Lawn Care Companies Are Making These 11 Local SEO Mistakes

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When you search for anything online, a lot of results pop up. These are not random results, but there is a reason why some of them appear in the top positions and others lag. It is their SEO strategy at work.
A great local SEO strategy is good but having the right one is vital.

More than knowing the best SEO practices, you should know the ones that are not working for you and wasting your resources. Today we will be talking precisely about them.

10 Local SEO Mistakes That Lawn Care Companies Are Making

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Here are some of the most common SEO mistakes that Lawn Care Companies generally make. In addition, I am also providing a tip on how you can avoid or correct them.

1. Stuffing Keywords

Stuffing keywords may have been a practice to trick search engines into faking the relevance of your content only till a few years back. Now they are smart, and if you are still sticking to the old methods, it can harm your Lawn Care or landscaping business website.

This keeps your content at the risk of being marked as spam! Ideally, a page should focus on 3-4 primary and relevant keywords. This improves your chances of ranking higher on the SERPs.

To identify if your content is stuffed with keywords, you can check the keyword density by dividing the word count by the number of times a particular keyword is used. The result should not exceed 1-2%. However, there is no rule of thumb.

How To Manage Proper Use Of Keywords

Avoid repetition of keywords or phrases. Instead, try to use their synonyms because Google focuses on the intent of the content along with the words.

Tools To Analyze Keyword Density

• Small SEO Tools tell you the frequency of keywords used in a particular web page for you to compare with others and manage accordingly.
• Sure Oak also shows the frequency at which any keyword has occurred on a specific webpage and presents its density in percentage to make it more convenient.
• Check SERP allows document and URL search to analyze keyword density and segregates the results based on different types of keywords.

Here’s a screenshot of the keyword density checker tool by small SEO tools:

2. Overlooking Search Intent

Search intent is the visitor's intention with which the query is searched on the internet. And Google focuses on providing the best experience to the users by letting them find what they are looking for quickly. This gives importance to the content optimized according to the search intent.

Often, companies forget they are providing information to their visitors, who can eventually become their potential clients. These companies talk about what they think is vital, not what visitors want.

For example, if there is an offer on your Lawn Care services, the focus shifts to that, rather than telling people why your Lawn Care Company is the best. And why they should choose you, offer or no offer. This disappoints Google and impacts your website's rankings.

How To Be Considerate About The Search Intent

Do your keyword research through various tools available online. Moreover, you can also consider Google's auto-suggestions when you type a phrase in the search bar.

Tools To Identify Search Intent Or Relevant Keywords

• Google Trends is a brilliant tool that helps you find out what people are searching for based on the specific location where your business operates.
• Hubspot has a keyword-generating tool that tells you the keywords and goes deep to help you find the sub-topics.
• Feedly is another tool that lets you know what is posted online. It keeps the results focused for you to gain better insights into what people are looking for.

Here’s a screenshot of Google Trends:

3. Having Device-Unfriendly Website

Over 60% of total searches are done through mobiles. And approximately 40% of visitors go to other websites if they have an inconvenient mobile browsing experience. 

So, no matter how well you have built your website, all the hard work may go in vain if it is not responsive or mobile-friendly. 

So, if you are not considering it as one of the essential factors for your Lawn Care business website, you may be in trouble. And FYI, it is the actual user, and also, the search engines give preference to those websites that are responsive.

When someone is looking at their garden and thinking if it needs reshaping, they won't do hours-long research. 

Instead, these people are generally expected to search for the Lawn Care service company quickly. Here, your well-developed and responsive website help.

How To Ensure Website's Device Compatibility

If you are in the development stage, you can choose a design that is already device responsive. And if your site is already there, segregate the elements for a convenient mobile experience.

Tools To Check Mobile-Friendliness Of Your Website

• Lambdatest is a tool that lets you check the compatibility of your website across different web browsers accessed on various devices.
• Cross Browser Testing is another tool focused primarily on website testing. It allows manual and automated testing of your site for different devices.
• Browserling checks the browser and device compatibility of your website in real-time. It also gives many options for screen sizes.

Here’s a screenshot of Lambdatest:

4. Using Outdated NAP Data

When someone is looking for Lawn Care services, they will search for the local ones. 

In any case, someone who lives in Chicago will not look for a Lawn Care service based in New York. 

This makes it vital for your website to have updated NAP, i.e., the Name, Address, and Phone number. But unfortunately, many businesses forget about it and put their primary focus on on-page SEO only.

Inconsistent or outdated NAP information will prevent search engines from giving importance to your business, especially for local searches. 

This makes you lose a considerable number of your potential clients. Moreover, inaccurate NAP information confuses the search engines regarding your site's credibility.

How To Ensure An Updated NAP Always

Ensure to keep your NAP information updated on your website and across the web wherever it is registered because search engines cross-check it.

Tools To Maintain Your NAP Information

• Moz Check Listing is a tool that allows you to check and identify any duplicate NAP listings for you to contact the site owners and get them updated.
• Brightlocal is another tool that facilitates your business data listing across all the directories manually and through automated processes.
• Whitespark is the tool that makes it convenient for you to find all the business citations across the web. 

Here’s a screenshot of Moz Check Listing:

5. Ignoring Long-Form Content

There are many reasons to think that long-form content can be avoided, and you can still establish your presence on the local search engines' results. 

Social media, especially Twitter with a character limit, increasing popularity of memes, and numerous studies that talk about the decreasing attention span of people are some of these reasons. 

But in the end, remember that you are also writing for the people looking for quality information, not just entertainment.

Think of someone aware that their lawn needs care but does not know what to do. Here, the information you provide through long-form content will guide these people. And also make the search engines happy. 

No matter what, long-form content plays a significant role in building the site's credibility.

How To Avoid Missing On Long-Form Content

Create a blog structure and follow that. Keep it revolving around your Lawn Care business through promotional or informational content.

Tools To Create Long-Form Content

• Answer The Public is a tool that tells you what people in your targeted area are looking for. This gives you the problem statement where you can show your expertise.
• CoSchedule Marketing Calendar lets you maintain your blog publishing calendar. You can also share it with your team making it easier to keep track and never miss out.
• Medium is a blog posting platform that lets you post your content, amongst many others. This improves your visibility and gains more potential customers.

Here’s a screenshot of Answer The Public:

6. Overlooking Website Structure

Providing the most relevant information about your business and the overall industry (if you want) is essential. But presenting that in a well-structured format and self-explanatory navigation is even more so. 

It should never be randomly arranged as it becomes the reason for impacting your SEO negatively. 

A well-organized site makes it convenient for visitors and search engines to navigate them effortlessly. This also improves its link authority.

When we talk about the structure, it is not only the sequence of web pages but also the URLs, backlinks, convenient navigation menus, etc. However, many times the website owners overlook this concept. 

This affects their SEO ranking without them even realizing it. This is because, according to them, they are creating the most relevant content but not placing that in the right place makes their efforts go in vain.

How To Ensure A Good Website Structure

Consider grouping topically related content and linking that to a pillar page, highlighting crucial pages, organizing the content in a logical hierarchy, and making it understandable.

Tools To Assist You In Creating A Great Website Structure

• GlooMaps is a simple-to-use tool that lets you create the plan for your website structure where you can make a flowchart or hierarchy diagram to understand it.
• Powermapper is another tool that creates your website's structure in various formats. You should choose the most relevant one and understand if anything is wrong.
• OctopusDo is also a site map builder that provides options to fill in the category boxes you can customize. You can also add or deduct any stage in the hierarchy.

Here’s a screenshot of the GlooMaps interface:

Read: Importance of Website Design for a Website

7. Avoiding EAT (Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness)

According to Google's Search Quality Evaluators Guidelines, EAT is one of the parameters to analyze any web page's quality. It is based on the human element it contains. 

It all revolves around the actual content creators for your website. 

Google understands and appreciates it when the creators are experts in their respective fields, with or without a formal degree. This gives a sense of authority to the website.

More often than not, websites focus on the quantity rather than the quality of the content created. But Google does not care about it, with approximately 7.5 million blogs posted daily. And it does not even have the time to read each one, so it works on the algorithms.

It will notice and take action when something is wrong, like broken links or links back to not-so-reputed sites. So, for your local Lawn Care business, ensure your visitors EAT healthily.

How To Ensure Your Website's Healthy EATing

Provide credits and sources wherever required to show trustworthiness. Also, make sure you provide updated information to ensure authority and expertise.

Tools To Support Website's EAT

• SEMrush Marketplace provides various forms of content for your website created by industry experts who specialize in creating that particular form of content.
• Ubersuggest is hat analyzes the backlink health of your website. It is responsible for the site's domain authority and ranking on Google.
• Trustpilot is an online brand management tool that helps your brand use your real customers' authentic reviews as social proof to improve trustworthiness.

Here’s a screenshot of Trustpilot:

8. Overlooking Performance Analysis

While talking about the performance analysis of your SEO efforts, I am reminded of an old saying, 'you can only improve what you can measure.' 

But here, unfortunately, many Lawn Care companies choose to overlook their performance and do not analyze whether or not their efforts are going in the right direction. 

They focus only on the inputs and wonder why they are not performing well even after many attempts.

It is essential for companies like yours to decide your performance metrics and then put in dedicated efforts. 

For example, international engagement will not be relevant when you provide services in your local area. But, if you are unknowingly putting in efforts to bring overseas traffic, it may not lead you anywhere as far as actual conversions are concerned.

How To Ensure Dedicated Efforts Through Performance Analysis

Decide your KPIs before laying out the SEO plan to define your direction and make it easier to know what to expect from your team. This will help keep your efforts efficient.

Tools To Measure Your SEO Performance

• Google Analytics tells you in detail about the results of your SEO efforts. And various filters help you keep it focused.
• Screaming Frog SEO Spider is a tool that allows you to analyze the performance of your website in real-time.
• Ahrefs Rank Tracker is a tool that tells you where your website stands regarding ranking. It also lets you do a comparative analysis of your performance with the competition.

Here’s a screenshot of Google Analytics:

9. Avoiding The Importance Of Anchor Text

Anchor texts are the words and phrases on which the link to another page is attached. 

Through these anchor texts, Google and other search engines understand and analyze the relevance and importance of that particular web page. It represents the web page it is on and the one towards which the embedded link points.

Moreover, these anchor texts help the search engine spiders to crawl the content that cannot supply a copy for indexing. 

This includes images, documents, apps, etc. Despite all this, many websites still do not give due importance to the anchor texts and miss out on a crucial aspect of SEO, thus affecting their rankings.

Why Proper Anchor Text Is Necessary

Use relevant anchor texts because Google now looks for the relevance of the text rather than just the links. This is to ensure a better user experience.

Tools To Analyze Your Anchor Texts

• Small SEO Tools provides a tool that lets you check all the anchor texts on a particular web page so you can manage them properly.
• Backlink Tool provides an in-depth analysis of all the anchor texts and the links attached to them by the URL for a particular web page.
• Linkio is a tool that provides you with a list of different types of anchor texts based on the keyword that you are looking for.

Here’s a screenshot of small SEO tools:

10. Posting Inconsistently

Consistency is the key, and this holds when it comes to posting content on your website. 

Here you need to understand not updating your website over time will make even your regular visitors lose interest. 

On the contrary, when you regularly provide new information to your visitors, they will know when to visit again and what to expect from your website. It will help them understand your new Lawn Care services and industry trends.

This improves the credibility of your site. And with a consistent approach, you can establish yourself as the voice of your industry. 

And FYI, it is not just people; the search engines also love consistency. But many times, it is not taken care of! Instead, companies focus on posting random content at irregular intervals, ultimately drawing visitors away who can be their potential clients.

How To Maintain Consistency In Posting

Planning is the key. You need to decide your content requirements and finalize everything before time. Try scheduling rather than posting manually.

Tools To Help Maintain Consistency On Your Website

• Trello is a brilliant tool that lets you manage your content requirements and creates internal coordination to ensure your teams work together.
• Google Calendar helps decide your posting requirements and events you want to tap. It is sharable, thus adding convenience while working with a large team.
• Contentcal is a software that provides the tools for planning and ready-made templates to save your time. And add to that, there are also engagement analytics tools.

Here’s a screenshot of Google Calendar:

Key Takeaways

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• Stuffing keywords while thinking, the more, the better.
• Ignore the search intent and tell what you want rather than what visitors want to know.
• Creating irresponsive websites and neglecting your customer base and their preferences.
• Outdated NAP data while assuming people and search engines will know your contact details.
• Avoid long content because you think two short articles are better than an elaborated one.
• Inconsiderate of website structure and not providing precise navigation to the visitors.
• Avoiding EAT and lack expertise and authoritativeness, thus missing out on people's trust.
• Overlooking performance analysis of your SEO and missing out on the chance to improve.
• Irrelevant anchor text and leaving uncrawlable elements without any solution.
• Inconsistent posting and thinking people will be excited about your irregular updates.