You can’t make data-backed marketing decisions without data. Some of the most important aspects of your business, like local SEO, can often feel like guesswork when you don’t have the industry insights you need.
You need statistics to help you promote your business in the best way possible. For example, data can be a guide as you connect with your local audience while making your presence known on top search engines like Google and Bing. That’s where local SEO statistics come in. We’ve got the data and statistics to show you just how powerful local SEO is, with specific proof points that answer questions like:
- What are the statistics on SEO?
- What percentage of searches are local?
- Is local SEO still relevant?
Be sure to bookmark this post for later as it’s filled with local SEO statistics that can guide you through anything those pesky search engines throw at you.
Local SEO statistics (our top picks)
We couldn’t wait to dig into the “good stuff” when it comes to local SEO data. Check out some of our favorite local SEO statistics below:
1. 46% of Google searches are local
That’s right, nearly half of all Google’s 8.5 billion searches per day (99,000 per second) are local. This means there is a huge slice of opportunity on that platform alone for your business. With those numbers, there’s clearly a chance to engage with your potential customers when you invest in local SEO (and it shows why you definitely need this strategy!).
2. 80% of local mobile searches convert
Not only are there millions of local searches happening on Google each minute, but they also lead to meaningful actions. This data point proves that most people conducting local searches have a strong purpose in mind: to become a customer.
Whether your conversion goal is to capture potential customer contact information, drive calls, or simply get more clicks to a specific landing page, local searches can help you achieve those valuable (and profitable!) goals.
3. 97% of people learn more about a local company online than anywhere else
This isn’t really surprising. People aren’t checking businesses out in the Yellowpages anymore (hello, blast from the past!), and while some may simply walk into a business before conducting research, most people turn to the web. It’s quick and convenient, and you can find pretty much anything you’re looking for.
This is why having an effective small business website coupled with a strong local SEO strategy is so important.
4. 90% of brands found that online reviews impacted local rankings
In other words, businesses have noticed a correlation between the reviews they have on their business listings and how well they perform on local search results. This is due to Google factoring in the quality of Google Business Profile listings as one of its top local SEO ranking factors (more on this later).
So this means that you can’t have a strong local SEO strategy without business listings (and you need a strong local SEO strategy to help your business listings show in results!).
You’ll also want to be actively asking for reviews to help grow the number of 5-star reviews your listing has. Plus, it also doesn’t hurt to respond to all reviews (good or bad).
5. 35% of businesses feel local SEO is important
We may be a bit biased, but we were a little surprised by how small this percentage is! Right now, a third of all businesses find that local SEO is an essential part of their marketing, which means now is a good time for you to prioritize this for your business as the competition will only get tougher from here on out.
Help your business stand out against the rising local SEO competition by using the right local keywords to ensure you’re ranking for the most relevant searches.
Get our local keyword research template.
6. 61% of businesses say that generating traffic and leads is their number one challenge
This local SEO statistic plays off the one above. We now know that only a third of businesses are prioritizing local SEO. However, more than half say that they’re struggling to get traffic and leads. Local SEO is the optimal solution for website growth and lead generation. If you prioritize an airtight local SEO strategy now, you’ll be ahead of these other growing businesses that find local lead generation and traffic growth to be a challenge.
7. 50% of business owners have seen incorrect information on their local listings
Yikes! There’s nothing worse than seeing inaccurate information about your business out in the world. Not only does incorrect business information create a negative experience for potential customers, but it can also hurt your ranking on search engines because consistency is so important to Google.
To avoid being a part of this scary local SEO stat, try free online tools, like the LocaliQ Free Business Listings Grader, to regularly audit all your listings in one place. That way, you can quickly double-check that your business listings have the most up-to-date business description, contact information, operating hours, and more.
Local SEO statistics that benefit any business
Clearly, local SEO is an important part of a holistic marketing strategy. The following benefits of local SEO prove that regardless of where you’re at in your marketing journey, local SEO is a need-to-have tactic.
8. Local SEO leads have nearly a 15% close rate
While we saw above that over three-quarters of local searches convert into leads, this local SEO statistic shows that a good chunk of those leads also converts into paying customers.
This proves that local SEO can push searchers down the sales funnel for you, which can help you grow your business without a huge lift on your end.
9. 28% of local searches result in a purchase within 24 hours.
It’s clear that local SEO is effective in growing your business in the long term. However, this local SEO statistic proves that local SEO can also bring you speedy results with a quick turnaround between local searches and purchases.
10. 64% of small businesses have a local SEO presence
With over two-thirds of small businesses already investing in their local search visibility, this is clearly an opportunity you won’t want your local business to miss out on. This also means that competition can be stiff, especially depending on your top keywords, your location, and your industry. By keeping up with the latest SEO trends and ensuring you’re following best practices, you can help your business stand out.
11. 40% of local SEO campaigns achieve a 500% or better ROI
It’s no secret that return on investment (ROI) is a major marketing metric to indicate success for most businesses. And for almost half of all local SEO campaigns to achieve such a high ROI is pretty incredible when you think about it! This shows that local SEO is a great addition to your marketing plan—and it won’t hurt your marketing budget!
12. People are willing to pay 22% more for a local product or service if the business has a good online reputation
Because reputation management is so closely tied with local SEO, this was a stat worth mentioning. Having a good online reputation doesn’t mean just having 100 5-star reviews, it also means that you’re presenting accurate and updated information about your business across the web, especially on business listings.
Local SEO helps you achieve a good online reputation, which can bring a huge payoff as customers are more willing to spend with your business.
13. For the average business, nearly 25% of website traffic comes from local searches
With a quarter of website visits coming from local searchers, SEO is an essential strategy if you want local searches to drive even more traffic to your website.
Local SEO and your website work hand-in-hand, so make sure your website is optimized using the right local keywords, is mobile-friendly, and loads quickly.
You can test how well your website performs with our free website grader.
More local SEO statistics
Want even more digital marketing statistics that speak to local SEO? Take a look at these fun marketing facts about local SEO.
14. The average page in the top 10 local search results is over 2 years old
This is another local SEO statistic that shocked us as we’ve seen more and more results that seem to be from the last year. However, the average result is actually over two years old, and this may be partially due to domain authority. Google may favor an older result over a newer one if it has a higher domain authority. Domain authority is a local SEO ranking factor that indicates to Google the quality of your page.
Google has a job to do: Provide high-quality results to its searchers. So, it’s important to create content consistently now to establish domain authority for the future.
15. 49% of businesses say that local organic search brings them the best marketing ROI
With some of the data we’ve seen regarding the benefits of local SEO, this statistic totally makes sense. Don’t just take our word for it, this statistic gets right to the source by indicating that business owners just like you feel that local SEO is worth the effort.
16. A Google Business Profile is one of Google’s top local SEO ranking factors
Here are the top five local SEO ranking factors from least to most important:
- Your Google Business Profile: Is your Google Business Profile listing fully filled out and up to date?
- Your Google reviews: Does your Google Business Profile have many reviews, and are they skewing positively?
- Proximity of the searcher in relation to your business: The closer your business is to the searcher, the higher you’ll rank.
- Physical address in the city of search: Even if you’re not close to the searcher, is your business otherwise in a convenient or popular location?
- Consistency of citations: Are there other local listing sites, like Yelp, that link to your website?
This local SEO information provides a plethora of opportunities to help your business succeed, but clearly, the lowest-hanging fruit is to optimize your Google Business Profile.
17. 58% of people search for a local business on their smartphone daily.
This marketing fact makes sense. Think about the last time you ordered takeout from a local restaurant or inquired about an offering from a home services business. You most likely did it on your phone since you were planning to make a call. Or perhaps you were discussing the decision with someone else, and you may not have been right by your computer.
Your customers are in the same boat as over half of them are looking for local businesses on their mobile devices. This means your website should be mobile-friendly. Use a free mobile-friendly site test to see if your website is responsive and able to accommodate various devices. Other quick mobile website fixes are to keep your copy concise and your calls to action clear to meet the needs of website visitors on the go.
18. 78% of local mobile searches result in an offline purchase
Even though most local business inquiries happen online via a mobile device, over three-quarters of them result in an offline purchase later. As you look at your local SEO metrics and see lots of traffic with no conversions, this could indicate that you’re getting even more activity offline.
19. 56% of actions on Google Business Profile listings are website visits
And 24% of actions are calls to the business as well as 20% of actions lead to other direct searches. As you optimize your Google Business Profile listing for local SEO, you’re also doing your business a favor by helping customers move through the buyer’s journey.
An example of all the actions that could be completed using this organic Google Business Profile result.
20. 50% of businesses believe that SEO tools are keeping up with the changes in local marketing
Local SEO trends are constantly on the move, and so should the online tools that help with them. It’s encouraging to see that, if you do invest in a local SEO tool, it most likely will be up to speed on the latest and greatest in local marketing.
Be sure your local SEO tool, like your keyword research tool, reporting system, and more, can assist with high-priority items like ranking factors and keywords.
21. About 8% of local search queries are phrased as questions
As you optimize your local keywords, don’t forget about the chunk of phrases that are posed as questions in the search bar. You may want to check out the “People Also Ask” section of the Google results page for popular local searches your business shows for. You could answer those questions on your website (like on an FAQ page) to be a resource for local searchers looking to get answers.
An example of common high-intent local searches that are phrased as questions.
22. 90% of consumers who search for a local business will make a purchase within one week of their initial search
The hardest part of local SEO? Patience. You may not get customers or even clicks right away as you start off your local SEO strategy. But waiting for those additional purchases to come through can be well worth it. Local search may be just to get initial information but could spark interest and purchases later.
That being said, a multichannel marketing strategy is best when implementing local SEO. When you optimize local SEO, you’ll also want to be beefing up your other marketing channels. That way, your local SEO can bring the customers in, and your other marketing channels can close the deal later.
Local SEO can be the start of the buyer’s journey, whereas the decision that is derived from the initial search happens much later.
23. One in three people use their smartphone to search for products before looking for a physical store nearby
No one likes to have their time wasted. The beauty of smartphones is that they now save us from that since we can ensure going to a physical store is worthwhile with a quick, local search first. This is yet another proof point of how local SEO can work for both online and offline business models.
24. 42% of businesses agree that Google is becoming “the new homepage” for local businesses
Off the top of your head, do you know the exact website URL for the local businesses you enjoy frequenting? Odds are, you probably don’t. As nice as it would be to have your customers memorize your website URL, they are most likely running a quick search to find you first. That’s why it’s imperative to have a local SEO presence as Google is acting as the “new homepage” more and more to link your customers to your website.
25. Over 40% of businesses have adopted an automated approach to local listing management
As the busy owner or marketing manager for a growing business, you most likely don’t have time to manually update every one of your local listings whenever there is a change within your business. Automated solutions to local SEO are becoming more popular since businesses understand that time is money.
Local SEO takes time, but when you have the right marketing technology to do it for you, you can save on resources. This is the perfect example of how AI in marketing can alleviate small business challenges to foster growth faster.
An example of an automated local SEO tool that pinpoints where to improve your content.
26. Over two-thirds of businesses use at least two to five SEO tools to assist them in their local SEO work
And 12% use six or more tools. There are tons of free and paid options for SEO tools. Whether you choose a local SEO checklist, a content management tool, or anything tool between, you’ll want to stay on top of this local SEO trend.
There’s no right or wrong answer when it comes to which SEO solution you choose, as long as you’re using at least a few to keep up with the competition. It may take some trial and error. So don’t be afraid to try a variety of resources to set your brand on a path to local SEO success.
27. 40% of SMBs outsource their local SEO work
Not only are businesses of all shapes and sizes investing in local SEO tools, but they’re also outsourcing to digital marketing partners. The beauty of this is it allows local SEO experts to provide strategy expertise while putting time back into your day. Like the old saying “two heads work better than one,” a business with a local SEO marketing partnership sees more success than one trying to do it all alone.
28. The local SEO industry is worth over $80 billion
This local SEO statistic indicates that competition is fierce within the local SEO space since it’s such a high-value industry.
29. 62% of consumers will disregard a business if they can’t find them online
Local SEO isn’t just a strategy used to grow website traffic and leads. It’s part of building a stronger online presence for your business overall to establish credibility with your target market. When your customers can’t easily find you online through local search results, it’s unlikely that they’ll put in the effort to find you offline instead.
30. 18% of businesses say local link building is the most important local SEO tactic for them to invest in
With all these local SEO statistics, we’ve discussed many of the different best practices that go into a strong SEO presence for your business. The question now is which should you focus on first? While there’s no right or wrong answer, this statistic proves that many businesses are investing in local link-building first and foremost.
To get started with building more links back to your website, try partnering up with other complementary small businesses that may be open to a link exchange. In another example, you could offer to guest post on an industry blog to secure more links that way. Alternatively, you may want to prioritize other aspects of your local SEO, as this chart below shows that there’s a clear spread of which tactics businesses are investing in:
Use these local SEO statistics to drive traffic to your website
While people can access your business’s website from anywhere in the world, it’s important your marketing plan focuses on the customers closest to you. This data proves that leveraging local SEO to drive traffic to your website and increase conversions is an easy win for any business.