Based in London, United Kingdom
Mani Bharij.Local SEO & AI Search Consultant
I work with multi-location groups and professional firms on getting found nearby, and on being named by the assistants people now ask first. It is the same problem I built SearchOps to measure.
Founder of SearchOps, a local SEO platform for tracking how businesses appear in local and AI search. Twelve years in search, including agency-side work on Expedia Group’s transportation line of business. Independent since.
Search has become a shortlist. I get you on it.
Every location is its own shortlist
When somebody near one of your sites searches for what you do, a short list of businesses gets considered. Head office usually sees one blended number and cannot tell which branches are on that list and which are invisible.
The shortlist is moving into AI
People increasingly ask an assistant and stop at the first answer. Same question, fewer names, no second page to be on. Being named in those answers is now part of the work.
Somebody has to own it
Most businesses I meet have plenty of advice and no one accountable for search. What is missing is somebody to say what matters, hold the suppliers to it, and answer for the numbers.
Four subjects I work on
Most engagements start with one of these and grow into another. How you buy them is a separate question, and an easier one.
Multi-location groups and franchises
Estates running from a handful of sites to several hundred, where the problem is as much about ownership and governance as it is about search. Head office sees one blended number and cannot tell which branches are invisible.
Professional services firms
Legal, accountancy, financial, and healthcare practices competing against national names and directories on the same generic terms, under marketing rules that rule out most of the usual shortcuts.
I also take white-label audits and second opinions for agencies and in-house teams who want a local specialist on an account without adding one to the payroll.
Three steps, and none of them are a discovery workshop
A conversation
Half an hour on what the business does, where the customers come from now, and what has already been tried. No pitch deck. If I am not the right person, I will say so.
A proper look
I go through your visibility, your profiles, your site, and the competitors taking the enquiries you want. You get findings in plain English and a plan ordered by what will move first.
The work, or the handover
Either I take the seat and own it, or your team does with the plan and a walkthrough. Both are fine. The measure is whether the phone rings more, not how much was delivered.
Both sides of the same problem
I build the platform that measures how businesses appear in local and AI search, and I take a small number of consulting clients on the same problem. The consulting keeps the product honest and the product handles the parts of consulting that repeat. Twelve years in search before that, from small businesses through to agency-side work on enterprise travel accounts.
- SearchOps
- Founder & MD
- PACIFIC
- SEO Manager
- Expedia Group
- Transportation, via PACIFIC
- MBSearch
- Independent practice
Notes on local search, written for the person paying for it
If people nearby are looking for what you do, they should be finding you.
Tell me what the business is and where it operates. I will tell you honestly whether there is something worth doing.