Start with your Google Business Profile. Claim it, verify ownership, complete every field including business hours, service areas, categories, and attributes. Upload 10+ photos showing your team, location, and work. Post weekly updates. This is non-negotiable because the Local Pack drives 30–40% of clicks for local queries. Next, build citation consistency. Get listed on major platforms like Yelp, Yellow Pages, BBB, and industry-specific directories. Your NAP must match exactly across every listing—punctuation, suite numbers, phone format. Tools like BrightLocal or Whitespark help track this. For Canadian businesses, include provincial directories and chambers of commerce. Reviews move the needle. Ask customers to leave Google reviews immediately after a positive interaction, not weeks later. Respond to every review within 48 hours, negative ones especially. Businesses with 40+ reviews typically rank higher than those with 10, assuming similar ratings. On-site optimization matters too. Create location pages if you serve multiple areas—one page per city with unique content about that market, not just templated headers. Include your city and region in title tags, H1s, and naturally throughout content. Add schema markup for LocalBusiness, including geo-coordinates. Local link building separates mediocre from strong performers. Sponsor local events, partner with complementary businesses, get featured in regional news sites. A link from Ottawa Business Journal or a local BIA carries more local relevance than a generic directory. Ottawa SEO runs this exact process for service-area businesses across the portfolio. We prioritize GBP optimization and review velocity in month one, citations and content in months two through three, then shift to ongoing link acquisition. The businesses that plateau are usually the ones who stop asking for reviews or let their GBP go stale. Local SEO requires maintenance, not a one-time setup. Track rankings for "service + city" queries and monitor your Local Pack position weekly using tools like Local Falcon or Grid My Business.