Maximizing Accolades & Rankings

Maximizing Accolades & Rankings as Part of Your Community's Story

Is your community one of Livability’s 2024 Top 100 Best Places to Live, or have you received other national accolades? This type of recognition can give your marketing content a boost and highlight community assets.

In a time where folks go straight to Google to learn about any topic, it’s important to think about your digital “front door.” List accolades can be a powerful addition. They often come from high domain authority sites, helping them rank near the top of search results, and they’re a solid third-party endorsement of your area.

At Livability.com, we publish many data-driven and editorialized lists, from Underrated Cities for Craft Beer to our annual Best Places to Live. We also work with communities on content marketing for talent attraction, so we’ve got tips for amplifying these placements – read on for our favorites.

Make It Your Own on Social
You know it’s great to share these wins on social media, but here’s a twist: create a graphic (Canva’s a great resource!) that emphasizes your community’s placement more than the original article may have. This example from the Tampa Bay Economic Development Council highlights the important part for their messaging instead of just sending folks to the article. This is also a great strategy to promote accolades that are behind a paywall, as the graphic displays the main headline you want to get across to followers about your community, even if they don’t click to read more.

Capture Traffic With Your Own Article
Boost traffic to your website and get more mileage from any accolade by creating your own article or blog about the accomplishment – like this example from the City of Round Rock, Texas. Pulling in some language and key phrases from the original piece can boost SEO as well. Just make sure you link to the original source and credit appropriately. The graphic you create can also be paired with this article for social media sharing to drive traffic back to your website.

Via Your Website
Once you’ve created your article, evaluate how else to promote it. Consider incorporating it into your homepage or newsroom, like the Fox Cities Chamber did for Appleton’s recognition on Livability’s Top 100. A web page dedicated to accolades or rankings is another way to corral honors your community receives over time, like this one does.

Your community’s recent recognition can also be a headline or tagline on your site or within other marketing (for example: “Ranked One of the Best Places to Live in the U.S. by Livability.com”). Scroll a bit on the Knoxville Chamber’s homepage for an example of this where they mention their 2023 Livability Best Places ranking as the headline for their webpage about Knoxville’s livability.

Pitch Local Media
Local media will pick up these accolades, and even further delve into them, as The Herald News in Fall River, Massachusetts, did after Fall River’s recognition on Livability’s 2023 Top 100. The groups producing these lists often provide a locally focused news release or at least enough language that it’s simple for you to draft one. At Livability, we conduct media outreach in each of the communities on our Top 100, but your local connections with peers in the media may be more effective for getting coverage. The more results, the more you’ll boost your community’s digital footprint, plus local media pickup is great for reminding locals of what to love about where they live.

Livability Media helps bring talent to your city through custom content programs.
Find out more at LivabilityMedia.com.

Livability Media is a full-service media and content marketing company focused on bringing talented individuals to your city. We work with chambers of commerce, economic development groups and city governments to tell the unique stories of cities, regions and states through custom online, print and digital content programs. Looking for industry insights to help you in your day-to-day? Check out our Inside America’s Best Cities podcast for chamber and economic development professionals or subscribe to our Let’s Talk Talent talent attraction newsletter.