SEO for
salons.

When someone in Charlestown searches 'hairdresser near me', the map results sit above everything else. Google says local results are based on relevance, distance and prominence. You can't move your shop closer to the searcher. You can make your profile more relevant and your business better known.

Google's own tips: complete details, verified profile, exact hours and special hours, replies to reviews, and photos and videos. For salons, special hours are where profiles fall down most. Public holidays, Christmas trading and the week you close for renovations all need to be on Google before the day, not after the one-star review that says 'drove there, closed'.

The most common is the name. 'Studio Mia Hair Salon Balayage Specialist Newcastle' might feel clever, but Google says including unnecessary information in your business name isn't permitted, and competitors can suggest an edit. Use the name on your sign.

Categories come next. Google asks you to choose the fewest categories it takes to describe your overall core business, and not to use them as keywords. A salon that mostly does colour and cuts doesn't need 'Nail salon' because one person does gels on Saturdays.

Mobile beauty and hair businesses should have one service-area profile and hide their home address, as the guidelines ask. Appointment-only home studios shouldn't list business hours, Google says, so the booking link has to show availability instead.

Clients search by service, not by 'beauty'. 'Brow lamination Erina', 'skin fade Penrith', 'BIAB nails Parramatta', 'keratin treatment Newcastle'. A single 'Services' page listing 40 treatments can't be the best answer to any of them.

The rule I'd use: a service gets its own page if you do it every week, it's a reason people choose you, and you want more of it. Everything else goes on a grouped services page, with a short section each. That keeps the site honest. Ten pages with real detail beat forty thin ones.

Each service page should answer what a new client wants to know: what it is, who it suits, how long it takes, a price range and what moves it, aftercare, labelled photos of your own work, who does it, and a booking button. That's also what Google means when it recommends content with a unique point of view and first-hand expertise over generic summaries.

Tick what you offer, and which services you do weekly and want more of.

A classic shortcut is thirty pages called 'Hairdresser Gosford', 'Hairdresser Erina', 'Hairdresser Terrigal', each the same text with the suburb swapped. Google warns against mass-producing pages to manipulate rankings. They rarely help, and they make the site look like it was built by a robot.

What works better: one strong page about where you are, with parking, transport, the shopping centre entrance and the suburbs your clients come from, named honestly. If you're mobile, a page about the areas you travel to and any travel fee. That's real information people need.

Prominence is partly built on reviews: Google says it's based partly on your review count. The legal way to get more is boring and works: ask every client, every time, usually through the booking system's follow-up message. Google bans incentives for reviews and asking only happy clients.

Photos are the other half. Profiles with ten shots of the shopfront and none of the work miss the point. Add recent photos of real work every month or so, by service, so the profile looks as alive as your Instagram.

Some services carry rules that belong on the page, or must stay off it.

Injectables: the TGA says ads can't refer to prescription-only injectables, by product, generic term or nickname. A page targeting 'lip filler near me' is an ad for a prescription medicine. Build a page about consultations for skin concerns instead, and see the advertising rules page.

Lasers: cosmetic lasers are licensed only in Queensland, Western Australia and Tasmania, and IPL only in Tasmania. A NSW laser page shouldn't say 'licensed'. Waxing, nails and cosmetic tattooing in NSW are skin penetration procedures and the premises must be registered with the local council, which is worth getting right before you advertise it.

Rankings are a vanity metric on their own. Watch three things: calls, website clicks and booking clicks from your Business Profile; the searches that bring people to each service page in Search Console; and, in your booking system, where new clients say they came from.

Add a tracking tag to the booking link on your Google profile so you can tell those bookings apart. Then judge SEO the same way you'd judge an ad: new clients who rebook, not visits.