For the small-business owner in the canal city who knows their work is good but suspects Google is sending people somewhere else first. This free evening in Welland covers the handful of things that genuinely help, in plain language, with nothing technical assumed and nothing to buy.
If you run a business in Welland and you want more local people to find you when they search, this evening is built for you. Get found online in Welland on Wednesday, October 21, 2026 from 6:30 to 8:30 PM is a free, in-person seminar on local search engine optimization (SEO), which is simply the work of helping search engines show your business to the people nearby who are already looking for what you offer.
Welland has spent its whole history at a crossing point, the place where the canal made everything pass through. A business here lives or dies on the same idea online: being on the route people travel when they go looking. I have taught small-business owners across Ontario how to put themselves on that route, and the ones who get the most out of it are rarely the technical ones. They are the ones willing to spend one focused evening on it.
I want to settle something before we start. Getting found locally is not a dark art, and it is not a monthly fee you owe a stranger forever. It is a short list of honest tasks you can learn. I have been building and teaching on the web since 1996, I am completing an MA at Royal Roads University, and the most useful thing I do in a room is take the fear out of it so the work becomes yours to keep.
How the evening runs
It is two hours, beginner-friendly, and hands-on wherever I can manage it. Bring a phone, or a laptop if that is easier. We open with what “showing up in search” really means, including the little map with three businesses at the top that nearly everyone sees and nobody questions. Then we work through Google Business Profile, which is the biggest easy win most local businesses have sitting in front of them, and I will walk you through claiming yours and filling it in the right way.
After that we cover the quiet problems that cost you without announcing themselves: your business name, address, and phone number not matching across the web, how reviews work and how to ask for them without the cringe, and the plain-English basics of what your own pages should say so a search engine and a real person both understand you. We close with a simple monthly routine to keep it all healthy.
What you will leave with
You will leave with a one-page local-SEO checklist you can act on the next morning. The evening is free. If you would like a seat, send me a note through the contact form and I will hold one for you. The venue is to be announced, and your registration is how I tell you exactly where to come.
By the end of the evening, you will be able to
- Read a local search result and understand why some businesses appear and others do not
- Claim and fill in your Google Business Profile so you turn up when neighbours search
- Check that your name, address, and phone number match everywhere they appear online
- Ask happy customers for reviews in a way that feels natural rather than pushy
- Follow a short monthly routine that keeps you findable without taking over your week
Come for the evening, leave with a plan, and start being easier to find the very next day.