Checkout these Free local SEO tools from one-person shops to the United States government.
GetListed
This best of all free local tools shows you where business listings exist for your company on key local platforms and where they don’t. It helps you to determine exactly where you need to list your business next.
GetListed.org is a go-to tool for business owners. Quickly find the zip code of the business, pop it into the tool along with the name, and have a ton of information at my fingertips. As a first point of appraisal and analysis, there is no other free tool like it, and it makes it so easy for solo business owners to see where they are at, citation-wise, and where they need to go next.
Google Places for Business Category Tool
Local Search Ranking Factors 2013 cites correct categorization of your business in the Google Places for Business Dashboard as the number one factor!
Type your service, product, and business model keywords into this Mike Blumenthal tool, and it generates a list of best-match pre-set categories from Google’s category taxonomy. Really helpful for when you are creating Google+ Local pages .
Free Local Analysis Google Places Tool
Enter your basic business information and this great little tool from 51 Blocks gives you a treasure trove of data about the optimization of your Google+ Local listing, the consistency of your NAP (name, address, phone number) as published on your website, a head count of your citations and links, and the ability to analyze your competitors’ stats, too.
A provided overview can be step one in your competitive analysis. You will, of course, be digging deeper than this for any business you promote, but this is a great, free place to jump-start your appraisal and begin forming a to-do list for your marketing plan.
Google Local Toolbox
Also from 51 Blocks. Entering your basic business info into this tool generates HCard, Schema, KML Location Code and GeoTags. Explicit structuring of your business data on your website and elsewhere means you are making every effort to help the bots understand who you are, where you are, and what you do.
Generate local AdWords and Keyword Lists Tool
Helpful for both PPC and on-page local SEO, a tool from 5MinuteSite.com lets you enter keywords and geographic data for the purpose of generating a list of terms you should consider targeting.
The radius feature of the tool will be helpful to local search marketers working with service area businesses (SABs) that serve a variety of cities.
If you do PPC, you now have an idea of tons of keyword permutations you might want to evaluate for targeting in your campaigns in your client’s service radius. Another use for the output of this tool would be to give it as a list to your client as potential subjects to blog about in an effort to increase their organic visibility alongside their local results for their city of location.
Review Handout Generator
This nifty free tool from Whitespark enables you to enter your business data and create a PDF handout that can be given to customers at the time of service with the goal of encouraging them to review you online. Even lets you upload your business logo to totally customize the appearance of the handout. If you’re having trouble launching a review acquisition campaign, this handy little printout can help your whole staff make an easy start.
Empower your phone staff to collect “how did you hear about us?” data and enter it into this form during phone calls. The data is then saved in a database so that you can view and analyze your statistics. The tool also fires the data over to Google Analytics using UTM tracking parameters, so that the data is tracked in Analytics as well. High marks for Whitespark for the creativity of this tool!
Offline Conversion Tracker
Implementing simple best practices in the office, like asking how a customer found your business, can make such a difference in your ability to understand your market, your position in your community and the areas in which you need to grow your outreach in order to appeal to new customers. Approach this task in a really organized manor with this neat free tool.
Employ best practices in your on-page local SEO by utilizing Schema markup to make your basic business data as clear as possible. This tool does just one thing: generates correct Schema markup. Local businesses should choose the “organization” link from the left-hand menu. My only peeve with this tool is that it doesn’t provide a field for your phone number, a key component of your core business NAP (name, address, phone) which you’ll be embedding into your website.
Schema Creator
Given that the main function of utilizing markup is to make data more explicit, it makes good sense to go with the most specific formatting you can. In other words, if you run a recycling center, you’ll see that there is specific markup for this that will make your business data just a little bit clearer than it would be if you simply used the generic “organization” code.
Right from the horse’s mouth, this nifty little Google widget generates code you can embed into your website so that your visitors can get customized driving directions to your place of business. A boon for any brick-and-mortar business model.
You can customize the display of the widget, including making adjustments to size, color, and language. It is currently available in nineteen countries.
USPS ZIP Code Tool
Look up ZIP codes with this tool from the USPS. It’s so important to be sure that your business is publishing a ZIP code identical to the one the post office officially assigns to your business. ExpressUpdate/Infogroup draws location date from the USPS an, in turn, feeds it to a host of other websites.
I’ve seen confusion arising in the Google and Your Business Forum over zip code discrepancies, particularly in areas where town names or borders are fuzzy. Inconsistencies in address data are the root cause of so many Google ranking problems. Thanks to this tool, you can be totally secure that you’re publishing your correct, official zip code. In the example above, the business has gotten it right.
OSHA Standard Industrial Category Tool
Especially helpful when listing your business at ExpressUpdate, this tool lets you enter keywords to determine under which official category your business falls..
If you don’t know your Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) number, which must be entered into the tool along with your keyword, you can find a list of numbers here.
Census.gov Tools
Need to know more about the population and economics of a client’s city in the USA? The government knows all and you can find a ton of useful statistical information from the census to help you fine tune your campaigns.
Plagiarism Checker
The tool highlights in red any instances of potential plagiarism and these instances link to the search engine results where the matching text was found. In addition to being a good tool for helping you make sure that no one is stealing your content, it can be used to ensure that no one is offering you previously published text.
Local SEO Client Questionnaire
While not exactly a tool, this freebie from Local Visibility System will save you so much back-and-forth with your local SEO clients that I just had to include it. You can shoot this over to incoming clients in PDF format, have them fill it out and then know you’ve asked all of the right questions to surface problems and ensure consistent data.
Read more: Free Local SEO Tools that Belong in Your Kit