Is Restaurant SEO necessary? Absolutely! 

SEO, known as Search Engine Optimization, is simply a way to make your business known in the online world. The core of using SEO tools is to find certain words that people usually search for relating to your business. 

When you use those words (which we call keywords) in your content, search engines will rank your website higher. This will increase the chance of people landing on your website. Which often means: more bookings!

While SEO has profited many businesses, restaurants can get increasingly beneficial results for two reasons:

1. People often search for restaurants locally (so you don’t have the same problem as an online clothing store or bookstore, who have to rival against country-wide if not global stores)
2. Draw targeted traffic towards your business in local restaurant searches.

Let’s see some of the best tips for restaurant SEO and some of the best SEO software and tools for expanding your restaurant business:

1. Make Your Website Content Optimized For Local Restaurant SEO

If you own a restaurant, you know for sure that your targeted traffic consists of local audiences mainly, meaning local SEO for restaurants is inevitable. For this reason, you should be looking for keywords searched only in the relevant area.

So, limit your keyword use to the suburb or a city near your restaurant. One way to do this is by checking out what keywords your local competitors are using to rank higher using SEO tools such as Ahrefs (paid) or Ubersuggest (free keyword tool). SEO quake is another useful tool to keep an eye on your competitors.

2. Use YOAST SEO For On-Page SEO Improvements

YOAST SEO is a plugin by WordPress that helps you build SEO content for your website. You can also check out the readability score of your content that adds up in improving your overall SEO. 

Yoast gives you a clue on where and how many times you should use a particular keyword in your web content or blog to help your content. Yoast plugin SEO requirements are designed, keeping in mind the search engines’ result finding pattern and, thus, help to rank your content higher. 

3. Include Google My Business In Your Restaurant SEO Practices

Have you noticed some pop up on the Google search results with a Google Map referencing the location appear whenever you search for certain services? 

This is why getting Google My Business for your local customers is vital. Not only can people quickly spot your restaurant on the map, but they can also contact you right away to book reservations by just checking out your contact details.

4. Try Getting Enlisted On Local Blogs

Search for local bloggers and reach them out for adding the links of your website in their blogs or promote your restaurant directly.

You can pay the influencer or give him/her a discount coupon for the future. They will write about food, nutrition, restaurants, and almost anything that would hint towards your restaurant where they will mention your business and put a link on their blog. They can directly write about your restaurant and dishes as well as a restaurant review. Both are useful.

Pro-tip: Look for YouTubers who ALSO have a blog, and make a deal where you get mentioned both on their blog and on video. Double win.

5. Do Keyword Research, Lots Of It For Right Keywords!

Before deciding which keywords to add and finalize your SEO strategy, search for keywords that are searched most in a specific time frame, and check the air for competition. Are there other restaurants in your area ranking for those keywords? Then check out their website. Dive deep. Why are they ranking for these keywords? Do they have a blog? If so, what do they write about?

Google SEO tools such as Google Keyword Planner Tool is one example that shows how much a keyword is going to add value to your website by drawing in more traffic. The best is, it’s free.

That’s it for Restaurant SEO!

Doing keyword research is not easy, but we hope these restaurant SEO tips will help boost your business. If you need some tips, then you can always reach out to us. Or start a chat in our Facebook Group! Also: we can help you with your restaurant SEO and do it for you. Just reach out. If you have a website built by us, then we can set-up the basics for you!

However, we believe you can get started with these tips. Use these easy ways to boost restaurant website SEO, and let us know what works for you.

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