7 Effective Ways to Use SEO to Launch a Business in Chicago Successfully in 2021

The Windy City is home to more than 2.5 million people. That means every business owner has an opportunity to tap into a vast market and make their venture successful.

There are several ways to establish and grow a business in Chicago with marketing initiatives. Business owners can contribute to local events, use strategic advertisements, indulge in community activities and cross-promote local establishments. These activities generate revenue for the company and establish a connection with the market and the local community.

In recent times, due to the pandemic, online marketing has become the most successful way to promote a business. But since digital marketing only makes an impact on the internet, it can be tricky to attract local customers from Chicago. In this article, we will discuss seven SEO techniques to make your business popular in Chicago.

If you feel that all of this is a bit too technical for you, you can always hire a Chicago-based digital marketing company to take care of your requirements. After all, your job is to manage your business, not worry about your website’s SEO. But if the technicalities interest you, read on to know more.

Keyword Research

You will need the correct keywords before you start any efforts towards marketing your business in Chicago. Manually searching for keywords can be a long process that involves hours of work.

Instead, you can use business analytics and keyword research tools to generate the relevant keywords for your business in Chicago. Keep in mind that each market behaves differently, so you cannot use the same keywords to increase search engine rankings for two kinds of businesses. 

Local SEO Proximity

If a person wants to get a haircut in Chicago, it would not make sense if a Google search shows barbershops in Addison, Illinois. That is why Google factors in proximity to offer relevant results to users.

If you want your business to be visible to local users, you should feature your business on a Google My Business listing. This allows Google to understand your business name, address and contact information, and show these details to the user. You can provide additional information, too, such as your website, social media pages and current offers, that can help you attract customers from Chicago.

Local Link Building

Links are an essential part of organic ranking on search engines. If you want your business to show up on Google searches by residents of Chicago, you must place relevant local backlinks in your website content. Since your business is new, you cannot expect backlinks to grow naturally.

Use appropriate links in the website content organically and strategically. Placing a link to a random blog on your website will not be as effective as linking an article from The New York Times. Keep these factors in mind when using backlinks on your website:

• Editorial links are better for ranking your website than random ones.
• Use local Chicago directories to get more local traffic.
• Provide links to other well-known businesses and organizations in Chicago.
• Approach well-known websites for guest blog posts.

On-Page Local SEO

Use the Contact Us page and the website footer to provide your business address and contact information. There are other ways to mention Chicago or other local addresses on your websites, such as portfolio, customer reviews, dedicated pages and local information. 

Citations 

Citations are an effective way to attract customers from Chicago. You can mention your business details on different directories and blog posts to generate more local traffic to your website. You can either do that manually or use special tools for link building and citation. If you are not sure where to start, you can check the citations used by your competitors and create similar ones.

You can also utilize data aggregators to distribute data to local and niche websites. Brand monitoring tools can help you find mentions of your business on the Internet that do not link to your website. You can contact the website owner and request them to place a link to your website with the mention of your business. 

Social Media Mentions

While social media has a relatively low impact on SEO compared to some other channels, you can still use it to attract local customers. Having social media pages allows you to draw attention to your business on platforms other than Google and your business website.

It also helps you to engage with your customers on social media and increase your brand awareness. You can use your social media mentions and interactions to lead people to your business website, which will eventually increase your search engine ranking for Chicago.

Reviews

Always respond to reviews the way you would your physical customers. Reviews can also be a powerful way to mention your business and help your ranking on search engines. While you can improve the number of positive reviews for your business through your products and services, use any negative feedback as pointers to enhance brand awareness.

Many people say that SEO techniques are not guaranteed to fetch results. But if that were true, digital marketing companies would have run out of business long ago. The truth is, SEO efforts take time to generate results, and many business owners are impatient.

If you use SEO techniques to make your new business successful in Chicago, be patient. It might take some time to generate results. But you can rest assured that it will have a positive impact on your revenue and profits.