Local SEO · Northern Colorado
Three things decide the map pack. You control two.
Proximity, prominence and relevance decide who shows up, and proximity is the one you can do nothing about. The other two are earned: a profile in the right categories, listings that agree with each other everywhere Google checks, and reviews arriving steadily rather than in bursts. Most businesses that should rank locally and do not are losing on the middle one.
Or call or text directly: (303) 815-0215
What the map pack weighs
One you cannot touch, two you can
Almost every local SEO argument is really about which of these three somebody is quietly ignoring.
Not yours
Proximity
How far you are from whoever is searching. It changes with every search, it is different for two people standing on opposite sides of the same street, and no amount of money moves it. Anybody promising to fix your proximity is promising to move your building.
Yours, slowly
Prominence
How well known Google thinks you are, which it works out from reviews, from being listed consistently across the directories it cross-checks, and from being mentioned anywhere that is not your own website. This is the one that takes months and the one that compounds.
Yours, quickly
Relevance
Whether your profile and your site actually match what was searched for. Categories, services, the words on the page. This is usually the cheapest thing to fix and the most often left half-done, because it is boring rather than difficult.
What gets done
The work behind those two
The profile
Primary and secondary categories chosen against what actually ranks for your searches rather than what sounds right, services and attributes filled in properly, hours and service areas correct, photos that are yours. Most profiles are two thirds complete and lose on the missing third.
The listings
One canonical name, address and phone, then every listing brought into line with it — including the ones you never created. Duplicates get merged or closed. Of everything on this list, this is the one that most often turns out to have been the whole problem.
Reviews
A process that asks every customer at the moment they are most likely to say yes, rather than when somebody remembers. Responses to the bad ones as well as the good, because how you answer a complaint is read by everyone who comes after.
The site itself
Location and service pages that actually say where you work, structured data that matches the profile exactly, and internal linking so the pages support each other. A profile that disagrees with its own website is a signal Google has to resolve, and it does not resolve it in your favour.
Reporting
Map pack positions for the searches that matter, calls and direction requests from the profile, and what moved since last month. A profile that gets seen a great deal and called by nobody is a problem wearing the costume of a result, and it is the one worth catching early.
Before you call anybody
Find out where your listings stand before you call
The tool is free, needs no sign-up, and gives you the finding whether or not you ever get in touch. That is the point of it.
Citation checker
Set one canonical name, address and phone, then get the exact searches that surface listings you never created, and a prioritised checklist of the directories that matter for your trade.
Citations on their own
If the listings are the whole problem, that is a defined job with an end rather than a retainer, and it is cheaper bought that way. Said here rather than after you have signed something.
Reviews are the other half that has to be earned, and the awkward part is asking. There is a review QR code generator here too, which turns your Google review link into something a customer can scan at the counter. Both of those, and the rest, sit on the tools page.
The retainer
What a month covers
The first line is the one that saves the most trouble later. Everything downstream of it goes wrong if the name and address are not settled before anything gets changed.
- A canonical name, address and phone agreed in writing before anything is changed
- Google Business Profile built out completely, not to the two-thirds most people stop at
- Existing listings found, corrected or closed, including ones you did not create
- A review process your team can actually run without being reminded
- Location and service pages that match the profile rather than contradicting it
- Monthly reporting led by calls and direction requests, with map positions underneath
Still deciding
If you want to understand it before you buy it
This page assumes you already know what local SEO is and want it done. If you do not, these go into it properly rather than making you sit through a sales page first.
What is local SEO?
The plain explanation, if you are still working out whether this is the thing you need.
How the map pack is decided
What is actually known about the three factors, rather than what gets repeated.
How long does local SEO take?
Realistic timelines, including the part where nothing appears to happen for a while.
Local SEO vs traditional SEO
How the two differ, which one a service business needs first, and the three signals the map block actually runs on.
Worth saying plainly
Nobody can put you first for everyone
The map pack is ranked per search, from wherever the person is standing. You will be first for some of them and not in the three at all for others, on the same day, for the same query. Anyone showing you a screenshot of position one without saying where it was taken from is showing you the weather in one spot.
What can honestly be promised is a profile that is complete, listings that agree, reviews that keep coming, and a site that corroborates all three — which is what actually moves you up across the whole area rather than at one address.
Before you commit
The practical questions
$500 to $1,500 a month per location, set by what state the listings are in to start with and whether reviews need a process built from nothing. Per location rather than per business, because each one has its own profile, its own listings and its own duplicates to chase — a second address roughly doubles the work rather than adding a little to it. A one-off cleanup is also possible without a retainer, and for a business whose listings have never been touched it is frequently all that was wrong.
Access to the Google Business Profile, the exact legal name and address you want used everywhere, and somebody who can answer questions about what you actually do. The review process needs about ten minutes of buy-in from whoever speaks to customers last. Beyond that the work happens without you.
Citations are one of the three or four things this covers. If your listings are the problem and everything else is fine, the citation work on its own is cheaper and you should buy that instead — it is a defined job with an end rather than a retainer. This page is for when the profile, the listings, the reviews and the site all need to move together.
You can rank in the map pack without one, and some businesses do. You will rank better with one, because the profile and the site corroborate each other and a site gives Google something to read about what you do. If you do not have a site yet, say so — it changes what is worth doing first and it may change the order of the work entirely.
They are priced individually, because they are separate work: a profile each, listings each, duplicates each. What does not multiply is the thinking — the naming convention, the review process and the page structure get decided once and applied across all of them. The common failure is location pages that differ only by the town name, which Google reads as one page repeated, and that is far cheaper to get right at the start than to untangle at twelve.
No. Local SEO is done remotely and plenty of it is nowhere near Larimer County. Being here means a business in Fort Collins, Loveland, Greeley or Windsor can sit down with the person doing the work, and that the local market is one somebody actually knows rather than one being read about.
Start with what your listings say now
Send the business name and address and you will get back what is actually out there, where it disagrees with itself, and whether that is the reason you are not showing up.