Local SEO for trades

The list is short: a tidy website, the same business details everywhere, new pages on a regular basis, and reviews coming in. Do those and keep doing them. This guide covers SEO for contractors in plain terms. The posts under it go into each piece, from page titles to service-area pages.

What local SEO is

When someone searches "plumber near me" or "Tampa electrician", Google shows two kinds of result: the map pack with three businesses, and the regular results underneath. Local SEO is the work that gets your business into both for the searches that bring in calls. The map side is mostly your Google Business Profile and your reviews. The regular results side is your website.

Fix the site you have

Many contractors have a site built by a nephew, a franchise program or a template builder. Most of it can be fixed rather than rebuilt. Common problems are the same on almost every trades site:

• Vague page titles, like "Home" or "Welcome".
• Missing meta descriptions, so Google writes its own.
• One page for every service, when each job (boiler, drain, rewire, re-roof) deserves its own.
• Thin service pages with two sentences and no mention of where you work.
• No phone number that is tappable on a phone.

Fixing those often helps more than anything clever. You rarely need a new website.

Pages for what you do and where you do it

Customers search for a job plus a place. A page for each main service and a page for each of your main cities and counties gives Google a reason to show you. Write them with real detail: a water heater swap in Tampa, how long it took, what the customer asked. Do not copy the same page with the town swapped, because it reads as thin and does not help. Cover places you really work.

Keep your details the same everywhere

Your business name, address (or service area) and phone number should match on your website, your Google profile and any directory you are in, including Yelp, the BBB and the directories for your trade. Mismatches confuse customers and search engines alike. Check it twice a year and any time something changes.

Reviews and photos on the site

A few recent reviews and some real job photos on your service pages help the customer decide, and fresh content gives search engines a reason to come back. The reviews guide covers how to collect them.

Publish regularly, and track what moves

New pages about the work you do and the places you cover keep the site alive. Then keep an eye on where you rank for the searches that actually bring in calls, not for vanity terms. Rankings move gradually, so check monthly, not daily.

What an agency charges, and the cheaper path

Agencies selling SEO to contractors usually charge a monthly retainer, and the range is wide. Ask what you get each month in writing, ask who owns the website and the accounts, and be wary of anyone who promises a ranking. Nobody can guarantee one. The paying for leads versus owning your reputation guide covers the other end of the spend.

The cheaper path is to do the same short list regularly, which is where most contractors fall down: it is always the thing left till Sunday night.

Common mistakes

• Paying for a link package or a "directory submission" deal you do not understand.
• Writing pages for every ZIP code you have never worked in.
• Letting an agency register the domain or the Google profile in their name.
• Checking rankings from your own phone at home, where results are skewed to you.
• Judging it after three weeks.

For a contractor with a decent site and a handful of recent reviews, a few steady months of fixes and new pages can beat a big one-off spend. Keep the tally of where your calls actually come from, because ranking first for a term nobody uses does not ring the phone.