Regional SEO: How to Attract Clients from Different Cities

Do you want your site to attract customers not only from your city? Then you need to know how to properly set up regional promotion. If you are interested in comprehensive local promotion, leave a request on the page, and we will contact you.

In this article, we will tell you what markers Google uses to determine the region of your site, why you need regional targeting, and how to set it. We will also share tips on how to promote your site in regions using subdomains or folders. So let's go!

How Google determines the region of your site

Google uses various signals to determine the region of your site, but the most important of them is the top-level domain (TLD). This is the part of your site address that comes after the dot, such as .ua, .com, or .org. The top-level domain can indicate which country or region your site belongs to. For example, if your site has a .ua domain, Google will most likely consider it a Ukrainian site and show it in search results for users from Ukraine.

However, the top-level domain is not the only factor Google considers. Google also analyzes the content of your site to determine its topic and language. If your site contains information relevant to a particular region or if it is written in a particular language, Google may assign it to that region or language.

In addition, Google may use other signals, such as the location of the server where your site is hosted, links from other sites pointing to your site, geo-specific queries, or information from Google Webmaster Tools, to determine the regionality of a site. You can use these tools to tell Google your preferred region or verify your top-level domain.

Geotargeting in Google Search Console With this tool, you can specify which country or region you want to promote your site to. You can set geotargeting for your entire site or for individual subdomains or folders. For example, you can specify that your example.com site targets Ukraine, and your pl.example.com subdomain targets Poland.

Site content signals. Google also analyzes the content of your site to determine its regional relevance. These signals include:

• content language. Google determines the language of the text on your site and compares it to the languages spoken in different regions. For example, if your site is written in Russian, Google may assume that it is targeted at Russian-speaking countries;
• currency and prices. If you provide prices on your site, Google may use this information and the price format to determine regional affiliation;
• Addresses and telephone numbers. Google may use contact information on your site to determine regional affiliation. For example, if you provide an address in Kyiv and a phone number with the +8 area code, Google may assume that your site is targeted at Ukraine.

It's useful to consider all of this when setting up regional targeting.

Why regional targeting is needed

SEO regional targeting (for example, US targeting, Site promotion in Kyiv or other cities) helps Google understand who to show your site to in search results. If you want to get customers from different cities or countries, you need to make sure that Google knows that your site is relevant to these regions. This will help you improve your search rankings and increase traffic to your site.

How to set regionality

If you want to set regionality for your entire site or for individual subdomains or folders, there are several proven methods you can use.

1. Google My Business

This is a free service from Google where you can create a profile for your business and display it on Google Maps and in local search. You can also add your address, phone number, hours of operation, customer reviews, photos, and other information about your business. Such regional promotion on Google will attract the attention of potential customers who are looking for services or products locally.

To use Google My Business, you need to:

• register for the service and confirm your business,
• fill in information about your business and add photos,
• optimize your profile using keywords that characterize your activities and region.
• collect feedback from your customers and respond to them,
• analyze statistics on traffic and interaction with your profile.

2. Contacts

As we have already mentioned, Google uses contact information on your site to determine regional affiliation. Therefore, you need to indicate your addresses and telephone numbers according to the regions in which you want to promote your business. For example, if you need to promote your site in a region such as Kyiv or Dnipro, provide two addresses and two phone numbers for your offices in these cities.

You also need to make sure that the contact information on your site matches the data in Google My Business. This will help Google understand that your site and your profile belong to the same business.

3. Keywords

These are words and phrases that users use to search for information on the Internet. Choosing the right keywords helps Google understand what your site is about and who it is intended for. If you need SEO promotion in regions, use keywords with geographical modifiers, such as the names of cities, regions, countries, or other territories. For example, if you sell flowers, you can use the following keywords: “flowers Kyiv”, “flower delivery Dnipro”, “buy flowers Kyiv” and others.

You can also use keywords with the names of districts, streets, or metro stations. For example: "apartment in Podil", "office on Khreshchatyk", and "next to the Zoloti Vorota metro station".

Use various tools for keyword selection, for example, Google Keyword Planner. You can also analyze competitors and find out what keywords they use to promote their sites by region.

4. Link promotion

This promotion of regional sites consists of obtaining links to your site from resources with high authority and relevance to your topic.

But how to promote a site in several regions using links? After all, each region has its own characteristics, competitors, and requests. To do this, you need to consider several factors when choosing sources for placing links:

• Try to obtain links from sites that are focused on the same region as yours. This will increase the trust of search engines and users in your site, as well as improve local optimization.
• Choose sites that are related to your field or offer related services. This way you will attract interested visitors who can become your customers or partners.
• Evaluate the level of trust and authority of the sites on which you want to place links. Use various tools to analyze domain zones, indexing, traffic, spam, and other metrics. Avoid low-quality sites that can hurt your ranking or get filtered by search engines.
• Choose anchors for links so that they contain keywords specific to each region. For example, if you are promoting a site in Lviv and Ternopil, you can use the words "Lviv", "Ternopil", "Lviv", or "Ternopil". Make anchors diverse so as not to arouse suspicion in search engines.

How to promote a site in several regions

Promoting sites by region will increase audience reach, increase conversion and revenue. But how to properly organize multi-regional promotion and avoid duplication of content and conflict of interest?

1. Regional subdomains

Subdomains for regions are a way of dividing a site into several parts, each of which has its own subdomain indicating the region. For example, dnipro.site.ua, lviv.site.ua, and so on.

Among the advantages of regional subdomains:

• the ability to create unique content for each region, taking into account its specifics, needs, and requests;
• the ability to use regional settings, such as currency, language, phone, and address;
• you can hold regional promotions, discounts, and bonuses;
• the ability to receive links from regional sites, which increases trust and authority and affects the promotion of the regional site.

Disadvantages of regional subdomains:

• it is difficult to technically maintain and update the site - you will have to deal with each subdomain separately.
• if you use the same or similar content on different subdomains, this may reduce the site's ranking in search engines. To avoid this, use the rel="canonical" and hreflang meta tags, which indicate the main version of the content and its language affiliation.
• If you receive links to different subdomains, they do not transfer their weight to the main domain. Using such regional promotion of sites, to enhance the effect of links, you need relinking between subdomains and the main domain.

2. Regional folders

Regional folders are another way to divide a site into several parts, each of which has its own folder indicating the region. For example, site.ua/dnipro/, site.ua/kyiv/.

Advantages of regional folders:

• It is easier to technically maintain and update the site. Such promotion of the site in several regions eliminates the need to deal with each folder separately, you can manage the entire site centrally.
• you can use the same or similar content on different folders without the risk of lowering the ranking. After all, all folders have the same domain, so search engines do not consider them as different sites;
• all links that you receive to different folders transfer their weight to the main domain. This increases the overall authority of your site in search engines.

Disadvantages of regional folders:

• limited ability to create unique content for each region. You cannot use regional settings, hold regional promotions, etc.
• Folders can take up more space in the URL, increase the length of links, and complicate site navigation.

Conclusion

Regional website promotion is an opportunity to adapt the site to the specifics of the local market, take into account the needs and requests of the target audience, and improve positions in search engines. Regional website promotion will also help expand geography and increase profitability. But if you don't know where to start and how to promote your site in different regions, you can always get professional help from SEO specialists to achieve high results.