Run · Local SEO
Local SEO in Dubai, branch by branch.
For a business with branches, the map result is usually worth more than the links above it — and it is decided by things most businesses have never finished setting up. Here is what we check, and what it costs.
One profile for three branches is two branches missing.
- Rate
- Inside SEO, AED 1,000 / month
- Separate local rate
- None
- Reported
- Per branch
01The problem
Three branches, one profile, and two of them invisible.
The pattern repeats across clinics, retail and any service business that opened a second site: one Business Profile created when there was one location, still carrying one address, now representing three. It competes in the area it names and does not appear in the others, so two branches are absent from the search that matters most to them — the one where somebody nearby is deciding now.
Underneath it, the same details differ everywhere they appear. A suite number on the site, not on the profile. An old landline in a directory. Two spellings of the same building. Each difference is trivial and together they read as several businesses, none of which has quite enough signal to rank. And the booking path that all of it leads to has usually never been opened on a phone by anyone who works there.
02What we check first
Four things, in this order.
- 01Profile completeness, per branch
- Claimed, categorised, hours correct, services listed, and one profile per real location rather than one between them.
- 02Name, address and phone consistency
- Identical across the site, the profiles and every directory carrying you. Not similar — identical.
- 03Review volume and recency
- Whether they arrive steadily rather than in bursts, and whether anyone replies, including to the bad ones.
- 04The booking path, timed on a real handset
- Not an emulator. How many taps from the profile to a confirmed booking, and where it fails when the keyboard opens.
03The approach
A profile per branch, and a page for it to point at.
Each real location gets its own completed profile and its own page, with that branch’s address, hours, directions and staff. A profile pointing at a homepage is a weaker result than one pointing at the page for that branch, and a page listing five branches gives the other four nothing to rank with in the areas they serve.
Then the booking flow, before anything is spent on traffic. Sending people to a path that loses them is the most expensive order to do this in, and the fix is nearly always cheaper than the month of advertising that would have exposed it.
04What we’d measure
Per branch, not in aggregate.
- 01Map pack visibility, branch by branch
- An average across locations hides the branch that is invisible, which is the one the work exists for.
- 02Direction requests and calls from the profile
- Both are actions rather than impressions, and both are counted by Google in an account you own.
- 03Completed bookings, not page views
- A booking page that is reached and abandoned is a failure that looks like traffic. The event has to be on the confirmation, not the arrival.
05From the checklist
All four clean? Then you don’t need this service.
The Local group, published.
Four of the twenty checks are the Local group, and they are this service in list form. Every one of them can be run against your own profile without us. The other sixteen are on the work page.
The audit · 4 checks of 20
Findings are yours to keep
04Local
- Google Business Profile completeness, per location
- Name, address and phone consistency across directories
- Review volume, recency and whether anyone replies
- A landing page per location that is not a copy of the last one
All four clean? Then you don’t need this service.
06Price and terms
Inside the SEO retainer, not beside it.
Local work is part of the SEO service at AED 1,000 per month, three-month initial commitment, then month-to-month with 30 days’ notice. There is no separate local SEO rate.
That is a deliberate answer rather than an omission. Splitting it out would let us sell the same hours twice — once as local, once as search — and for a multi-branch business the local work is usually where the first three months go anyway, because the returns arrive faster there than anywhere else.
07Out of scope
What we turn down.
Not offered:
Fake locationsA profile needs a real address with real staff at it. Virtual offices and mailbox addresses are a policy violation and they get removed, usually after they have started working.
Not offered:
Review gatingAsking everyone is a process. Asking only the people who look happy is filtering, it is against Google’s policies, and it works right up until it costs you the profile.
Not offered:
Profiles at addresses that are not realIt is the same rule we hold ourselves to. Our studio is in Business Bay, and we say so even on the page targeting another emirate, because a listing that survives only until somebody checks is not an asset.
08Questions
The things people actually ask.
How much does local SEO cost in Dubai?
It is not priced separately. Local work sits inside the SEO retainer at AED 1,000 per month, with a three-month initial commitment and then month-to-month. For a multi-branch business it is usually where the first three months go, because the returns arrive faster there than anywhere else in search.
Why isn’t our business showing in the map pack?
Most often because the profile is incomplete, the categories are wrong, or several branches are sharing one listing. Sometimes because the name, address and phone differ between the site, the profile and the directories, and the differences read as separate businesses. The audit checks all of it and the answer is usually visible within an hour.
Do we need a separate profile for each branch?
Yes, if each branch is a real location with its own staff and its own hours. A single profile covering three sites competes in one area and is invisible in the other two. Each profile also needs its own page on your site to point at — a profile pointing at a homepage is a weaker result than one pointing at that branch's page.
Can you get us more reviews?
We can set up a process that asks every customer at the right moment, which is what actually moves review volume. We will not filter who gets asked based on how happy they seem — that is review gating, it violates Google's policies, and it is the kind of thing that works until it is detected and then costs the profile.
How long does local SEO take to work?
Faster than the rest of search. Profile fixes and NAP corrections can move map visibility within weeks because they are corrections rather than competition. Ranking the branch pages in the organic results still takes the usual three to six months.
We only have one location. Is this still relevant?
Yes, and it is simpler: one profile, completed properly, consistent details everywhere they appear, and reviews arriving steadily. Most single-location businesses have never finished the profile they claimed, and finishing it is often the highest-return hour in the whole engagement.