YMCA of Metropolitan Dallas Case Study

<span>YMCA of Metropolitan Dallas</span>
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Overview

YMCA Dallas serves their local community through youth programs, fitness facilities, and community engagement initiatives. Despite maintaining an active online presence, their website wasn't capturing local search traffic. When community members searched for fitness programs or youth activities nearby, YMCA Dallas wasn't showing up in the local pack where most searches begin.

ImageX developed a local SEO strategy that optimized their 16 Google Business Listings and created targeted content for each location. The results were significant:

Non-branded keyword impressions jumped from 9,000 to 85,000
Organic transactions increased 36%
Traffic from business listings grew 30%

The strategy transformed how YMCA Dallas connects with their community online, turning local searches into program sign-ups and engagement.

What They Needed

YMCA Dallas has 16 locations serving their community, but they weren't showing up when people searched for programs nearby. Their Google Business Listings existed but weren't optimized to drive traffic. Categories weren't set properly, services weren't listed, and there was no regular content keeping the listings active and visible.

The bigger challenge was capturing non-branded searches. People looking for "youth programs near me" or "fitness classes" weren't finding YMCA Dallas, only those who already knew to search specifically for "YMCA." Without proper tracking and attribution, they also couldn't tell which digital efforts actually drove sign-ups or where their highest-quality visitors came from.

They needed a strategy that would make them visible in local search results and help them understand what was working.

How We Helped

Finding the High-Quality Traffic Sources

We started by analyzing their existing traffic through Google Analytics and Search Console. The data revealed something important: visitors coming from Google Business Listings weren't casual browsers. They were high-quality prospects with strong engagement rates, ready to sign up for programs. This insight shaped our entire strategy.

Making Every Location Visible in Local Search

We systematically optimized all 16 YMCA Dallas locations. Each listing got updated categories and services that matched what people were actually searching for. We created weekly posts for each location with targeted keywords, highlighting program updates and offers specific to that facility. This regular activity kept the listings visible and relevant in local search results.

Creating Measurable, Scalable Systems

We linked each Google Business Listing to a dedicated location page on the YMCA Dallas website with UTM tracking codes. This helped us attribute traffic and conversions back to specific listings. We aligned each location page with user intent, adding program-specific keywords and implementing local business schema markup to enhance how they appeared in search results. The result was a system that not only drove traffic but showed exactly what was working.

Words from
the client

"[Greta at ImageX] feels like a part of our team and has exceeded my expectations"

- Josue Mercado, AVP of Marketing YMCA Dallas.

The Results

Significant Traffic and Revenue Growth

The local SEO strategy delivered measurable improvements across all key metrics:

Sessions: +22%
Total users: +20%
Total transactions: +36%
Total revenue: +21%

Google Business Listings Delivered Results

The optimized business listings became a powerful driver of high-quality traffic:

Sessions and users: +30%
Transactions: +27%
Revenue: +35%
First-time purchasers: +31%

These visitors showed strong engagement and conversion rates, confirming our data-driven insight that business listing traffic represents ready-to-sign-up prospects.