Daycare facilities are well-appreciated by working parents. However, as a business, it can be difficult to convince parents to choose your daycare centre over the competition. Traditional print campaigns or word-of-mouth marketing may not be effective for you.
The answer is local search engine optimization (SEO). Local SEO enables your website and content marketing to be more effective in attracting more customers near or within your area.
You are passing up a fantastic opportunity to promote your daycare centre to more families if you don’t use local SEO. Many digital marketers in cities like Vaughan are now offering their services to help solve the stagnation due to online competition. This ultimate guide to local SEO can help you increase your ranking in search results in no time.
Your Local SEO Checklist
You can make your business more noticeable in search engine results and increase the number of parents who can easily find you by employing this local SEO guide:
- Create an account and advertise on social media
It wasn’t long ago when the ability to place an advertisement in the Yellow Pages and wait for calls from parents was the go-to business strategy. With 89% of people today using social media, Canada is one of the countries with the highest levels of online connectivity.
This makes the development of your local presence a crucial component of local SEO for daycares. You need to make sure parents in the neighbourhood can easily discover your daycare centre online through social media. Create an account, know the current trends, and be creative in your campaigns.
- Use local directories
Successful childcare facilities in particular regions are listed in several local directories. This is an excellent strategy to expose potential clients to your centre’s name and contact details.
- Gather positive reviews
Excellent testimonials from parents can influence prospective clients to pick your daycare facility over others. You can receive favourable recommendations from parents on several platforms; via social media or review sites like Yelp or Google+.
Prioritize getting feedback from parents when they register their kids at your facility and make it simple for them by adding backlinks on your website. You can give incentives to encourage the reviews.
- Add multimedia to your website
Creative digital marketers in Vaughan can easily think of ways to use local trends to attract potential customers, particularly parents who are meticulous in childcare services. A great strategy to get the attention of nearby families is by including media like pictures or videos.
Parents adore it when you have substantial proof of the quality of your services that they can easily view. Be sure to include high-resolution images of your centre’s amenities and programs.
- Post informative content regularly
Regularly posting high-quality blog content is one of the best methods for optimizing your business.
Search engines and potential customers will start to see that you are an expert in childcare and early childhood education. You can draw new website visitors who might later decide to enroll their kids at your centre.
- Optimize website for mobile users
Nowadays, a growing number of people conduct online information searches on their smartphones and tablets. For this reason, you must make your site mobile-friendly.
This entails making sure that your site is easy to navigate on mobile devices and employing responsive design to make it look excellent on all kinds of devices. You can easily tap the services of web design experts for this.
- Utilize local SEO keywords
Finding appropriate keywords to use on your site is an integral part of SEO for any business. People use key information in the search field to find products and services online. You must optimize your website for the appropriate keywords if you want to show up in related searches.
Extensive keyword research is a wise move to identify relevant terms. Local SEO dictates that you should include your location in your keyword usage. For example, you can use the keyphrase “daycare in Newmarket Ontario” when your centre is in the area.
Put also a priority on long-tail keywords when conducting keyword research. The effective keywords for your website are long-tails because they have a clear and defined search purpose.
A good example of a long-tail keyword or phrase is adding an adjective to the location like “reliable English tutor in Richmond Hill”. When you incorporate those keywords into your website and your content, it will be easier for search engines to classify your business for search results.
- Create well-researched Meta descriptions and title tags
The Meta description and title tag are vital components in websites and content that assist search engines to identify your company. The Meta description is the text that displays beneath the link in search engine results pages, whereas the title tag is the text that shows in the blue bar at the uppermost of your browser.
Although the Meta description and title tag should be keyword-rich, they should also be compelling to potential buyers. It must clearly state the services that your centre provides and will be able to pique the interest of potential clients.
- Take Advantage of Google My Business (GMB)
Establishing your Google My Business listing is a huge step in assisting your daycare to show up in local searches. Here are some benefits of creating a GMB profile:
- Primarily, your company will rank faster in local search listings. This is significant since many parents conduct online searches for daycare facilities. You are more likely to get new clients if your company listing is complete and updated.
- With a GMB profile, you will give prospective clients more details about your childcare facility. This comprises pictures, contact details, and business hours.
- Improving and claiming your Google My Business listing will help boost your legitimacy. Positive Google evaluations regarding your facility will help influence prospective clients to pick you over competing establishments.
- Build links
Create links as part of the foundation of your local SEO campaign. There are 2 types of links you must consider:
- Links to other pages within your website, referred to as internal links
- Backlinks, which are links to your page that come from other websites
You need good connections from reputable, authoritative websites if you want to rank highly on Google. Or, you can build yourself up as an authority in daycare services so other sites will use your content as a reference.
Establish connections with businesses and other digital marketers in Vaughan that provide services complimentary to your own, such as companies promoting products for children and then propose link exchanges.
Childcare is a local industry that will always be in demand. It’s a place to keep the kids safe while the parents are attending to other matters or an opportunity for the kids to mingle. This is one reason why many people are going into this business.
With a highly competitive environment, there is surely a need for an intensive local SEO campaign to grow your clientele. Follow this checklist for your daycare centre or let the experts do the SEO efforts for you.