What Is Local SEO Strategy 2019 and Why Does It Matter

Local SEO in 2019 focuses on optimizing a business's online presence to rank for searches within a specific geographic area. Unlike traditional SEO, which targets national or international audiences, local SEO targets customers actively searching for services "near me" or within their city. This includes optimizing Google My Business listings, building local citations, earning location-specific backlinks, and creating geographically relevant content. For agencies, this represents a massive opportunity because most small businesses—the ones who actually hire agencies—operate locally and desperately need help capturing nearby customers searching on mobile devices.

The practical value for your agency is straightforward: local SEO services are easier to deliver, more profitable to scale, and produce faster results than organic national SEO. A plumber in Phoenix or a dentist in Austin doesn't need to rank nationwide—they need phone calls from people in their service area. This means you can deliver real business results in 60-90 days rather than 6-12 months, which improves client satisfaction and retention. Local clients also tend to be less sophisticated about SEO, so they're more likely to accept your recommendations without endless debates about strategy. You'll also find that local SEO requires less competitive keyword research because you're competing against fewer established players in specific geographic markets.

To use local SEO practically in your agency, start by specializing in one or two industries within your region. A web design agency in Dallas could focus exclusively on local service businesses like HVAC contractors, plumbers, and electricians. Build case studies showing a roofing company ranking for "roofing contractor near me" searches in their specific neighborhoods. This positioning makes your sales conversations concrete and your results measurable. The core tactics involve claiming and optimizing Google My Business profiles (which many small business owners haven't even claimed), building local citations in directories relevant to their industry, encouraging location-based reviews, and creating location-specific content pages for service areas. You can often win local rankings with minimal technical SEO because local factors—citations, reviews, proximity—carry enormous weight in Google's algorithm.

The timing in 2019 makes this particularly relevant because mobile search adoption had just reached critical mass, and "near me" searches were still growing rapidly. Small business owners finally understood they needed an online presence but often didn't know where to start. Your agency can position itself as the expert who bridges that gap. Create a simple service offering: optimize their Google My Business profile, build 10-15 high-quality local citations, implement schema markup for local business, and develop a review generation system. Price this as a project or monthly retainer, and you'll likely see faster client results than with broader SEO work.