This is a practical plan for a local business owner using RankThat as their local SEO software: what to set up in the first week, what to do each week after that, how to read the report at the end of the month, and which plan makes sense. The example throughout is Coastline Plumbing, a fictional six-van plumbing company in Austin, Texas, with a WordPress website and a Google Business Profile. Swap in your own trade and town.
You don’t need to be technical for any of it. Plan on about an hour in the first week and twenty to thirty minutes a week after that.
Before you start: pick the plan that matches what you’ll use
| You want to | Starter, $50 a month | Professional, $99 a month |
|---|---|---|
| Find and fix website problems | Mini audits (up to 50 pages, 10 a month) | Full site audits too, 50 a month |
| Track Google rankings | 100 keywords | 1,000 keywords |
| See map rankings across your area | Local Rank Grid, 4 scans a month | |
| Know if ChatGPT and Gemini recommend you | AI visibility, 4 checks a month | |
| See Search Console clicks and searches | Included | |
| Write articles in your own voice and publish to WordPress | 5 AI articles a month | 25 a month, with brand voice and WordPress publishing |
A single-location business with a small site can start on Starter: a mini audit covers up to 50 pages, which is the whole site for many local businesses. If map rankings are where your calls come from, and for most trades they are, Professional is the better fit because it includes the Local Rank Grid. Both plans have a 14-day free trial. You enter a card when you sign up, and you’re not charged until the trial ends.
The first week: setup
Do these in order. Each one takes ten to fifteen minutes.
- Add your website as a project. Use the address visitors actually see, such as
https://coastlineplumbing.com. - Connect Google. On Professional, connect Search Console so RankThat can see which searches bring people to your site. Connect your Google Business Profile so you can read reviews and get replies drafted.
- Install the free Bridge plugin if your site runs on WordPress. Download it from your project’s settings and upload it under Plugins in WordPress. It lets RankThat apply fixes for you, and it counts enquiries: contact form submissions and taps on your phone number, email and WhatsApp links, with where each visitor came from.
- Choose your keywords. Start with each service plus your city, and the phrases customers really use: “water heater repair Austin”, “emergency plumber Austin”, “plumber near me”, “slab leak repair Round Rock”. Twenty to forty is plenty to begin with. In the Rank Tracker, set the location to your city and track mobile as well as desktop, since most local searches happen on phones.
- Run your first site audit. Read the summary. Fix anything marked urgent now, such as pages hidden from Google. Leave the rest for week two.
- Set up your first map scan and AI questions (Professional). Run a Local Rank Grid scan for your most valuable search. For AI visibility, add the questions customers ask, like “Who is the best emergency plumber in Austin?”, and add two or three competitors you lose jobs to.
Your month, week by week
Week 1: website fixes
Open the audit and work through it from the top. Every issue explains why it matters and how to fix it in plain English. On WordPress, RankThat drafts many fixes for you to review: page titles and descriptions, redirects for pages that no longer exist, LocalBusiness schema with your name, address and hours, image descriptions, and a tappable phone number. Approve the ones you’re happy with and the plugin applies them. Every change can be undone in one click, and RankThat re-checks the live page after each fix.
For service businesses, two fixes are worth doing early. A mobile call and book bar keeps your phone number on screen as people scroll on a phone. Tappable phone numbers let someone call with one tap instead of copying digits. Both are available through the plugin.
Week 2: map rankings
Look at your Local Rank Grid scan. It shows where you appear in Google Maps results from points spread across your area, not just from your own shop. Coastline Plumbing might rank 2nd near its office on Barton Springs Road and 14th in Round Rock, twenty miles north.
What to do with it:
- Strong near you, weak further out is normal. Map results lean heavily on distance. Pages on your site for the outer areas you serve, with real details about work you do there, help most.
- Weak everywhere usually points to your Google Business Profile: the wrong primary category, too few reviews, or a name, address and phone that don’t match your website.
- Check your citations: RankThat looks up if you’re listed on the main directories for your country and trade with the right details, and gives you a list to fix. It doesn’t submit listings for you. Keep your name, address and phone identical everywhere.
Week 3: reviews and content
Read and reply to new Google reviews. RankThat drafts a reply for each one and you approve or edit it before it’s posted. Reply to all of them, including the five-star ones, and handle complaints calmly: future customers read your replies.
Then look at content. Your keyword rankings show which services sit just off page one. A page for “tankless water heater installation” that ranks 12th usually needs more detail: prices or price ranges, brands you install, how long it takes, what’s included, and answers to the questions customers ask on the phone.
Week 4: AI assistants and the month ahead
Review your AI visibility results: which of ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude and Google AI Overviews mention you for questions about your services, and which competitors they name instead. Assistants tend to recommend businesses whose websites state facts plainly and that other sites mention. If you’re missing, the usual fixes are clearer service and location pages, consistent listings, and reviews.
Finally, note one or two things to focus on next month.
Reading your monthly report
At the start of each month, RankThat drafts your monthly report in plain English. Read it in this order:
| Look at | Why | A good sign |
|---|---|---|
| Enquiries | Calls and form fills are the point of all of this | Up on the same month last year |
| Clicks from Google | More people finding the site | Rising, compared per day so short months aren’t unfair |
| Rankings | Which services moved | Money keywords moving toward the top three |
| Map grid | Coverage across your area | More of the grid in the top three |
| Work completed | What was fixed and published | A short, concrete list |
Compare with the same month last year, not just last month. A plumber’s January (frozen pipes) and a landscaper’s August look nothing like the month before, and the report’s year-on-year view accounts for that.
Pick one number that matters to your business, usually enquiries from Google, and write it down every month. Rankings go up and down; the phone ringing is what pays.
What RankThat won’t do for you
Being straight about the limits saves you a frustrating month:
- It can’t move your shop. Distance is a large part of map rankings. RankThat shows you where you’re weak and what helps; it can’t make you appear first forty miles away.
- It doesn’t create or verify your Google Business Profile. You do that with Google. RankThat reads your reviews and helps you reply.
- It doesn’t submit directory listings. It finds them and tells you what to fix.
- Automatic fixes need WordPress. On Wix, Squarespace or Shopify you still get the audit, rankings and reports, and you make the changes yourself. There are no apps for those platforms.
- It doesn’t run ads. There are no Google Ads tools.
- Results take months, not days. Website fixes can show in weeks. Map rankings and AI recommendations usually take longer.
Your local SEO checklist
- Website added and Google connected
- Bridge plugin installed (WordPress sites)
- 20 to 40 keywords tracked for your city, on mobile and desktop
- First audit run and urgent issues fixed
- Mobile call bar and tappable phone numbers in place
- LocalBusiness schema added (on other platforms, the free schema generator writes it for you)
- First Local Rank Grid scan and AI visibility questions set (Professional)
- Citations checked and a fix list started
- Every new review replied to
- One page improved for a service that sits just off page one
- Monthly report read, and your one key number written down
For more depth, our local SEO checklist covers the Google Business Profile side in detail, the Local SEO feature page shows the grid and reviews, and trade-specific advice starts at SEO for plumbers. Current plan details are on the pricing page.