile completeness, listing scores, review reporting and sentiment analysis, and local search traffic data.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Manage local listings without having to visit each individually.
- Easy to understand and intuitive user interface design.
- Respond to reviews and analyze review sentiment.
- A useful feature for removing duplicate listings.
- Low cost for automatic citation building.
Cons
- Some local citation sources can take weeks to update.
- While more affordable, not as many listing sources as Yext.
Pricing
The separate Moz Pro software is required for rank tracking, keyword research, competitor analysis, and related reports. Moz Pro starts at $99/mo or $79/mo with yearly billing. Moz Pro offers a 30-day free trial.
Moz Local pricing plans start at $14/mo per location. This local SEO software provides listing management and distribution, reputation management, Google and Facebook integration, social posting, and notification alerts.
6. Whitespark
Previously a web design agency, Whitespark is a local SEO company that offers a suite of ala-carte tools and services to help businesses with local search marketing.
Examples include a local rank tracker, a local SEO checklist, a review and reputation builder tool, citation and GMB research tools, and listing management services.
Features
- With the listing service, business citations are manually submitted to listing sites and any existing citations found as well as duplicate citations are cleaned up on some sites depending on the package.
- You own your listings and they are not removed if you decide to end listing services.
- Get your business citations submitted to top data aggregator networks.
- Tools to find local citation opportunities and research GMB listing competitors.
- The reputation builder tool provides a number of features including review monitoring and reports, managing and responding to reviews, a review widget to market your reviews, and automated email and texting features to aid in getting reviews.
- Google local rank tracker for tracking keyword positions in local search results.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Track unlimited domains and locations with the local rank checker.
- Side-by-side rank tracker visuals of local competitors.
- Unique comparison views for local keyword rankings.
- Local listing service is more affordable than Yext.
- Useful citation finder and brand mention tools.
Cons
- Gets expensive if you require more than one tool.
- Not as many local citation sources as Yext.
Pricing
Whitespark's GMB management service is $497/month per listing.
The local listings service starts at $199 per location.
The Yext replacement service starts at $349 per month.
Local data aggregator cleanup is $99 per location.
Custom enterprise pricing and packages are also available.
7. Nightwatch
Nightwatch is a powerful rank tracker tool that provides accurate daily ranking updates for tracking many local keywords across different locations, including other websites, as well as site auditing and reporting features.
Features
- Best SEO rank tracking tool for local businesses and service-area businesses that want to accurately track many keyword rankings for multiple locations.
- Track and compare local rankings for competitor sites against your site.
- Group keyword rankings and create custom views based on filtering options such as keyword tags, search engine, location, device, ranking position, and more.
- Perform a site audit to discover SEO issues and opportunities.
- Monitor your website's backlinks and create automated ranking reports.
- Integration with Google Analytics and Google Search Console lets you analyze your web traffic and additional Google together in a visually appealing interface.
Accurately track, segment, and analyze many keywords in the local SERPs for the locations that matter to your business and get daily rank updates. This includes tracking keywords on Google, Google Maps, YouTube, Bing, Yahoo, and DuckDuckGo.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Affordably track many local keywords for multiple websites.
- One of the most accurate rank tracker tools on the market.
- Advanced keyword and dashboard view segmentation.
- Build attractive and automated local ranking reports.
- Daily rank updates are included in all plan tiers.
Cons
- Not as feature-rich as other all-in-one SEO software.
- Keyword search volume data could be improved.
Pricing
Monthly plans start at $39/mo. Save up to 40% with an annual subscription.
Nightwatch offers a 14-day free trial.
8. Mangools
Mangools provides a set of beginner-friendly tools helpful for local SEO including rank tracking, keyword research, backlink analysis, and competitor analysis tools.
Features
- Intuitive keyword research tools for finding low competition and local keywords.
- Visually appealing rank tracking tool with simple reporting options.
- Reveal a site's SEO authority including top content, backlinks, and competitors.
- Inspect off-site domain authority metrics for competing websites.
- Analyze local SERPs and see the strengths and weaknesses of local competition.
Mangools keyword research tool called KWFinder provides a really enjoyable and easy experience for finding new keywords with low competition and ranking difficulty.
Mangool's SERPWatcher tool is also great for those who prefer a simple but visually appealing keyword position tracker with daily rank tracking updates.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Easy-to-use set of SEO tools for beginners.
- Modern interface design that's easy to use.
- Find low-difficulty local keywords to target.
- Analyze the strength of competitor domains.
- Monitor local SEO rankings daily with all plans.
Cons
- Research data is not as in-depth as other tools.
- Lacks competitor tracking and reporting features.
Pricing
Monthly plans start at $49 per month. Save up to 40% with annual plans.
Mangools offers a 10-day free trial. No credit card is required.
9. Screaming Frog SEO Spider
Screaming Frog SEO Spider is a download required software for quickly crawling and auditing many website URLs for insight into site structure, page elements, crawl issues, and opportunities to improve your site's local SEO performance.
Features
- Crawl a website instantly including your site and competitor sites.
- Analyze page titles, meta descriptions, page subheaders, word count, inbound links, and more.
- Discover any redirects, page URLs blocked from search engines, and duplicate content.
- Visualize site architecture such as how your local pages are linked together.
- Connect your Google Analytics, Google Search Console, and PageSpeed Insights to fetch data for all page URLs in a single crawl.
- Schedule audits and compare crawls to track the progress of fixing SEO issues and finding opportunities.
The free version of Screaming Frog is very useful for auditing small local business sites and finding potential on-site SEO improvements.
The tool quickly identifies broken links, redirecting links, missing meta descriptions, titles, headers, and other SEO-related tags, internal links between pages, and external links to other sites.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Crawl a website quickly to analyze metadata.
- Diagnose technical SEO errors and redirect chains.
- Analyze internal anchor text to each page.
- Visualize site structure and build sitemaps.
- The free version lets you crawl up to 500 URLs.
Cons
- The UX/UI is dense and could be modernized.
- Can run out of memory when crawling a large site.
Pricing
Free up to crawling 500 URLs. The paid plan price is £149.00 per year.
10. Google Analytics
Google Analytics (GA) is a free website analytics tool for understanding how visitors explore your website, including insights into organic traffic from local SEO work.
Google Analytics can help guide your content and online marketing strategy based on the visitor engagement and demographic data it provides.
Features
- Discover the sources of your website visitors such as major search engines, social media, and other referring sites.
- Increase your understanding of how visitors from local searches use your site.
- Find out where visitors are from such as country, state, region, or city, to help you understand if your local SEO strategy and efforts are driving relevant local visitors to your site.
- See which pages are visited, including for how long, and how many pages a visitor views, to determine popular pages and which pages could potentially be improved.
- Track custom conversion events you determine such as website form submits, phone calls (call tracking software required), visitors from specific locations, page views, and more to better understand the customer journey.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Quick setup for tracking website visitor sessions.
- Get detailed insights into user demographics.
- Auto-tagging capabilities for Google properties.
- See where your website traffic comes from.
- Segment data and save custom reports.
Cons
- Semi-technical setup required for custom event tracking.
- The learning curve for understanding interface and features.
Pricing
Google Analytics is a freemium service. The free version is perfect for individuals and small to medium-sized companies.
The paid version, called Analytics 360, is suitable for large enterprises and provides features for tracking large sets of data and metrics.
Additional SEO Tools
Here are some other SEO tools that can be helpful for your local search campaigns.
Google Search Console
Google Search Console (GSC), formerly Google Webmaster Tools, is a free set of tools to help you manage and measure your website presence in Google search results.
Features
- Submit XML sitemap files to request indexing of site content into Google Search.
- Identify pages that are submitted, indexed, valid, or excluded from Google SERPs.
- See the date when your sitemap was last read by Google and its status.
- View clicks, impressions, clickthrough rate (CTR), and keyword position trends.
- Get insights into Core Web Vitals, mobile usability, and schema markup on pages.
- See external links (backlinks) and internal links that have been picked up by Google.
- Analyze crawl stats such as total crawl requests, download size (bytes), and average response time (ms) to better understand how the search engine crawls your site.
Bing Webmaster Tools
Bing Webmaster Tools (BWT) is a set of free tools offered by Microsoft for the management and analysis of your site on Bing Search.
Features
- Submit XML sitemap files to request indexing of site content into Bing Search.
- See the time when a sitemap file was last read by Bing and its current status.
- Identify webpages that are submitted, indexed, valid, or excluded from Bing SERPs.
- Check clicks, impressions, clickthrough rate (CTR), and keyword ranking trends.
- Scan your site for a simple audit that detects errors like missing titles or metatags.
- View referring domains, backlinks, and anchor text identified by BWT.
Google Trends
Google Trends is a website that allows you to analyze the popularity of top search queries and local terms in Google Search and YouTube across regions and languages.
Features
The site uses graphs to compare the search volume of different queries over time. You can add five search terms at once and compare their interest over time side-by-side.
Below the chart is more info on related topics and queries, with the option to filter topics and queries by those that are rising in interest or currently at the top (most popular).
You can also download a multi timeline CSV file of chart data and embed a script on your site that displays the chart of your selected terms with live and updated data.
GrowthBar
GrowthBar is a low-cost SEO tool and Chrome extension with features for performing local SEO research, competitive analysis, and tracking web rankings.
Features
- AI Writing Tool
- AI Blog Post Outline
- SEO Writing Services
- Keyword Research Tool
- Keyword Ranking Tool
- Competitor Research
- Content Idea Generator
GrowthBar offers a unique mix of search engine optimization tools and AI writing capabilities that are useful for executing simple but effective SEO campaigns.
GrowthBar pricing starts at $48 per month.
GeoRanker
GeoRanker is a local SEO platform with rank tracking, competitive intelligence, keyword research, citation sources, and data mining features.
Features
- High volume API for paid and organic SEO data such as keywords search volumes.
- Tools for rank tracking, automated local ranking reports, and competitor analysis.
- Customized data services related to parsing or building machine learning algorithms.
GeoRanker provides a powerful API (application programming interface) for SERP and keyword data extraction that might prove useful for large agencies or companies who are developing custom SEO-related software programs.
GeoRanker pricing starts at $99 per month.
Yext
Yext is a brand management platform offering a host of AI-powered marketing solutions for submitting listings, managing online reputation, site search functionality, and more.
Features
- Listing Management: Submit business data to Yext's Knowledge Graph to have your data synced, formatted, and published across each publisher in the network.
- Competitive Intelligence & Search Tracker: See how you stack up against competitors based on the share of search and branded vs. unbranded search performance.
- Reputation Management: Tools to monitor, analyze, respond to, and collect reviews. Create intelligent responses using pre-built text assets and dynamic templates.
- Site Search: Add AI-powered search functionality to your website. Yext site search understands natural language questions and returns relevant answers to users.
Yext listing plan pricing starts at $199 per year.
Synup
Synup is a local business citation and brand presence management platform.
Features
- Listings Management: List your business on Google, Facebook, Bing, Yelp, and around 35 other websites.
- Location Management: List every individual business outlet or store location to increase share-of-voice on search. Publish updates across listings in one click.
- Voice Search Optimizer: Upload details about your business and services for each location and optimize your listings to potentially surface on top for voice searches.
- Mobile App: Manage listings and customize store pages from your phone with Synup's mobile app for Android or iOS.
- Reputation Management: Monitor inbound reviews across partner sites such as Google, Facebook, and Yelp. Respond to incoming reviews from Synup.
- Review Highlights: Synup uses natural language processing to analyze the customer sentiment of reviews to help you understand customer likes and dislikes.
- Review Acquisition: Gather feedback directly from customers via email and SMS. Create and save frequently used responses as templates.
- Automation: Synup can automatically respond to reviews based on sentiment, star rating, location, or keyword. Set up automated filters, alerts, and messages.
Synup pricing starts at $30 per location.
BiQ
BiQ is an ai-powered SEO suite that contains four main products.
Features
- Keyword Intelligence: Find related keywords to target including data on keyword demand trends, volume, cost-per-click (CPC), competition, and search intent.
- Content Intelligence: Optimize content with the help of data-driven insights. Identify problems that may be hindering your content from ranking high on the SERPs.
- Rank Intelligence: Submit a site or URL to instantly check keyword positions, view performance by ranking distribution, and identify SERP feature opportunities.
- Rank Tracking: Get precise local ranking updates, view position history, and use advanced tagging and filter systems to organize and make sense of data.
- BiQ also offers a mobile app for on-the-go monitoring.
BiQ pricing starts at $55 per month.
Birdeye
Birdeye is a customer experience and reviews software for multi-location businesses.
Features
- Messaging: Message customers at any stage of the customer journey and manage all messages from prospects and customers insight the platform.
- Listings: Manage, update, and track business info for thousands of locations in a single dashboard and get listed and auto-synced across 50+ directories.
- Reviews: Collect, manage, and promote reviews across the web for one or thousands of individual business locations.
- Webchat: Place a chat widget on your site to capture and convert more leads, respond to questions automatically with a chatbot, and text leads that leave your site.
- Referrals: Create custom referral and loyalty programs for customers with features for automating campaigns, getting notifications, and capturing new leads on autopilot.
- Surveys: Send out automated surveys via text and get feedback with the help of AI-powered data insights.
- Ticketing: Convert reviews, social mentions, and survey responses into support tickets with Birdeye's ticketing software.
- Insights: Birdeye includes a natural language processing (NLP engine) called Athena that makes it easy to understand customer feedback and review sentiment trends.
- Benchmarking: Get access to your competitors' public sentiment data from over 150 review sites, 300 million websites, forums, blogs, and social media channels.
The Birdseye Standard plan pricing starts at $299 per month for a single location and includes the messaging, listing, and reviews features. The Professional plan provides the webchat, and the Premium plan unlocks the rest of the features shared above.
Local SEO Tools Comparison Table
| Local SEO Tool: | Strength: |
|---|---|
| Google Business Profile | Google Business Listing Creation |
| SE Ranking | Best Affordable All-In-One SEO Software |
| BrightLocal | Low-Cost Local SEO Tools & Services |
| Semrush | Premium SEO Platform with Local Features |
| Moz Local | Reputable Local Search Tools & Services |
| Whitespark | Free & Paid Local SEO Services & Tools |
| Nightwatch | Accurate Keyword Rank Tracking Software |
| Mangools | Simple Beginner-Friendly SEO Toolkit |
| Screaming Frog | Desktop Website Crawl & Audit Software |
| Google Analytics | Website Traffic Behavior Analysis Tool |
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Local SEO?
Local SEO is the practice of optimizing a business's website content, listings, links, and reputation for one or several local areas with the goal being to increase visibility in locally searched results to attract local traffic and potential customers.
SEO vs Local SEO: What's the Difference?
SEO and local SEO share many of the same tactics and strategies. However, local search engine optimization focuses more on creating localized content, listing citations, and links to rank prominently for relevant local search terms.
What Are Local SEO Tools?
Local SEO tools are used for various research, tracking, and optimization activities when managing a local search campaign.
Example activities include researching local keyword phrases, tracking keyword positions over time, auditing websites and links, and analyzing performance reports.
Are Local SEO Tools Free?
There are both paid and free local SEO tools available on the market. Free tools tend to provide limited features while paid tools offer access to robust sets of data and complex features.
Paid local SEO tools often include features for tracking specific local search terms, running detailed audits, getting access to data on your local competition, and creating reports.
Which is the Best Tool for Local SEO?
The best local SEO tool for your business depends on a number of factors including your goals, industry, and competition.
All-in-one SEO software is great for most tasks in conjunction with other local search tools for completing more specific tasks like checking individual page speeds and managing listings.
Check out the local SEO tool recommendations below for a summary of which tools are best depending on the activity.
Why is Local SEO Important?
Local search engine optimization (SEO) can help your business get found by potential customers when they search up terms relevant to your business in the areas you serve.
Example searches include the types of products or services your business offers, various questions about your business, and how-to guides related to your niche. A variety of SEO strategies and tactics are used to increase visibility for these terms.
Local SEO activities include site audits, keyword research, competitor analysis, publishing localized content, managing business listings, earning online reviews, tracking keyword rankings, and monitoring SEO performance.
Local SEO tools can help you with these many of these tasks. Some of the tools shared below can also help you uncover topics and keywords to create content around that offer the best chance of driving targeted local traffic to your site if you rank for them.
Consider these local SEO statistics:
- 90% of consumers have used the internet to find a local business. (BrightLocal)
- 82% of consumers read online business reviews during a local search. (BrightLocal)
- 28% of local searches result in a purchase. (WebFX)
- 46% of all Google searches have local intent. (99 Firms)
- Businesses enjoyed a 61% increase in calls from January to July 2020 because of their Google My Business listing. (Small Business Trends)
Why Use Local SEO Tools?
Local SEO software tools can help you manage more effective campaigns.
Here are 7 benefits of using local SEO tools:
- Uncover your rivals' strengths and weaknesses
- Better understand local search intent and terms to use
- Get found by more “near me” and “close by” searches
- Know how often relevant local search queries are searched
- Discover the type of backlinks pointing to competing pages
- Monitor your site's and competitors' keyword rankings over time
- Efficiently audit many web pages across multiple websites
- Schedule and share automatically generated local SEO reports
Conclusion & Recommendations
The best local SEO tools give your business a competitive advantage and can help you boost your online presence, get found by customers, and increase leads and sales.
Consider testing some of these local search engine optimization tools to gain market intelligence and improve the overall effectiveness of your local SEO efforts.
For small businesses on a tight budget, an all-in-one SEO platform can give you the best bang for your buck and allows you to get more done under one roof.
These tools include features covering major aspects of local search marketing like keyword research, competitor insights, rank tracking, website auditing, and reporting.
SE Ranking or Semrush is your best bet for access to market-leading keyword and competitor research data, among other helpful tools for managing SEO campaigns.
For newer businesses, I recommend SE Ranking as a more affordable Semrush alternative that scales well as you grow and offers super flexible plan options.
SE Ranking has everything you need for researching keywords and competitors, finding link opportunities, rank tracking, website auditing, and reporting. While the research data isn't as extensive as Semrush, it's pretty close and new features are added often.
If your local business is well established, the premium choice is Semrush to gain access to leading keyword, competitor, and backlink data, as well as daily rank tracking, local SEO audits, an easy-to-use interface, and extensive reporting features.
Semrush also provides a tool for managing local listings, updating your business data on prominent directories, monitoring reviews, and encouraging customer engagement.
Alongside an SEO platform, BrightLocal is worth checking out for an affordable complementary set of local SEO tools and services including their citation building service and review management tools.
Finally, Google Analytics, Google Business Profile, and Google Search Console are top-notch free SEO tools that are essential for analyzing your site traffic, managing your Google business listing, and improving your local presence in Google Search.
Google Keyword Planner is another free tool you can use for basic keyword research. While this tool is built into Google Ads, the tool is useful for checking local search term demand and getting a sense of how competitive terms are based on PPC data.
Top-Pick Local SEO Tool Offers:
- SE Ranking Free Trial – 14-day free trial with access to all features.
- Semrush Free Trial – 7-day free trial with full access to toolkits.
- BrightLocal Free Trial – 14-day free trial with access to the full toolset.
Helpful Local SEO Resources
Here are some of the most helpful resources about local SEO on the web:
- Definitive Guide to Local SEO (Backlinko)
- Comprehensive Guide to Local SEO (HubSpot)
- Local SEO Checklist (Synup)
- Local Search Ranking Factors (Whitespark)
- How to Improve Local Rankings on Google (Google)
- 21 Web Directories You'll Still Want to Use (Search Engine Journal)
- Local SEO Secrets eBook (Roger Bryan)
I hope this post helped you find the best local SEO solution for your needs.
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- Best SEO Automation Software
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