How these 20 tips are organized
Each tip below has one sentence on what to do and one on why it works. They are grouped by job: getting found, writing pages that win, earning trust, and keeping score. Pick three, do them this week, then come back.
If you want the same ground as a strict order of operations, use the small business SEO checklist. This page is the opposite: a pile of ideas you can pick from. And if you are deciding between doing it yourself and hiring, our guide to affordable SEO help for a small business lays out the options.
Examples are labeled. They are illustrations of the idea, not client results.
Getting found: tips 1 to 5
1. Verify your site in Google Search Console
What: add your site to the free tool and confirm ownership. Why: it is the only place Google reports directly on how it sees your site, including which searches show your pages.
2. Claim and complete your Google Business Profile
What: fill every field, pick accurate categories, add photos and services. Why: for local searches the profile often appears above every website result, so it is a second front door.
3. Write a homepage title that says what and where
What: use a plain pattern like "Roof repair in Boise" under about 60 characters. Why: the title is the biggest single signal of what the page is about and the line a searcher reads first.
4. Keep your name, address and phone number identical everywhere
What: write them one way on your site, your profile, and your social pages. Why: matching details across the web make it easier for search engines to treat you as one real business.
5. Make the site work on a phone
What: open every important page on your own phone and fix what is awkward. Why: most local searches happen on phones, and Google judges the mobile version of your site first.
Pages that win: tips 6 to 11
6. Build one page per service
What: give each thing you sell its own page rather than one list. Why: each page can match a separate search, and you stop asking one page to do eight jobs.
7. Answer the question in the first paragraph
What: state the answer in one or two sentences, then explain. Why: searchers and AI assistants both lift the clearest sentence, and a page that buries it loses to one that leads with it.
8. Use the words customers use, not your trade's words
What: write "fix a leaking tap" if that is what people type, even if your invoice says "repair faucet fixture." Why: you rank for the phrase that appears on the page, so match how people really speak. Specific, long searches are where a small site wins first.
9. Add a short FAQ to important pages
What: list four or five real questions customers ask you and answer them directly. Why: it covers searches you did not think of and gives AI assistants clean answers to quote.
10. Show real photos of real work
What: use pictures from your own jobs, shop or team with a plain description. Why: they prove you are real and they cannot be copied by a competitor.
11. Put a clear next step on every page
What: one button or phone number, near the top and again at the bottom. Why: ranking brings visitors, and a clear next step is what turns them into customers.
Earning trust: tips 12 to 16
12. Ask every happy customer for a review
What: ask the same day, by text, with a direct link. Why: reviews feed both local rankings and the answers AI assistants give. See do reviews help SEO for how.
13. Ask for specific reviews
What: suggest they mention the problem, the service and the town. Why: a review that says "replaced our water heater in Raleigh the same day" tells search engines and readers far more than "great service."
14. Reply to every review, good or bad
What: a short, human reply within a few days. Why: it shows the business is active and handles complaints calmly, which readers notice.
15. Build an About page with real names
What: who you are, how long you have done this, your licenses, your service area. Why: it supports the trust signals Google calls E-E-A-T and answers a buyer's first question, which is who they are dealing with.
16. Get a few local mentions
What: chamber of commerce, supplier pages, sponsorships, local press. Why: independent mentions are evidence you exist beyond your own site, and a few real ones outweigh many bought ones.
Keeping score: tips 17 to 20
17. Check Search Console once a month
What: note clicks, impressions, average position and top pages. Why: it shows direction without the noise of daily changes. Read how to measure SEO for a small business for the plain version.
18. Look at the searches that already bring you impressions
What: find queries where you appear on page two and improve those pages first. Why: a page already close to page one needs a small push, not a new start.
19. Ask an AI assistant your customers' questions
What: type "best accountant for a small restaurant in Tampa" into ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity or Claude and note who is named. Why: more people now ask assistants first, and you want to know if you are in the answer. Our free AI visibility check shows the method.
20. Keep a simple log of what you changed
What: write the date and the change in a note. Why: when a number moves, you can see what likely caused it, and you stop repeating things that did nothing.
How to choose your first three
Twenty tips is too many. Choose by your situation.
If you have never touched SEO: tips 1, 2 and 3. Search Console, Business Profile, homepage title. About two hours.
If your site exists but gets almost no calls from search: tips 6, 7 and 12. One page per service, a clear first paragraph, and a steady stream of reviews.
If you already rank somewhere and want more: tips 18, 9 and 16. Improve the near-misses, add questions and answers, and earn a few more mentions.
Whatever you choose, do not abandon the plan after one month because nothing changed. Search results lag the work. How long is normal is covered in how long SEO takes for a small business.
Worked examples for tips 3 and 7
Two tips cause the most confusion, so here they are in practice. These are examples, not results from real clients.
A homepage title, before and after
Before: "Welcome to Mike's Home Services." After: "Furnace repair and installation in Duluth, MN." The first tells nobody anything. The second contains the service and the place, which are the two things a searcher typed.
A first paragraph, before and after
Before, on a page about drain cleaning: "At our company, we pride ourselves on delivering exceptional service to all of our valued customers." After: "A slow or blocked drain usually means a clog in the line or a buildup further down. We clear most residential drains in Duluth in under two hours and tell you the cause before we start."
The second version answers the question, names the place, and gives a reader something concrete. It is also the sentence an AI assistant is most likely to quote. Notice that it does not include a price, because a price you cannot keep current is worse than none. Describe what affects the price instead.
Which tips matter most for which business
All twenty tips are sound. Some are far more valuable depending on how you work.
Trades and home services: tips 2, 6, 12 and 13. The profile, service pages, and reviews that name the work and the town. We expand on this in SEO for service businesses.
Shops and retail: tips 6, 7, 10 and 5. Product and category pages that answer the question first, real photos, and a site that works on a phone while someone stands in the aisle comparing.
Professional services: tips 15, 9, 7 and 16. The About page, FAQs that answer what clients are nervous about, a clear first paragraph, and a few mentions from respected local bodies.
Restaurants, salons and appointment businesses: tips 2, 4, 10 and 11. A complete profile, consistent details, photos, and a booking link that is impossible to miss.
Choose from the list that matches you, and treat the rest as backup.
How to tell whether a tip worked
Doing tips without checking them is how owners end up repeating the ones that do nothing. Use a plain test for each change.
Pick one number before you start. For a title change, it is clicks to that page. For a new service page, it is impressions for the search it targets. For a review routine, it is reviews per month and the star average. Write the number and the date.
Wait long enough. A title change can show a difference in a few weeks. A new page often needs several months before Google has tested it. Judging at week two is judging too early.
Change one thing at a time on a page when you can. If you rewrite the title, the first paragraph and the photos together, you will not know which did the work. For a small site that is a minor loss, but it is a habit worth having.
Look at the trend, not a single month. Seasonal businesses swing. A garden center in April and a heating contractor in January will both look great or terrible for reasons that have nothing to do with a tip. Compare to the same month last year when you can.
If a tip shows nothing after a fair wait, do not abandon the whole plan. Drop that tip and move to the next one.
Which of these tips cost money
Almost none, and it is worth saying so plainly. Tips 1 to 5, 7, 11, 14, 17, 18, 19 and 20 cost nothing except attention. Tips 6, 9, 10, 12 and 13 cost writing time and some photography, which you can do with the phone in your pocket.
Money enters at two places. First, if you would rather pay for the pages in tip 6 and the questions in tip 9 than write them yourself. Second, if you want help earning the mentions in tip 16, which is slow relationship work.
Be wary of anyone who sells the free tips back to you as a package. Setting up Search Console and filling in your profile is an afternoon, and you should own those accounts in your own name, not leave them under an agency login.
Tips you will hear that are not worth your time
A few pieces of common advice deserve a pause before you act on them.
"Post on social media every day for SEO." Social posts do not directly rank your site. They can bring customers, which is worthwhile, but it is a separate job.
"Add your keyword to the page as many times as possible." Pages written that way read badly and do not rank better. Say it where it naturally belongs.
"Submit to hundreds of directories." A few reputable ones help. A mass submission produces weak links and sometimes harm.
"You need a blog post every day." Quality and usefulness beat volume for a business with limited time. One honest answer a month to a real customer question is a fine start.
How RunOctopus handles the writing and publishing
Most of the 20 tips above are one-time fixes. The ones that take sustained effort are pages, articles and mentions, and those are where small businesses run out of time.
RunOctopus is a done-for-you service for exactly that part. Its AI, Ollie, researches your business, then writes and publishes pages directly on your own website. A team plans, writes, reviews and publishes alongside Ollie. It works with Shopify, WordPress, WooCommerce and Wix, and there is nothing to install, approve, upload or schedule. You do not approve each page. Pages go live on their own.
In the first week you get 8 long-form articles, 6 pages, and a custom interactive tool built for your niche. After that it is 175+ pieces of content a month, written, published and linked. You also get reports on where ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude and Gemini name your business.
The free site read lets you see the plan before deciding anything: paste your address, Ollie reads the site and shows it. No account, no call.