Local SEO marketing is mandatory now. Research carried out by Hubspot shows that 97% of people learn more about a local company online than anywhere else. Your local SEO game has to be strong if you want to increase your brand awareness and profits margin.

Everyone wants to rank first in their niche. After all, there’s a lot of business promised to them if they secure that top spot. But SEO can be an expensive investment and some companies are spending hundreds and even thousands of dollars on it every month on it, so you need to justify your expenses as part of the marketing budget. 

Use the information below to set goals, decide your overall budget, figure out if local SEO services are worth it for your company, or successful if already started.

What Are Your Expectations?

If you are going to measure your local SEO results, then you should atleast have clear expectations. 

How many clients will you get for being the first business ranked in your niche?

The first step is to know the volume of searches your keywords are getting. For example if your focused keyword was “purple potato chips”, you need to know the number of searches made using that phrase. To do this we’ll need to use Google’s Keyword Planner Tool which you get by setting up an account with Google Ads (you don’t have to pay for anything just skip through the steps to use the keyword planner).

Type in your target keywords and see the number of monthly impressions the phrase is getting.

Calculate the Actual Potential Visits to Your Business Website

So let’s say you found out that the keyword “seo company in los angeles” gets 10,000 impressions a month. Does this mean you’ll get 10,000 visitors if you top the search engine results list? No.

Studies have shown that 40% of searchers will click on the first result. This means the business ranked first will have 4,000 visitors per month. You have to work hard to get there since the last business listed on the first page gets only 3%. A difference of over 3500 visitors!

Will all visitors convert to clients?

No. In fact, the number is very small. Only 5% of the 4,000 will contact your business. This means you will be expecting 200 leads. Out of the 200 leads, only 25% of them will go ahead and buy your product or services – these are 50 sales.

Now for the final step of calculating your SEO ROI (Return On Investment).

How Much Money Should You Make?

You’ve invested so much time and money to be listed first and it’s only fair if you knew how much you stand to make. Let’s say one SEO client is worth $1000, this means our SEO company should have monthly sales totaling to $50,000.

To get your SEO ROI, you need to subtract your monthly SEO costs from the sales and again divide the result by the SEO costs.

Here is the SEO ROI Formula:

• a= search volume of focused keyword
• b=% of searches who visited your business website
• c=% of visitors who became clients
• d= the average value of one customer
• x= your local SEO revenue

(a) X (b) X (c) X (d) = (x)

Your SEO ROI = (x – Cost) / Cost

Other Ways to Measure ROI of Your Local SEO Efforts

These are quick things to look at and see whether or not your SEO efforts are working:

Track Your Ranking on Search Engine Results Pages

Once you have implemented your Local SEO strategy, go to Google Search and enter the keywords you want to rank with. If you notice a sudden boost in rank then there’s definitely something you are doing right. A sudden decrease in rank means there’s something you are doing wrong. 

It might take a few months or even years for your new business to start ranking on the first page in competitive niches. The best way to keep track is by taking weekly screenshots of your business rankings or noting in Google Sheets, or using an automated reporting software.

Track lead calls

Have a dedicated business number listed on your business website. It’s important to connect your site with Google Analytics to make tracking easier. Log in to your Google Analytics account and add calls as part of your goals – Every time a client calls you from your site it counts as a conversion.

An increase in lead calls is proof that your SEO efforts are working.

Track your Click-Through-Ratio (CTR)

CTR refers to the number of impressions made on your search engine results. If there are alot of people clicking on your result then it means your business is ranking high and therefore, your SEO efforts are fruitful.

Track impressions on your Google My Business dashboard

This will help you know how many people are interacting with your Google My Business profile.

Seasonal Tracking

Some businesses are seasonal so they don’t maintain high ranking throughout the year. The best way is to track your SEO efforts on a yearly basis.

Local SEO can be a lucrative lead generating tactic. Be sure to calculate ROI with the LTV (lifetime value) of a client (not a single sale) for the true value of an SEO campaign.