{"id":3792,"date":"2025-10-21T06:38:52","date_gmt":"2025-10-21T10:38:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sharpinnovations.com\/blog\/?p=3792"},"modified":"2025-10-20T13:42:28","modified_gmt":"2025-10-20T17:42:28","slug":"the-biggest-local-seo-myths-and-whats-actually-true","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sharpinnovations.com\/blog\/2025\/10\/the-biggest-local-seo-myths-and-whats-actually-true\/","title":{"rendered":"The Biggest Local SEO Myths, and What’s Actually True"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cLocal SEO,\u201d has so many meanings nowadays. Especially in a country with over 350 million citizens from literally all walks of life. So it\u2019s no surprise that there are more Local SEO Myths than there are Local SEO strategies<\/a>. That\u2019s not even including the fact that a Local SEO strategy in, say, a major downtown city is completely different from a rural urban area that gets a weekly newspaper made of mostly ads, public notices, obituaries, and high school sports scores.<\/p>\n

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And that\u2019s if you only have one location\u2026<\/p>\n

Yeah. Local SEO is intricate, heavily dependent on brick & mortar \u201clocation, location, location\u2026\u201d and engagement. Books can be written on such strategies. I\u2019m talking good books. Page-turners. Probably. Ones you curl up with and read with an orange bowl of Orville Redenbacher. popcorn and\u2026well, anyway\u2026<\/p>\n

\"lady <\/p>\n

With respect to Local SEO being mostly Google-centric because of their monopolistic-ish<\/span> market share, let\u2019s dig in to the biggest Local SEO Myths we know of:<\/p>\n

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Local SEO Myth #1: Facebook doesn\u2019t matter in Local SEO.<\/h2>\n

Hard Truth:<\/strong> Oh, trust me, I wish that was true. If I could deactivate my Facebook account, I would. Twice. Once just for catharsis.<\/p>\n

The hard truth is that not only do Facebook Pages have reviews and Open Street Map access (that you can easily peer edit) and essentially all the essential local SEO tools of Google Maps, but more importantly is their convenience in areas with limited local media.<\/p>\n

Approximately 15% of the country lives in what\u2019s classified as \u201cdeep rural\u201d and \u201crural urban\u201d areas<\/a>. That\u2019s about 51,000,000 residents. Many of those areas have limited local media & press coverage. Some don\u2019t have any at all. Facebook fills those cavernous voids. Facebook groups, especially. And while much of it is vigilante, gaslighting, ranting, and other notorious demarcations of human decay, the hard truth is that in several places, it\u2019s the only voice being heard. So you have to learn to discreetly listen to the shouting there. As a small business trying to show up online<\/a>, this can be especially important.<\/p>\n

The good news is that there are tools out there you can use to keep as much out of the fray as possible. Facebook\u2019s Meta Business Suite allows you to schedule to your page and those local groups. \u00a0Other tools like Hootsuite and Social Pilot allow you to syndicate to all sorts of social media accounts. Tools like BrightLocal \u2013 a favorite of both myself and our VP of Marketing, Rodney Hoover, \u00a0allows for Local SEO behavior of Facebook so you don\u2019t have to jump into the cesspool to check the activity.<\/p>\n

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Image:<\/strong> Example of Bright Local dashboard – Source<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Bonus point:<\/strong> File this under \u201coffline helping online and vice versa.\u201d Speaking of those weekly papers, if you have a location(s) in these areas with a weekly paper, write a column in it. Some of these publishers are starved for content support. If they pay, they typically pay in stipends that barely will be enough to send you a W-9, but what it gives you is a chance to be in several homes throughout the area for time & materials minus stipend. \u00a0\u201cFree advertising,\u201d as it were, and nearly as important, it offers proactive reputation and brand management opportunities.<\/p>\n

Local SEO Myth #2: Only 5-star reviews matter.<\/h1>\n

Softer Truth: <\/strong>Your Google Business Profile<\/a> can have a major impact on your visibility. <\/strong>While 5-star reviews are causes for celebration, what\u2019s even more important in Local SEO is engagement with the reviewers. Google, in most all its offerings, remains true to one constant, and that constant is that their content must be relevant. If it\u2019s just 5 stars without a written review, they typically \u2013 from my understanding \u2013 don\u2019t weigh it as much as those who put some proper time & effort into a review.<\/p>\n

Google wants you to:<\/p>\n