More and more people are using search engines to plan their leisure and business travel. They make their booking online and therefore it is important for tourism businesses to have an effective online presence on the search engines. For this businesses need to implement SEO.
When businesses rank higher in the search engine result pages it will lead to more website visitors and thus more sales. SEO helps you to improve your visibility in the organic search results. SEO is therefore essential for travel websites. SEO for tourism involves factors like page speed, creating quality content, optimising titles and meta descriptions, user experience, quality backlinks and more.
If you are a local travel business and provide services in a specific region then you can benefit from local SEO. Local search rankings appear in the form of Map Pack on Google. But you need to appear in organic search results as it helps Google to understand your overall prominence.
To rank in Google’s Local Pack you need to implement local SEO. Local Pack helps people find businesses near them, get contact details, know the working hours and more. People need not click through the website to get this information. Local SEO helps you to build your local online presence.
Basic local SEO tips
- You should claim a Google Business Profile as it is one of the most effective ways to improve your local SEO and it is free. In the profile, choose a primary category that best describes your business. You can also add your location, products, photos and more. Your proximity to a searcher is a strong ranking signal but you cannot optimise for it. Therefore writing accurate information in the Google Business Profile is essential. Consistent NAP can influence your local rankings and user experience.
- Get your business listed on online business directories like YellowPages. To get reviews you can list your business on review websites like Yelp, Glassdoor and more.
- You should provide an accurate name, address and phone (NAP) on all your mediums. Consistent information will allow the customers to connect with you easily.
- Positive reviews help you to improve the visibility of your website and the likelihood of more customers visiting you. You should try to get positive reviews and respond to them. When reviews use keywords or city Google views you as a trusted local business. Reviews submitted in Google Business Profile can determine the star ratings you get in Google Search and Google Map results.
- When you respond to your reviews on Google, it shows that your website is actively managed and reviews are important as they help to build trust.
- If you are not active on social media you can at least claim your business on Linkedin, Twitter and Instagram. You can add a post and invite users to visit your website. You can create a Facebook Business page and update it with your website, the business’s working hours and a description.
- Google uses mobile-first indexing and therefore your website should be mobile-friendly and use a responsive web design. You should ensure that your users will have a seamless mobile experience.
Advanced local SEO tips
- You should create relevant titles and meta descriptions so that the user finds what they are looking for on your website.
- Local SEO for tourism websites involves creating valuable content to meet the needs of local searchers and consistently publishing it. Include your relevant local keywords and location in the content. You can write about local events, content important for the local community, put in efforts to raise funds for local charity and more.
For example, instead of optimising for ‘Car repair’ you should optimise for ‘Car repair, Thane’. Add the keyword and the location in titles and meta descriptions whenever possible.
- Use schema markup to help Google understand your content in a better way. The different schema markups for local SEO are address, phone number, website, hours, menu and multiple departments.
- An important part of a local SEO target is link-building, it helps to improve your rankings. Local links help to show people that you are a trusted business in your area. You can build links from websites within the local area. When building links you should ensure that you link to your location page or the most relevant page on your website. You should ensure that there is a CTA on the linked page.
- You should diversify your link strategy and try to build links from as many different websites as possible. Your inbound links are an indication of the value of the content and should be relevant but may not be highly authoritative. You can get links from community blogs, news websites and more. To get links you can engage in discussions on social media, get a press release and more.
