If you own a restaurant, you’re likely to use a combination of old-fashioned word-of-mouth and modern online advertising to grow your business. Since many of your customers will learn about you online, it is essential that your local SEO is as good as possible. Google’s search algorithm uses over 200 factors when ranking websites, so it is essential that you know what you’re doing with SEO. If you want to know how local SEO can help grow your restaurant, consider these three facts.

Reviews Create Trust

If your customers are leaving reviews for you on Yelp or Google, this improves your SEO while also increasing the trust you’ll receive from new visitors. Not only will they see your restaurant’s name come up when searching for options in your area, but they’ll also have reviews to read from real people. If you have multiple good reviews, people are more likely to both find your restaurant and want to eat there.

An Optimized Website Increases Search Engine Rank

If you live in an area where there are a lot of restaurants, you need to get in front of your customers before someone else does. You want to appear near the top of any search results. If your website and its content are optimized for local SEO, you’re going to show up closer to the top than you otherwise would. Use a digital marketing agency with SEO experts to help you do this.

Business Listings Provide Citations

In order to improve your local SEO, you’ll want to claim your business listing on every online directory you can. Not only will this give you more control over your restaurant’s image, but it will also create citations online that search engines look at. If you are mentioned in places other than your restaurant’s website, it will show the search engines that you are a trusted source and they will move you up their rankings. By claiming your business listings, you can create some of these citations yourself.

Local SEO is essential to growing your restaurant. By targeting local keywords and users, you’ll be sure to get in front of guests who might actually visit your restaurant. By taking the time to do it yourself or hiring someone to improve your local SEO for you, you’re investing in advertising that will greatly benefit your business.