NEW FREE VIDEO COURSE: How to Create a Winning Local SEO Strategy for Any Business

Get practical insights on crafting local SEO strategies that deliver real results for any business, big or small.

20 min read

Local Search Industry Survey 2022

Local Search Industry Survey 2022
Key Takeaways
  • LinkedIn leapfrogs Facebook as the best social media channel for landing new clients.
  • Male local marketers earn 27%, 16% and 32% more than their female counterparts in the US, UK, and Canada, respectively.
  • Local marketing agencies and freelancers earning annual revenues of $500,000 or more have declined by almost 10% since 2021.
  • Retaining long-term clients relies on GBP Optimization, Content Creation, On-site Optimization and Citation Building as the key local marketing services.
  • 75% of local businesses now use WordPress as their CMS platform of choice—almost double last year’s result.
  • 81% of local marketers are likely to stay in their job this year, despite 50% of businesses wanting to make more hires.
  • 57% of local marketers plan on freelancing in the future.

Back in 2011, we decided to launch the Local Search Industry Survey—a large-scale analysis of the local marketing landscape.

Now into its eleventh year, this survey aims to compile the thoughts and opinions of those working in local search, helping to illustrate what the world of local SEO currently looks like.

We recognize that the chopping and changing nature of local search can make it difficult to know not only how to implement appropriate strategies, but also to understand how to keep up to date with your potential competitors. So, we thought we’d try to help.

In this year’s survey, we questioned 400 local marketers around the world, gathering valuable insights. From agency workers to freelancers to employees in local businesses, we aim to provide a useful measure of life as a local marketer on a year-by-year basis, assessing the attitudes, experiences and finances of people working within the world of local SEO.

So, without any further ado, let’s see what 2022 has to offer.

Publishers are welcome to use the following charts and data, crediting BrightLocal and linking to this article’s URL. If you have any questions about the report, please get in touch with the content team, or leave a comment below. Information about the demographics of the survey can be found at the end of this post.

The Outlook for 2022

LSIS Chart 1

As we speed on through the first quarter of the year, it appears that many local marketers are hopeful about what the rest of 2022 has to hold—albeit not to the same extent as in 2021.

As the chart above shows, 23% of respondents believe that it will be easier to achieve local SEO success in 2021—down from 26% in last year’s Local Search Industry Survey.

However, with the majority of respondents saying it will be neither easier or harder (42%, up from 37% last year), this means that, overall, more local marketers are expecting this year to be almost as difficult as last year (36%, down from 37%).

Local SEO Salaries

The Average Salaries for Local Marketers in the UK, USA, & Canada

LSIS 2022 Chart 3

N.b. More than two-thirds of this year’s respondents were self-described as being a senior level local marketer, which could have had a bearing on the average salaries calculated above.

Salaries can vary pretty drastically within the world of local marketing but, we wondered, could you earn more for doing the same job in a different country?

Well, according to our data, yes you can.

We discovered that the median salary in the USA ($75,800 per year) was significantly higher than the median salaries in both the UK ($59,218 per year when converted into USD) and Canada ($66,275 per year when converted into USD). This correlated with the trend that we found in last year’s Local Search Industry Survey, with US-based local marketers bringing in a higher average salary overall ($90,664 per year).

UK local marketers were also seen to have a higher average salary this year than in 2021, bringing home an average of £47,130 per year—a £1,416 increase on last year’s data. The findings appear not to be so rosy for Canadian local marketers, though, with the average salary declining by $5,267 between 2021 and 2022.

So, why do you think this might be the case? We’d love to hear your thoughts so please let us know your theories in the comments section below.

Local Marketer Salaries in the USA, UK, & Canada by Gender

LSIS 2022 Chart 4

Delving into the salary data a bit further, disparities were also found between the average and median salaries earned by male and female local marketers across the USA, UK, and Canada.

In the US, male local marketers received approximately $20,500 more per year than their female counterparts while, in the UK, there was a £7,500 difference between men and women. However, Canadian local marketers were shown to have the largest gender disparity, with a $25,000 difference in median salaries, according to the data above.

Overall, women were shown to earn around 26% less than the men in this survey—though there were fewer women defined as working in ‘senior’ positions. So, this makes us question whether women in SEO are getting the opportunities they need to grow into the highest-paying and most senior roles? Our recent blog, entitled ‘How We Can Support Women in SEO: Advice for Women, from Women’, offers some great insights into this area, so let us know what you think!

The Average Salaries for US-based Local Marketers by Business Type

Type of BusinessAverage SalaryMedian Salary
Combined Average$95,152$75,800
Agency$87,957$75,300
Freelance$68,000$60,000
In-house$105,180$100,000

N.b. This analysis was only performed for US-based local marketers due to currency discrepancies with other countries.

Since this year’s respondents came from a whole host of different backgrounds—local search agencies, national marketing agencies, local businesses, multinational businesses—we decided to question how the average salaries may differ between each type of local marketer.

Looking at the data above for just US-based local marketers, we can see that respondents who worked for either a local business with a single location or a multi-location business earned around $10,028 more than the combined average salary.

However, since many in-business marketers will have SEO and digital marketing tasks as just one of their many responsibilities, this news should be taken with a pinch of salt; the salary they receive won’t necessarily be a true reflection of the specific local search duties that they are expected to perform.

At $68,000 per year, freelance local marketers were found to bring in the lowest average salary, overall; approximately 26% less than agency workers, 62% less than single or multi-location business employees and 27% less than they were earning on average in 2021. As a result, this finding could be representative of the transition away from the pandemic, with it now becoming increasingly harder for freelancers to obtain new work.

Unfortunately, the news wasn’t all good for local marketing agency workers, either. Last year, the average salary for this type of local marketer was estimated to be $91,468 per year, meaning that this year’s figure has declined by approximately 4% on average.

Local Marketer’s Satisfaction with Salaries

LSIS Chart 4

In light of the various salary disparities seen in the data above, you might be wondering how local marketers actually feel about the money they receive for their efforts. We were too and, interestingly, we found that the majority (39%) appear to still be satisfied with the salary they receive.

That said, this percentage has decreased by almost 10% since last year’s survey, with a higher proportion of respondents (46%) now feeling only ‘somewhat satisfied’ with their salary.

LSIS Chart 5

Looking into the difference between male and female local marketers, we also noticed that a higher proportion of female local marketers (18%) were less satisfied with their salaries than their male counterparts (10%).

This is, of course, to be expected when you consider the significant differences in income between male and female local marketers outlined in the salary comparison above.

However, what’s not to be expected is the ratio of male and female respondents who said they were either ‘very’ or ‘extremely’ satisfied with their salaries—found to be the same at 38% each. This accordingly makes us wonder whether female marketers’ salary expectations are therefore lower than male marketers’, resulting in an increased salary satisfaction despite earning less than their male counterparts. Let us know what you think in the comments below.

Working in Local SEO

Annual Revenues for Local Marketing Agencies & Freelancers

LSIS Chart 6

N.b Respondents were asked to provide their annual revenue data in their local currency. Only converted currency data from US, UK, Canada and Australia-based respondents was used within the analysis.

Looking at the revenues of local marketing agencies and freelancers, there was a small rise in the number of combined businesses earning up to $100,000 this year (27%) than in 2021 (23%). There was also a slight decline in the number of businesses earning between $500,000 and $5 million this year (28%) compared to last year (35%).

But, when you break down the data individually, how did each type of local marketing business fare on a year-by-year basis?

LSIS Chart 7

N.b Respondents were asked to provide their annual revenue data in their local currency. Only converted currency data from US, UK, Canada and Australia-based respondents was used within the analysis.

According to the data above, we found that freelance local marketers generally had the lowest amount of annual revenue, with many (84%) earning less than $250,000—a 7% decline on last year’s data. That said, however, more freelancers were also found to earn more than double this figure, with 9% earning more than $500,000 in annual revenue compared to just 5% last year.

The majority of web design agencies (52%) were also shown to have annual revenues around the lower end but—with the remaining 48% of respondents earning $250,000 or more—this represented a 27% increase on last year’s data. However, since the web design respondents from this year’s survey differed from last year in both numbers and seniority, this finding may simply be due to the change of audience.

However, the same trend was also true of national marketing agencies, which were found to be the most profitable type of local marketing business; 22% earned more than $5 million in revenue this year compared to just 13% last year. This corresponded with a 19% drop in the number of respondents earning between $1 million and $5 million, effectively demonstrating that national marketing agencies are now earning significantly more this year compared to last.

Local marketing agencies weren’t too far behind, though. Approximately 25% earned more than $1 million in revenue in 2021, while 75% earned at least $100,000. But there was a 21% decline in the number of local marketing agencies earning more than $500,000 this year, perhaps suggesting that the bigger, national agencies are picking up more clients from these smaller types of marketing agencies.

Overall, when combining the data together, our results show that there has been a 9% decline in the number of freelancers and agencies earning more than $500,000 in revenue each year: 41% this year, down from 50% last year.

LSIS Chart 8

Taking the average from the data listed above, the same trends quickly become apparent.

At just over $2.5 million, national marketing agencies earned approximately 58% more than local marketing agencies, while the average annual revenue for freelancers was found to be less than $500,000.

How many clients do Local Marketers personally work with? 

Type of BusinessAverage No. of Clients Worked With on a Personal Basis
Local Marketing Agency19
National Marketing Agency16
Freelancer14
Web Design Agency18

Having assessed which type of local marketing business is typically the most fruitful, we were keen to determine whether the total amount of revenue earned was a reflection of the amount of effort put in per marketer in the business. So, we decided to investigate.

We can see that, on average, each local search employee will work with an average of 16 clients on an individual basis. But, when looking into the data further, our findings show that local marketing agency and web design agency workers tend to work with a higher average number of personal clients (19 and 18 clients, respectively) when compared to freelancers (14 clients) or national marketing agency workers (16 clients).

These findings effectively show that working in a national marketing agency will provide employees with fewer clients to work with on a personal basis, while rewarding them with an improved salary and a higher total annual revenue—as per the data above.

However, this goes against the general idea that national marketing agencies tend to work with fewer, but bigger, clients, with our data suggesting that each affiliated employee works with almost as many personal clients as smaller local marketing agency workers.

On the other hand—and perhaps as expected—freelancers will typically earn a lower amount of income despite working with a similar number of personal clients to other types of local marketers.

The Average Lifespan of a Local SEO Client

LSIS Chart 9

Almost half of this year’s respondents (49%) said that their average client lifespan was approximately three years or more—the same percentage as found in last year’s survey.

This is welcome news to hear, especially considering the tumultuous past couple of years the industry has faced in light of the coronavirus pandemic.

Winning new clients can take up a lot of time and energy, after all, so being able to retain them over a longer period is crucial to getting the best results—especially from an ROI perspective. As such, it’s great to see so many long-standing relationships between local marketers and their clients despite the economic difficulties faced in recent times.

But, how exactly have local marketers been able to retain these clients over such a long period?

Services

The Local SEO Services Most Commonly Offered by Local Marketers

LSIS Chart 10

N.b. Respondents were asked to share all of the local marketing services that they offered.

Due to the varied jobs that local SEO can entail, not every agency or freelancer will be able to—or even want to—offer every type of service to their clients. As such, many local businesses wanting to choose a consultant will often have to think carefully about the specialities they really desire.

According to our data, the local SEO services most commonly offered by local marketers in 2022 were found to be:

  1. GBP Optimization / Management (92% of respondents)
  2. Content Creation / Optimization (88%)
  3. SEO Audits & Analysis (83%)
  4. On-site Optimization (82%)
  5. Citation Building / Cleanup (79%)

As you might expect, Google Business Profile optimization—the biggest factor that affects local rankings—takes the crown as the most commonly-offered service, corresponding with our finding that almost two-thirds of local marketers believe the platform has improved over the past year.

Meanwhile, 5% more respondents are now offering content creation and on-site optimization compared to last year, while the rest of the top five results have more or less stayed the same as last year’s survey.

However, there have been a number of other interesting areas of growth and decline this year, some of which appear to go against what many expert local marketers may have predicted.

LSIS Chart 11

As you can see, 6% more local marketing agencies and freelancers are doing competitor research this year compared to last year, while video marketing services were shown to grow by the same percentage.

More interestingly, however, GBP spam fighting and Google Local Services Ads (LSA) management have both dropped in offering, by 6% and 13% respectively. This is a little surprising, especially when you consider the overall value many local marketing experts say they get from LSA.

Sterling Sky’s Joy Hawkins, for example, mentioned during our ‘The State of Local Search 2022’ webinar that Google is now showing photos in more results, including LSAs. This, coupled with the fact that LSA has now expanded to cover a wider range of industries, means that many local marketers could be potentially missing out on a big opportunity within this area this year by failing to recognize its importance.

After analyzing each individual respondent, we set out to determine which local marketing techniques were the most valued by those with a minimum client retention rate of five years or more, in an attempt to learn the habits and tactics of the most successful local SEOs.

LSIS Chart 12

N.b. Respondents were asked to share what they felt were the five most valuable services used within local marketing.

As seen in the data above, more than two-thirds cited GBP optimization as the most valued local marketing technique—albeit at 6% lower than other local marketers.

Services like content creation (a 6% increase), on-site optimization (a 5% increase) and website design (a 4% increase) were also shown to hold more value by this type of respondent, while other local marketing services like online reviews management, email marketing, PR, link building and outreach showed decreases in value, at 13%, 6% and 6% respectively.

As such, this data appears to suggest that—while GBP optimization may be important to all marketers—those that successfully retain their clients often look beyond it, advocating the value and implementation of other types of local marketing services.

Therefore, new agencies and consultants should strive to follow the same model, delivering a range of highly valued services that—along with GBP optimization—should include:

  • Content Creation / Optimization (54% of respondents)
  • On-site Optimization (48%)
  • Citation Building / Cleanup (39%)
  • Website Design (36%)

How Clients’ Understanding of Google Business Profile has Changed

Google Business Profile optimization is not only the most commonly offered local marketing service but it is the most valued as well. In simple terms, it is an essential component to local SEO success.

However, with the vast number of changes Google consistently makes to its platform—such as the recent Vicinity Update—it can be difficult for local marketers to keep up to date with their level of understanding, let alone educate the clients they work on behalf of.

So, with this in mind, and after another year of updates and changes, we thought we’d take a look at how clients currently perceive and understand the software.

LSIS Chart 13

In last year’s survey, we found that approximately 56% of respondents actually understood GBP better than before, with only 10% understanding it less.

However, this time around, that same trend has massively slowed, with only 41% of respondents understanding GBP better in 2022 than they did in 2021. Similarly, a higher percentage of respondents (17%) now understand GBP even less than last year, with the remaining 42% staying at the same level of understanding.

As such, this makes us hypothesize: is it good for local marketing agencies and businesses to have clients with less of an understanding of GBP? Or should there be more of a push to educate clients on how to use it effectively?

Let us know what you think in the comments below. And, if you think that clients should be better educated on GBP, make sure to check out our Learning Hub dedicated to doing exactly that.

Google My Business Management 101

Attracting New Clients

The Most Valuable Channels for Attracting New Clients

LSIS Chart 14

N.b. Respondents were asked to share the five most valuable channels for attracting new clients.

Retaining clients may be one thing, but attracting new ones is a whole other matter—so, how do local marketers do it?

Well, looking at the data above, the five most common ways of attracting new clients appear to be:

  • Word of Mouth (57% of respondents, up from 53% in 2021)
  • SEO (46%, up from 38% in 2021)
  • Content Marketing (38%, up from 33% in 2021)
  • Local Business Groups (26%, the same as in 2021)
  • LinkedIn (26%, up from 19% in 2021)

Word of mouth has been the clear front-runner for a number of years now and this year’s survey is no exception. In fact, after last year’s dip from 63% to 53%, it appears that word of mouth-based recommendations are becoming more and more crucial for local marketers again this year, perhaps thanks to the increased ability to network again following the pandemic.

Interestingly, the only new entry into the top five channels for winning new local marketing clients this year is LinkedIn, which has overtaken Facebook for the first time (24% this year, down from 26% last year).

This movement could be down to two key things. Firstly, more and more freelancers are now using LinkedIn as an alternative to their own website, increasing their reliance on the platform for gaining new work.

And, secondly, due to the number of privacy and ethics issues that Facebook has faced over the last few years, consumer trust may have now diminished—a finding we also identified during our recent Local Consumer Review Survey.

Industry conferences are also no longer used to attract new clients in the same way as last year, seeing a 9% decline in support. This is another likely result of the pandemic, with more local marketing businesses now feeling more comfortable with using alternative networking strategies, instead of relying on in-person opportunities.

However, looking ahead, it will be interesting to see whether industry conferences regain their popularity again during next year’s survey. Will the trend reverse itself as we move further into the post-COVID era, for instance? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.

Local SEO Pricing

How Clients Are Billed for Services, and The Prices That They Pay

We’ve looked at how local marketers bring in new clients but, once they’re on the roster, how are they charged for the services they receive? And how much do they typically pay for the pleasure?

LSIS Chart 15

N.b Respondents were provided with several options to choose between and were able to select more than one answer where applicable.

Most local marketers charge clients using either a monthly fee based on deliverables (58% of respondents, up from 51% last year) or on a ‘per project’ basis (51% of respondents, up from 37% last year).

As such, this demonstrates more of a movement towards billing clients using fixed-cost methods—a risk-averse system likely to have become a lot more popular in light of tough lessons learnt during the coronavirus pandemic. What’s more, the data also appears to show that local marketers are now offering more flexibility on how they bill their clients.

As a result of these changes, charging by day rates and per lead were found to be much less commonly used billing methods by local marketers, despite still being offered by some (5% and 4%, respectively).

LSIS Chart 16

Looking at how local marketers charge for their services, the average hourly rates appear to have stayed more or less the same over the last year in the USA, Canada, and UK.

However, when converting these figures into USD, a clear discrepancy between the average hourly charges across these three countries becomes more apparent; US-based local marketers charge approximately $48 (£36) more than their UK counterparts and $38 ($49) more than their Canadian neighbors.

But, what influence does this have on the actual money local marketers charge their clients?

LSIS Chart 16

Well, according to our data, monthly rates tend to be a bit more standardized across the three different countries.

Therefore, despite UK-based marketers charging a lower hourly rate, the average monthly cost they bring in per client appears to be significantly higher proportionally than in either the USA or Canada. In fact, the UK had the only monthly charge seen to actually increase across the three countries since last year, by approximately £102 per month.

Life In-house for Local and Multi-location Business Marketers

Working in the world of local marketing doesn’t only relate to agencies or freelancers. Therefore, we decided to include respondents in charge of local marketing across both local and multi-location businesses in the conversation as well—a group which included approximately 24% of our total respondents.

The Content Management Systems Most Commonly Used by Local Businesses

LSIS Chart 18

During last year’s Local Search Industry Survey, WordPress was by far and away the most popular choice of Content Management System (CMS) amongst local businesses, accounting for 42% of the vote. This year’s survey showed an even greater dominance by the platform, with 75% of respondents now stating they use WordPress as their main choice of CMS platform.

No respondents in this year’s survey were found to use either Squarespace or Weebly, with the remaining 16% trusting custom CMS platforms in place of the more typical website builders.

These findings both were and weren’t surprising. After all, with WordPress now said to power around 43% of all websites, its dominance in this year’s survey was to be expected.

However, with more and more CMS platforms now available, some local marketers may have thought that WordPress’ dominance would dwindle over time. As such, this is perhaps an area to monitor with interest over the coming months and years.

How Much Local Businesses Spend on Local Marketing

LSIS Chart 19

Between 2019 and 2021, we had been seeing a gradual decline in the number of local businesses spending more than $5,000 on local marketing each month. However, this year’s survey appears to have finally bucked that trend, showing a 4% increase on last year’s data.

Likewise, only 28% of respondents were found to spend less than $499 on local marketing each month, representing an 8% increase in the proportion of local businesses investing more than this amount.

LSIS Chart 20

Looking at the average across the data, local businesses were found to spend approximately $139 more each month in 2022 than last year—corresponding with the trends shown above.

Again, these changes may have occurred due to the transition away from pandemic-related restrictions, with more local businesses now feeling a lot more comfortable about investing in local marketing once again.

The Metrics Most Valued by Local Businesses

LSIS Chart 21

N.b. Local business respondents were asked to share the five local marketing services they believe to be the most valuable for attracting new clients.

As per last year’s findings, the most valued metrics by local businesses remained more or less the same this year—with one surprising exception:

  1. Google Local Rankings (57% this year, the same as last year)
  2. Google Organic Rankings (49% this year, 54% last year)
  3. Organic Traffic (41% this year, 47% last year)
  4. Number of New Reviews (40% this year, 44% last year)
  5. Phone Calls (39% this year, 51% last year)

New leads and enquiries have now been replaced in the top five of local businesses’ most valued metrics. Taking its place, local businesses were found to favor the number of new reviews instead, despite there being a 4% drop in its overall percentage.

Rankings on Google remained as local businesses’ most important metric for measuring marketing success—whether that be local or organic. This is particularly interesting as it goes against the general consensus many local marketing experts tell their clients, in that rankings aren’t necessarily as important a success metric as phone calls or sale numbers.

In fact, large decreases were actually seen in the value of metrics like phone calls (12% decrease), new customers (19% decrease) and overall website traffic (6% decrease). As a result, this could suggest that local businesses may not be paying as close attention to what they’re being told by local marketers as initially thought.

Future Plans

Will local marketing businesses hire more SEO-related staff in 2022?

LSIS Chart 22

Almost half of the agencies and freelancers surveyed said they were ‘probably’ or ‘definitely’ likely to hire more SEO-related staff over the coming year—roughly the same percentage as last year.

On the flipside, 34% of respondents said they either ‘definitely wouldn’t’ or that ‘it’s unlikely’ they’d be making any more hires—a 4% increase on last year.

These findings seem to suggest that, while businesses may have prioritized getting more digital marketing experts on board over the past year, that same necessity and trend is now slowing down in light of the pandemic-related restrictions becoming more and more limited.

But, how has this change in hiring impacted local marketers themselves?

The Proportion of Local Marketers Moving Jobs in 2022

LSIS Chart 23

Well, according to our data, eight out of every ten local marketers plan on staying in the same jobs as they work in now, representing a 6% increase on last year.

As such, the same disparity we established within this area during last year’s survey appears to stand up once more; the proportion of companies expecting to hire more SEOs doesn’t correlate with the proportion of marketers expecting to change roles this year.

This, therefore, puts the power in the hands of marketers, potentially giving them more autonomy, a larger choice of jobs to choose from and a lower level of competition. As a result, local marketers could soon be able to request higher salaries and source better benefits, purely based on the lack of competition expected when searching for a new role.

The Proportion of Local Marketers Planning to Freelance in the Future

LSIS Chart 24

We hypothesized that, in light of the growing transition towards working from home, more local marketers would now be thinking about becoming freelancers.

As the above data proves, 42% of this survey’s respondents either work as a freelancer already or are planning on becoming one within the next three years (14%). In fact, only a third of our sample believe it is unlikely they will start working as a freelancer in the future—the same proportion as identified during last year’s survey.

These findings are interesting to see. While freelance work may not be for everyone, it appears that many local marketers are either picking up extra work on the side already or are keen to do so as time moves forward. This will certainly be an area to monitor as local marketers adapt to today’s new way of working.

About the Respondents

The Local Search Industry Survey is shared with BrightLocal’s audience and customers, but it’s also promoted in other places local marketers frequent to gather as representative a sample as possible.

During this year’s survey, 70% of respondents were from the US, 8% from the UK, 7% from Canada, 4% from India, 3% from Australia and the remaining 11% from 21 other countries. All of our results represent these countries, with the exception of salary and pricing questions, which only take into account respondents from the US, UK, and Canada for ease of comparison.

In terms of gender, a similar split was seen as per 2021’s Local Search Industry Survey; 35% of respondents were female, 62% were male and 3% declined to share their gender. 26% of our respondents were aged between 18 and 34 years old, 52% between 35 and 54, and the remaining 22% were aged 55 or older.

In terms of experience, the majority of respondents (70%) self-described themselves as a senior-level local marketer, with 24% as mid-level and just 6% as junior. As mentioned previously, this could have had a potential bearing on the average salaries calculated and discussed earlier within this article.

Types of Business

Type Of Business202220212020
Agency Focusing on Local SEO / Marketing38%41%42%
Agency Focusing on National SEO / Marketing14%17%21%
Freelancer / Sole Marketing Consultant14%11%11%
Local Business with a Single Location12%13%10%
Multi-Location Business8%10%9%
Web Design Agency11%4%6%
Marketing Software4%4%-

There was a broadly similar split between agencies, freelancers, and people working within businesses compared to both the 2021 and 2020 survey. However, this year’s survey did bring in approximately 3% more freelancers than previous years, as well as 7% more web design agency workers.

The Number of Employees in Local Marketers’ Businesses

LSIS Chart 25

In terms of the number of employees across each individual business, there was a fairly similar split to ones we have seen in recent years. The only real differences of note were the 9% rise in the number of businesses with 2-5 employees and the 4% decline in businesses with 251 employees or more.

LSIS Chart 26

Looking at the number of years our respondents have worked within the industry, with 70% rating themselves as being a senior-level local marketer, it will hardly come as a surprise to hear that 65% had worked in local marketing for a minimum of six years. In fact, over a third were shown to have worked in local marketing for over a decade or longer.

Conversely, we found that only 9% of this year’s respondents had less than 2 years’ worth of experience—a 4% drop from last year’s survey. This, again, could have had a bearing on the salary data discussed above.

LSIS Chart 27

When considering the seniority and working longevity of this year’s respondents, the majority (65%) rated themselves as having a level of local SEO knowledge as ‘Very Good’ or ‘Excellent’.

Only 9% of respondents were shown to have a ‘Fair’ or ‘Poor’ understanding of local SEO—the same percentage as found during 2021’s Local Search Industry Survey.

That’s All, Folks!

We would like to say a huge thank you to everyone who took part in this year’s Local Search Industry Survey.

We hope that the results discussed above will provide some useful benchmarks for local marketers to not only understand what their peers are doing, but help shape their ongoing local marketing strategies for the coming year as well.

As mentioned during the article, we would also love to hear your thoughts on any of our findings so please let us know all of your theories, feedback and opinions in the comments section below!

Patrick Bawn
About the author
Patrick was BrightLocal's Research Content Specialist. He was responsible for BrightLocal's research into local SEO trends, pulling in BrightLocal data, surveying the community and drawing on his own data journalism experiences to provide valuable local SEO insights.

Related Posts