A Restaurant Owner’s Guide to Local SEO

Running a restaurant is already a full-time job, but to stay competitive in a crowded market, you need to stand out in local search results. 

According to Owner.com, 91% of guests visit a restaurant’s website before placing an order in the US, and 78% do the same before visiting a restaurant in person. This means that if your restaurant’s website isn’t optimized and up to date, you risk losing a significant slice of the pie to competitors who are easier to find online. 

The good news? With a feature-rich website builder and an understanding of simple SEO principles, you don’t need to be a tech expert to improve your local ranking.

From perfecting your Google Business Profile to implementing a local business schema, we guide you through eight effective strategies to help your restaurant secure a higher ranking and cook up more profits.

What Is Local SEO and Why Does It Matter?

Local SEO is the process of optimizing your online presence so that your restaurant or food business shows up in local search results. Well-optimized websites are more likely to get discovered by nearby customers, helping businesses stay competitive in a market where most dining decisions begin with a quick Google search. 

In contrast to general SEO, which targets broader national or global audiences, local SEO targets people actively searching for results within a specific geographic area. For example, it helps your business appear for searches like “Thai restaurant Oregon” or “sourdough pizza near me”.

There are several reasons restaurants should care about local SEO. First, it boosts your online discoverability, making it easier for hungry customers to find your restaurant when they’re interested in dining or ordering online.

A robust local SEO strategy also helps to build consumer trust, especially if you present accurate contact information, high-quality photos and you’ve been able to secure positive reviews.

Ultimately, strong local SEO can directly translate into increased revenue, as greater visibility and credibility drive more people to visit your website, place orders, and walk through your doors to dine in person.

8 SEO Tips To Improve Your Restaurant’s Ranking

You don’t need to launch an expensive ad campaign to get more eyes on your restaurant’s website — just use a little SEO know-how. Here are eight practical strategies you can use to climb to the top of Google’s search results. 

1. Claim and maintain your Google Business Profile

Claiming or creating a Google Business Profile (GBP) is one of the biggest wins you can make for your restaurant’s local SEO. It determines how your business appears in Google Maps and the local pack results that show up above the regular search results — often the first place customers look when deciding where to eat.

If a profile for your business already exists, sign in to Google Business Profile with your Google Account, search for your restaurant name, and claim it. If it doesn’t, you can create one easily by selecting “Add your business to Google”.

Once verified, you should also write a compelling business description and add key details like your menu, opening hours, and whether you accept takeout or delivery orders. 

Be sure to maintain your listing, too, by regularly posting updates and keeping information accurate. Alongside keeping potential customers clued up, this will also signal to Google that your restaurant is trustworthy and active, helping you to climb higher in the local search rankings.

2. Upload pictures of your food and restaurant

While Google’s algorithms primarily analyze text, the importance of uploading high-quality images to your website or Google Business Profile and website can’t be understated. Just like humans, search engines are visual machines that prioritize websites that clearly showcase what a business offers.

When you add up-to-date images of your dishes, dining area, and exterior, Google rewards this transparency by giving your website greater visibility than businesses that don’t. This is because the search engine’s algorithm favors websites that are well-maintained and up-to-date — clear indicators of an active and trustworthy business.

Photos also help capture the attention of potential customers. By adding eye-catching visuals of your signature dishes or inviting interiors, you’re showing diners what to expect and enticing them to visit or make an online order via your website.

You don’t need to invest a fortune in expensive camera equipment to get results either. Just make sure to take photos in natural lighting when possible, keep the composition clean, and include a variety of shots. 

3. Ensure your website is mobile-friendly

For restaurants, having a mobile-friendly website is a non-negotiable. The majority of customers search for restaurants on their smartphones for greater convenience, often when they’re already on the go. If your website doesn’t load quickly or display properly on mobile devices, there’s a much higher chance a visitor will move to a competitor’s site instead. 

While lots of the best website builders ensure websites are automatically optimized for mobile, this isn’t a given. For example, if you build a website with Wix, you’ll be required to adjust your mobile layout manually to make sure everything functions perfectly on smaller screens, from your menu to your contact buttons.

Beyond providing a better user experience to customers, ensuring your website is optimized for mobile is also crucial for SEO performance. Google now uses mobile-first indexing, which means it primarily evaluates the mobile version of your website to determine rankings.

Ultimately, this means that poorly optimized mobile pages stand a much poorer chance of appearing in local search results. 

4. Get involved in community events that will get coverage

Sometimes, boosting your website’s SEO involves thinking outside of the box. In addition to traditional strategies, getting involved with local community events, from food festivals to charity fundraisers, can be a powerful way to increase your restaurant’s online visibility.

When your restaurant sponsors or participates in a community event, you’re likely to receive coverage and be mentioned online by local organizations, bloggers, and even news outlets.

Google rewards this kind of visibility because it signals that your business is trusted and connected to the community it serves, upping your chances of appearing in local search results and Google Maps rankings.

Beyond improving your SEO, involving your restaurant in the local community will also help you build brand awareness offline, creating a two-pronged approach that strengthens both your digital and real-world presence. 

5. Encourage positive customer reviews

Aside from creating social proof and reassuring customers that your restaurant is worth visiting, positive reviews also have the power to directly influence local search rankings. Google places a lot of weight on customer reviews when calculating which businesses to prioritize in the search engine results page (SERPS).

This is especially true for queries with local intent, where Google favors businesses that are frequently reviewed and well-rated by happy customers. Furthermore, even when two restaurants appear in the same search results, the business with better ratings and reviews will always appear more desirable to customers. 

The volume, detail, and freshness of your reviews also carry significant weight — both in how customers perceive your restaurant and how search engines rank you.

To encourage guests to leave quality feedback, you could embed review widgets on your website and offer small incentives, like discounts on their next visit, or loyalty points for verified reviews. In-store prompts, such as QR codes on receipts or table tents, also make it easier for diners to share their thoughts.

6. Use local business schema 

Schema markup is a type of code you can add to your website to help search engines understand your content better. When you enter structured data about your restaurant, like your business’s name, opening hours, and contact details, it provides Google and other engines with clear information about who you are and what you offer. 

Not only does this increase your chances of appearing in local searches, but it also makes your content more likely to appear in rich search snippets that display details, like star ratings and menu links. All of this has the power to considerably boost click-through rates for specific queries, making it easier for potential customers to find your business. 

Fortunately, adding local business schema doesn’t require advanced technical skills. You can use Google’s Structured Data Markup Helper or plugins like Yoast SEO to generate code automatically. Once it’s been added, simply use Google’s Rich Results Test to check whether the schema is working correctly, then wait for the results.

7. Implement a keyword strategy

Another organic way to improve your website’s ranking is to roll out a simple keyword strategy. By tactically including targeted keywords in your website’s content that match what terms customers are searching for, you have a much higher chance of appearing higher up in the SERPS.

Begin by identifying local and intent-driven keywords, whether it be “best Indian meal in Denver” or “bottomless brunch Miami”. Then, try to incorporate these keywords as naturally as possible into your content via headings, meta descriptions, and your website copy, as well as the overview of your restaurant’s Google Business Profile. 

We also recommend regularly reviewing how your keywords are performing, using tools like Ahrefs and Google Keyword Planner, and adjusting your strategy accordingly. 

8. Keep your information up-to-date

It may sound like a simple step, but keeping your business’s details accurate and up to date is one of the most powerful ways to strengthen your SEO. Search engines prioritize consistency when determining which businesses to show in local search results.

Therefore, if your restaurant’s details are outdated or inconsistent across your website, it can confuse search engines and negatively impact your search ranking.

Failing to update key information, like opening hours, addresses or menu items, can also erode trust with customers. Nothing’s more frustrating than showing up to a closed restaurant or finding that dishes listed online are no longer available. So, to keep customers and search engines happy, maintaining up-to-date information is a must.   

How to Track the Success of Your Local SEO Strategy

The hard work isn’t over once your restaurant has implemented an SEO strategy. To ensure your efforts are actually driving results, you should regularly monitor your performance and adjust your tactics accordingly. 

Here are some effective ways to measure your local SEO success:

• Track your keyword ranking: Monitoring your keyword traffic helps you understand which phrases are driving the most traffic. You can do this easily by using tools like Google Search Console or Semrush.
• Check your website’s traffic: Use Google Analytics to monitor changes to your organic traffic. You can also use the free platform to track metrics like average session duration and bounce rate, to gain deeper insights into customer behaviour. 
• Analyze your Google Business Profile insights: Use the GBP insights dashboard to check how often your restaurant’s website appears in search and map results, as well as how many users follow through to visit your website. 
• Measure website conversions: In addition to tracking traffic, measure how many visitors actually make a reservation, place online orders, and dine in your restaurant in person. Doing this helps you understand the real-world impact of your SEO strategy, beyond clicks. 
• Monitor and respond to customer reviews: Regularly look for positive reviews on platforms like Google, Yelp and Facebook. Respond to feedback too, whether it be thanking happy customers or addressing negative reviews professionally and promptly.