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Local SEO audit for service businesses

A free local SEO audit and checker: look up your Google listing, answer 28 questions about your profile, contact details, reviews, local pages and schema, and get a fix list in the order we would tackle it.

Step 1, optional

Find your Google listing

We look up the public listing and compare it with the details on your website. Your search is sent to Google to find the listing; nothing is saved.

Step 2

Answer 28 questions

Answer for how things are today. If you are not sure, say so: each "not sure" comes with a way to check.

01

Google Business Profile

The listing that shows in Google Maps and the local results.

  1. Have you claimed and verified your Google Business Profile?
  2. Is the primary category the most specific one that describes your main service?
  3. Have you added secondary categories for your other main services?
  4. Are your opening hours set, including special hours for bank holidays and closures?
  5. Does the profile have a description that says plainly what you do and where?
  6. Have you listed your services (or products) in the profile?
  7. Have you added your own photos of your work, premises or team in the last three months?
  8. Does the website link on the profile go to the right page, and does that page load properly on a phone?
  9. If you go to customers, have you set a service area, and hidden your address if customers do not visit it?
02

Name, address and phone (NAP)

Whether your details read the same everywhere they appear.

  1. Is the business name on your profile exactly your real-world name, with no added keywords or town names?
  2. Do the name, address and phone number on your website match your Google profile exactly?
  3. Are your address (or service area) and phone number on the website as text, not only inside an image?
  4. Have you checked that your main directory listings (such as Bing Places, Apple Business Connect, Yell and any trade body) show the same details?
  5. If you have moved or changed number, have you updated or closed listings that still show the old details?
03

Reviews and replies

How reviews arrive and how you answer them.

  1. Do you ask every customer for a Google review, with a direct link?
  2. Have you had a new Google review in the last month?
  3. Do you reply to your reviews, good and bad?
  4. When a review is critical, do you reply calmly in public and offer to put things right?
  5. Do you ask every customer in the same way, without offering discounts or gifts for reviews?
04

Local pages on your website

The pages your listing and searchers land on.

  1. Does each main service have its own page on your website?
  2. If you cover several towns, does each main town have a page that says something specific about working there?
  3. Do the page title and main heading of your key pages name the service and the town?
  4. Does your contact page show your address or service area, phone number and hours, with a map or directions if customers visit?
  5. On a phone, can someone find your number and call you with one tap from any page?
05

LocalBusiness schema

The structured data that describes your business to search engines.

  1. Does your website have LocalBusiness structured data (schema markup)?
  2. Do the name, address and phone in the schema match your website and listing exactly?
  3. Does the schema include your opening hours and links to your official profiles (sameAs)?
  4. Have you tested the schema and fixed any errors it reported?

0 of 28 answered

How the audit works

The audit has two parts. The optional listing lookup finds your business on Google and compares the public listing with the name, phone number, postcode and web address you give from your own website. It reports matches, differences and gaps, such as missing opening hours or no website link.

The questionnaire covers what a lookup cannot see: whether the profile is verified, whether you ask for and reply to reviews, whether each service and town has a proper page, and whether your site carries LocalBusiness schema that matches your listing. Each answer other than "yes" comes with a specific next step, and "not sure" answers tell you how to check.

The fix list is ordered by priority, then by answer: things you said are missing come before things you were unsure of, which come before things that are partly done. Start at the top. If you would rather someone worked through it with you, our local SEO service in Guildford starts from the same checks, or you can get in touch.

The score is a self-check, not a full audit or a forecast of rankings. Weights are our judgement, not measured figures.

Questions

What is a local SEO audit?

A local SEO audit checks the things that decide whether you appear when someone nearby searches for what you do: your Google Business Profile, whether your name, address and phone number match everywhere, your reviews, the local pages on your website and the structured data that describes your business. This tool covers those basics as a self-check.

Is this a full local SEO audit?

No. It works as a local SEO checker: a self-check based on your answers, plus a reading of your public Google listing if you look it up. A full audit also looks at your competitors, your links and citations, the content and speed of your pages and how you rank across the area you serve. It is a good way to find the obvious gaps before paying anyone to look.

How is the score worked out?

Each question carries a weight of one to three, set by our judgement of how much it affects local visibility. "Yes" earns the full weight, "partly" half, and "no" or "not sure" nothing. Questions marked "doesn't apply" are left out. The score is the share of available points you earned. It is not a prediction of rankings or traffic.

Can I use this as a Google Business Profile audit?

Yes, for the main fields. The first group of questions covers verification, categories, hours, description, services, photos, the website link and service areas, and the listing lookup checks what Google shows publicly. It cannot see inside your profile settings, so it relies on your answers for those.

What does NAP consistency mean?

NAP stands for name, address and phone number. Search engines compare these details across your website, your Google listing and directories to confirm they are looking at one business. Small differences, such as an old phone number on a directory or a different way of writing the address, are worth tidying up.

What happens to the details I enter?

Your questionnaire answers and website details stay in your browser and are not sent or saved. If you use the listing lookup, the search text you type is sent from this site to Google to find the listing, and only the listing details the audit uses come back. Nothing is stored.

Do I need a Google Business Profile to use this?

No. You can skip the lookup and answer the questions. If you have no profile yet, the results will put creating and verifying one at the top of the list, as it is the starting point for appearing in Google Maps.

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