Local SEO by industry
Local SEO, built for how your industry actually gets searched for.
A dentist and an electrician do not get found the same way, and they do not have the same economics either. Pick your industry to see what a customer is genuinely worth in it, what the paid alternative costs, and what it takes to rank.
The industries we work in most
See all 49Most patients pick from the top of the map pack, not page two. If your practice isn't there, they're calling the practice that is.
You will not outbid firms with television budgets. You can outrank them on the searches they never built a page for.
Nobody searches for a chiropractor. They search for the pain. Two or three extra patients a month covers the work.
Med spa clients research more than almost any other local category before booking. Reviews and treatment-specific content decide who they choose.
Emergency-intent searches like "AC repair near me" spike seasonally. Ranking has to already be in place before the spike, not during it.
"Emergency plumber [city]" spikes at the worst possible hour for the searcher. The ranking has to already be there when it happens.
The most expensive keyword niche in home services, and a 48 hour clock that decides whether the job is a dry out or a demolition.
A repair lead costs $40 to $90. A replacement lead costs up to $250, and the job behind it is worth around $12,000. Everything about roofing marketing follows from that gap.
Your regulars do not search for you. Everyone else does, from wherever the car started making the noise.
"Car rental near me" and "car rental [city]" decide who gets the booking, and independent rental companies are competing directly against national chains with far more listing history.
Buyers search "homes in [neighborhood]," not just "[city] real estate agent." Agents compete against a small, named set of local rivals, not a whole industry.
"Near me" and "open now" decide where most people eat tonight. Hours accuracy and fresh reviews matter as much as the food photos.
The same map pack, three completely different businesses
Most agencies sell one process and apply it everywhere. The process is not the problem. Applying it without knowing what a customer is worth is.
A daycare
$67,000
per infant enrolment held to age five. Parents shortlist three centres in one evening and tour only those three, six months before the place is needed.
A restoration company
$251
per click, the most expensive in home services. One panicked search at 11pm, no comparison, three taps on the first three numbers in the map pack.
A barbershop
$500 to $3,000
per client across five to ten years. Won by being the closest shop with recent reviews when someone unfamiliar with the street opens a phone.
Those three businesses need different pages, different review systems, different timing and completely different judgements about whether to rank at all. A daycare can justify almost any acquisition cost. A barbershop cannot, and has to win on proximity instead. Getting that wrong is how marketing budgets get spent on the right activity for the wrong business.
Four things, researched for that industry specifically
What a customer is actually worth
Lifetime value or average job value, sourced rather than assumed, because it decides everything else on the page.
What the paid alternative costs
Real cost per click and cost per lead for that trade, so you can judge ranking against the thing you are probably already buying.
How people in that trade search
The query families that convert, which are almost never the obvious head term, and usually the ones nobody in your market has built a page for.
A ninety day plan
What happens in the first three months, in order, including which terms should move first and which are a longer fight.
Industry specific local SEO, answered
Why does the industry change the local SEO work?
Because the economics change. A daycare enrolment is worth around $67,000 in lifetime tuition and a barbershop client is worth a few hundred dollars a year. One of those can justify almost any acquisition cost and the other cannot. The industry also decides how people search: a burst pipe produces one panicked search with no comparison, while a wedding venue is chosen from a spreadsheet over several weekends. Same map pack, completely different job.
What is actually on each industry page?
What a customer is worth in that trade, what the paid alternative costs per lead, the searches people genuinely use, and a ninety day plan. Every figure is researched for that specific industry rather than adapted from a template, which is why the pages disagree with each other about what matters. In pest control the recurring contract carries everything. In tattooing it is the style search. In dispensaries it is that advertising is banned outright.
My industry is not listed. Can you still help?
Usually yes. The verticals listed are the ones we have researched deeply enough to write about honestly, not the limit of who we work with. The underlying work is similar across local businesses, and the first thing we do on any engagement is the same: find out what a customer is worth to you and where you are actually invisible.
Is local SEO better than paid ads for my business?
It depends on your numbers, and we will say so honestly rather than pretend there is one answer. If you are new, have no reviews and need revenue this quarter, ads are the correct instrument and we will tell you that. Ranking makes sense when the acquisition cost repeats on every customer forever, which is the case in most of the industries we write about, and when you can wait a few months for it to compound.
How long does industry specific local SEO take?
Specific searches move first, often within two to four months. That means condition terms for a clinic, damage types for a restoration company, styles for a tattoo studio. The head term in a competitive metro takes considerably longer and sometimes is not the right target at all. Anyone quoting a fixed timeline without having looked at your market is guessing.
Not sure what a customer is worth to you?
That is the number the whole decision turns on, and most owners have never calculated it. Bring us your average job value and your close rate and we will tell you honestly whether ranking is worth doing for your business.