Local SEO & Google Business Profiles: Future Trends

[Music] AI is going to start to prioritize a lot of video content so getting their brands and the video content is going to be a priority getting those titles and then making sure that they they have like emergency you know all the call to actions and then helping you know with that customer Journey we're going to see you know YouTube shorts is going to be prioritized in the AI overviews hello and welcome to rankings do follow podcast here we hold regular talks with SEO and digital marketing experts to discuss hoto topics and share actionable insights with the SEO community so subscribe to stop of everything going on in SEO today we're talking about the future trends of local SEO and Google Business profiles to help us explore this question in depth I'm excited to be joined by Claudia Tamina who is the chief executive officer at reputation armm as well as a platinum Google product expert welcome to the do follow podcast Claudia thank you for coming on appreciate it thanks for having me if you don't mind I Just Want to Jump Right In and ask you to share a bit about your

journey in SEO how you got started what led you to specialize in local SEO and how you became a platinum Google product expert exciting story should be uh yeah so I started in a local SEO in 2019 I partnered up with my partner Al who owns uh gtu and he specializes in Enterprise multilocation businesses so reputation arm was kind of formed to help as an extension of his agency where we focused heavily on citation management and helping businesses generate new reviews and then a big emphasis on Google business profile management then I uh Google product expert I started that program in 2022 and um I kind of fell into it by accident I had an issue with a client and they had like tons of like fake reviews that were coming from like different countries and that flagging wasn't getting it removed so I I found myself posting in the Forum and as I was waiting to get that resolved I was exploring the forums and looking at things and I thought to myself well I

can answer more than half these questions you know so I I actually started en joined the program I didn't know where it was going to lead me but I I ended up embracing it I loved it and I just I really thrived off really advocating for the small business in there and having that connection and being able to ask aay and plead that case to Google was really it's just been overall and a great experience for me so I really enjoy being part of that program yeah a lot of the stories from my cosos I heard that just naturally like drop into an issue and sort of become an expert gradually the next question I like to ask you is how has local ISO evolved over the past let's say six years that you've been working on it and what trends do you see shaping its future so there are two parts to this question let's just start off with what the story was like when you started off basically yeah so you know starting off was just more about like optimization and just making sure like keywords and data was there but I think there's a huge shift towards visual contact and so now we have to show our story and not so much tell our story and

so videos and photos are becoming like a bigger role in uh local SEO and I always tell my clients help me tell your story like what is it that you want your customers to know about you without saying it in words so um you know if you want to focus on Commercial restoration let's show images of repairs in commercial restoration we can't just list the service anymore we actually have to show and use photos to really tell that story yeah there's definitely too many competitors going on this is already sort of the trend so what used to be Texs now it's more into a visual content and what about Google Business profiles and their features like ask maps about this place post question and answers product listings what role do they play in local SEO and uh how should businesses leverage these features effectively what what has your experience been like yeah so I like often explore ask maps and and I find myself like constantly going onto Google Maps to see how Google's prioritizing their data so I mean it's really important for seos to really focus on

that it's not just about ranking reports anymore it's about looking in where your customers are and what they're seeing and and exploring different AI features like the asaps you know a asaps is still evolving I've seen it totally hallucinate and I had one business that I was managing and it was referencing websites that were out of the country so you know you it was clear that there wasn't enough data um on their about that business so that's why as Maps probably started to hallucinate but it's getting better I've seen it improve I think there's more of a focus on looking towards reviews and kind of pulling the data from the reviews so generating good reviews and is going to be important and you're going to notice there's a shift in um reviews like Google's asking the consumers a lot more questions how long did you wait you know and they're giving them predefined answers and all that's by Design they want to be able to take that data and then use it within as Maps

so getting reviews and getting that data in the reviews is going to be it's reviews has always been a top priority so it's going to stay there and then making sure that your website answers a lot of the questions you don't want AI to have to look in other thirdparty sources I think if the majority of the information can be found in your website making sure your content is really there I think there's going to be a big focus on um organic SEO and a shift away from Paid ads because people are going to start to realize that AI is answering these questions and maybe they're not answering it correctly for them so they're going to need to refocus um and so we're going to see a lot of that and as Maps is going to probably replace a lot of like the generic features like the Q&A um I think Google will probably keep Q&A for some businesses where they maybe don't have a website listed or don't have a ton of reviews but if you want to be enabled in those type of features you're going to have to have a lot more Rich data appreciate that answer Claudia with the rise of AI

driven search tools like Chad gbt how can local businesses adapt those strategies to remain relevant in an increasingly automated landscape with Chad gbt the first thing you really want to do is kind of do a quick search and see what chap gbt is prioritizing so if you find that I find when I search Chat gbt meta titles and meta descriptions are becoming a big focus on the results so like rep prioritizing some of your meta titles I mean I'm sure there's a lot of businesses out there that kind of have their website set up but really didn't focus on optimizing you know that kind of data they're just more focused on paid ads or in other areas so I think there's going to be a big shift in organic SEO just because chat gbt doesn't prioritize paid ads um so I could I see that coming in the future and then I also think there's going to be a big emphasis on citations again uh you know everyone always says citations is dead I've never thought citations are dead I always thought they were you know

critical for a business to make sure that they're listed everywhere because search engines care if you're listed on Yelp and Trip Adviser but right now I think focusing on making sure that you're present and claimed and optimized on these other platforms because I the big Focus has always been Google Maps let me optimize Google Maps that's where the the funds are going but now you're going to need to make sure especially franchises where their franchisees have Yelp listings and it's not in their branded account right so it's like now they don't have control the trip advisor listing is unclaimed I think there's going to be a big focus on a lot of these Brands saying hey let's let's prioritize getting these third-party sources in one branded account so we can reoptimize and then can kind of control the data that's getting put out there and then there's AI is just throwing out like old third-party citations so there's going to be a big cleanup right if you're restaurant and you have a menu that was on single platform and it was

outdated you're going to want to make sure a lot of that stuff is is cleaned up and reprioritized I realize that you already touched on reviews being a huge ranking factor for local SEO with regard to onpage signals nap data consistency user generated content which one is the most critical maybe you can single out another one uh besides reviews and maybe you can an ipate something else coming at the for Forefront do like being a dominant signal for Google yeah I mean there's like I hate to say something is most critical because an SEO like that's a culmination of best practices but if I had to say in 2025 what brand should be focusing on I think it's a lot of visual content really getting those videos out there and then finding where your audience is whether it's Tic Tac but then also making sure like YouTube shorts I think YouTube shorts is going to be a big thing there's going to be a big shift towards that people need to start diversifying and then really focusing on local video content so it's

not just the brand as a whole um making branded video content I think a lot of this there's going to be a big shift towards making local video content and then you know of course like review reviews are important but maybe more review diversity now making sure that like Yelp and Trip Advisor and and maybe some of these other random platforms have more recent reviews so it's not really so much the quantity but maybe just making sure that you have something more recent and not from like 2022 but what about companies that work with a lot of different locations they have multiple locations in various maybe countries maybe in a single country what are the biggest challenges they they can expect to see like because I realize that a lot of the answers You' already sort of touched on I mean I realize that it's important to do video content uh to do reviews on a lot of different platforms but specifically with what is the challenge for managing a lot of locations maybe there's like nap consistency maybe Google doesn't understand where the headquarters are located could you maybe address that issue because you said that you worked with multiple businesses with managing

multiple locations so I'd love to know that as far as you know Brands and then their focus I think location pages and then communities that they serve need to be more of an emphasis so maybe building out those pages and then that way they can okay I'm where are you located that's what AI is going to ask me if I'm like give me the best pizza near me it wants to know where I'm at so the next followup is oh here's my ZIP code or here's my city and then they're looking at all the pages relevant so if you don't actually have a service page laid out on your website that says we service you in this city you're going to miss out on showing up in those AI search results so I think brands are going to start to realize like maybe expanding on the communities that they serve so that they can show up it's not just going to be like the local pack anymore um because the AI overviews are going to show a lot of that and so it's not another another page another opportunity at a meta title another opportunity at a meta description and so that's going to

be I'm noticing that has become more of a focus for me and what I'm seeing what is the degree of using AI to help businesses manage their local local data maybe there's a way to unify all nap data and just uh get get Chad GPT for example to tell you like okay there's something going wrong with that location uh I'm just wanted to find out with regard not to ranking an AI but using AI to speed up this process to maybe feed into Google's algorithm in a more favorable light you got to be careful with AI like it's going to evolve it's going to change so you know just kind of getting the bigger picture the surface like what's AI showing now kind of make sure that you're like well optimized your pages you know are giving the right content you could use AI to create new content but we got to make sure that it's localized content we got to make sure that we're serving the purpose and fulfilling the Journey of the customer so it's not just you know like Hey we're going to create this page for AI we got

to make sure that we have you know the customer journey in mind and fulfilling that and using all the best practices so it's not just about gaming the system and making sure we have these Pages it's got to be quality relevant and then again like fulfilling uh the customer Journey but I think um you know for companies that are um managing multiple locations I think some of the biggest challenges on the horizon for them is really going to be you know creating that local video content I think AI is going to start to prioritize a lot of video content so getting getting their brands and the video content is going to be a priority getting those titles and then making sure that they they have you know like emergency you know all the call to actions and then helping you know with that customer Journey we're going to see you know YouTube shorts is going to be prioritized in the AI overviews and so we need to like help these Brands really put a focus on local

content and then training these local restaurants these local franchisees to really like produce the good content without overdoing it on the budget because there's always a budget in mind and that's why like you know pay paid ads is you know always a priority we're going to probably see a big Focus you know for Brands saying okay we maybe maybe we have to focus on training our franchisees to do better with the local content because it's not so much in the budget and so getting that local content from the team is going to be a big priority I think and then training them to stay on brand and then using that creating those video title tags tagging the locations and YouTube that way they can and then making sure that those YouTube accounts and social accounts are put inside their Google Business profiles and expanding the brand as a whole like across the web you as a professional how often would would you go to review an account how often would you even if you know that your

everything is great with your GBP profile how often would you go to maybe throw in something new explore new features is jumping on new features a a great way to getting more visibility or would you recommend people businesses to sort of take their time see what's working best and then take advantage of maybe like like you said YouTube shorts taking advantage of that and my question is about the long-term game and how often would you suggest businesses looking heavily look into auditing their local business presence yeah you always want to audit your local business presence so um what I like to do is like I I work with working with a lot of Brands and franchises I tell them book an appointment with me quarterly and let's review everything and know people get busy they're going to provide enough content to last me so long but what I tell them is let's meet every quarter and let's analyze your data and let's look at the new features that Google's presented most recently they added the feature for like text messaging and what'sapp and so I tell them like I don't know if it's going to turn spammy

I mean the last feature with the text messaging in the chat option was pretty spammy I said I don't know how many texts you're really going to get but it's another way to get engagements on your Google business profile F so let's try it do you want to add your text message you want to add a WhatsApp and then you know just explaining like it's only going to be on when Google rolls out new features it's it's funny because it's only on mobile and it's only on Google Search and it's not on Google Maps and it's not on desktop so I think for the average business owner it's really confusing it's like okay I thought you added text messaging but when I search myself I don't see it so you know um new features are good they're limited and based on you know whether it's mobile or desktop but I do think it's important to stay on top of anything new that Google's putting out there it's just another way to engage adding all those videos and everything it's it's a way for the consumer to stop scroll click and the idea is let's get more clicks on your Google business

profile even if it doesn't turn into an actual conversion we still want to make sure that we're focusing on getting any of those clicks and engagements so anytime Google throws something new in there there I think it's it's worth a sh try but like which metrics do you look at often or do you predict that it will be a factor that tells how successful a business is uh so and with regard to uh talking to clients with on about local SEO about GBP what metrics do you focus on besides well I'm not going to say besides I I'll let you do the entire list so what metrics do you focus on uh when communicating with clients about the importance of doing like local SEO yeah I mean this is an interesting questions so I mean everyone looks at like the basic metrics right like website clicks you know keyword rankings um but I think like as um as an SEO expert now I think part of the hardest part now is retraining our bu our customers to rethink about metrics it's

like yes I understand your website clicks are down it's because Google's ecosystem is designed to have them stay within there so you know you're not going to have as many clicks perhaps but let's let's focus on the different kpis and right now I think you know it's it's influence over track uh over traffic so it's it's brand followers it's influencer mentions and Google Maps they're putting like top 10 restaurants hidden gems and a lot of that a lot of those restaurants that are placed in there is because an influencer tag them in a video content so it's just getting those influencer mentions uh the brand followers brand awareness maybe even another metric could be review diversity on different platforms that could be a new focus and then possibly email subscribers are those going up so even though website traffic is down you got to look at the whole picture like as far as influence is your influence going up uh what about with

regard to the team that makes up the website for example does Google look at each individual person who populates the website with content as an well not necessarily as an expert but it looks at as a source of expertise and it analyzes to see okay is this person an expert is that person not an expert so my question is what can businesses do to maybe incre increase their expertise in the eyes of search engines so maybe I don't know they need to put up their certificate somewhere on a on the website just to make sure that Google understands okay this website knows what it's talking about I'm going to give it a bigger push on maps is that is that a thing on local SEO yeah like you want to you want to show yourself to be an expert right and and how do you do that I think it's you know followers likes teaming up with influencers I think is a is a big thing I think Google is really recognizing that and so if you're getting a lot of brand mentions um by other people and not just on your own social accounts then that's definitely going to help your brand presence you know so it's not

the backlink anymore it's the it's the influencer uh mention it's it's all the men that you're going to get whether it's through social media your reposts so yeah like how can you show Google that you're relevant and that you know what you're talking about I would say it's probably going to be uh what kind of influence you have on your uh social media accounts I have another question if you if you could give one piece of advice to local marketers and business owners looking to stay ahead and local SEO with so much constantly going on and new features popping up every day basic almost what would it be what would the advice be so um my one piece of advice in 2025 has really been YouTube shorts you really have to focus on um like I think a lot of businesses focus on like Tik Tok Instagram um or Facebook but if you can redirect and or your focus into YouTube shorts and then the brand needs to really decide how they want to like lay this out right they have one brand YouTube channel and then maybe make a bunch of playlists for all the multiple

locations that they have and then you're going to have these local content videos from your franchisees or your you know employees out in the on the local level and then have make sure that the titles are relevant so it's going to be you know whether you tag it with uh Houston flood help you know your title on the video might be you know emergency water Cleanup in Houston um you know like I think in general a Restoration company isn't thinking of video but video is the way it needs to go and then being creative with it and making sure your titles are in there you're being tagged and then eventually you know as AI evolves and it's going to prioritize a lot of videos they're going to stay ahead of the curb so just think in terms of how you can really prioritize your brand with video did I miss anything else maybe you want to share something maybe you read a piece a piece of news this morning that really stood out and you want to add something else to this conversation this is the opportunity to do that if may maybe I miss something

yeah I mean the final message really is you know go go out there go online look at how your brand is presenting itself go on AI and see look it's funny because AI is prioritizing a lot of the meta titles and meta descriptions so look at that rethink how your titles are and maybe consider adding a bunch of more keywords in there so that you're going to show up in the AI results Embrace authentic content visual visual storytelling is really it's really where it's at you really want to connect with your local audience so you got to make sure that you're doing that show show your story you're not really telling it anymore so local visibility you know it's just it's not about the raiki reports and the website clicks anymore it's about finding your audience and making sure that you're having the influence where they're at you heard it here F first folks thank you for saying that we should show not tell more and all the other things that you shared during the podcast and if you don't mind I'm going to do the outro today Claudia

Tamina Shar with us her insights on the future trends of local SEO and Google Business profiles I hope our listeners are inspired and are already coming up with ideas on how to capitalize on their local SEO and GBP efforts thank you Claudia for making time to be here with us sharing your knowledge with our community and to our listeners I want to thank you for tuning in be sure to subscribe to the do follow podcast and we'll see you in the next episode [Music]