About the Company

Our Story: From Google Places Pioneer to Full-Service Digital Marketing Partner

How We Do Local Became Kansas City's Trusted SEO and Web Design Agency


We Do Local began in 2011 with a simple mission: help businesses get found online when customers searched for them locally. Back then, local search was still a new frontier. Google had just started marking businesses on Google Maps, and when they opened up their platform so business owners could claim these listings—creating what became known as "Google Places"—we saw an opportunity to help.

About the Founder
Rob Scutti

Local Maps SEO & Online Reputation Management


You’ve had some interesting jobs over the years. What was your favorite and why?

Right out of high school, I wanted to go to work for a major airline. I didn’t want to be a pilot, but rather something in middle management dealing with people and marketing. It took me a year and a half to land a job with American Airlines at LAX. I worked there for 6 years while also going to school, working on a Business Mgmt. degree, minoring in marketing. Working for American was probably my favorite job I’ve ever had. I loved working on and around the gigantic jets, I loved the travel benefits and I even loved being affiliated with a company I admired a lot. I still have my old ID badge and my AA Tie from back in the day. What I didn’t realize at the start was that I would be working crazy shifts and ALL the holidays for at least the next 20 years of my life. That realization was a sobering one.

I ended up changing my career path in 1984 and took a partnership position with a friend in the Los Angeles Floral Wholesale industry. This was my most lucrative job to date. I was shocked to find that I could make much more money in small business than I could working my way up the ladder at American Airlines. Losing my travel benefits turned out to be not so bad after all. I found that I could now just pay retail and have the time to travel! Plus, I learned a lot about small business which would go on to serve me well to this day. So, after a 10-year run in the flower biz under my belt and a new family to provide for, I made the big move to Kansas City, seeking a better environment for my kids to grow up in and a chance to own one of the first high-end espresso bars here.


What did you want to be when you were a little boy?

My first answer to “What do you want to be when you grow up?” was either a jet fighter pilot or a veterinarian. Jets had a definite allure for me from a very young age, and since I liked animals so much, I thought a job that would take care of them would also be a good choice for me.


Why internet marketing? And why local maps SEO?

From those first thoughts of a profession… Fast forward some 30 years and I found myself in Kansas City with a new Espresso business that was blazing the specialty coffee market trail in Olathe, KS. There was no Starbucks here yet and after my first year, I understood why – there was no market for the product in Kansas City…  YET. So, I knew I needed to get the word out any way I could and so leveraging the new World Wide Web by creating my first website was definitely in my plans. I launched the site in 1998 and in the early days of the web, I learned how to optimize for search engines. My first year was also Google’s first year and they were the first company to rank websites be open with how they did it. So, I optimized my site to rank for the typical search words and phrases one would use to find a coffee/espresso place, but also for Starbucks searches and unknowingly became an early spammer! (before the word even existed). For almost 2 years, my site ranked #1 for Starbucks in Kansas City. It changed after Starbucks finally opened in Kansas City, but never the less, I thought that the fact that I could outrank them for a while was exciting and fascinating. Ever since, I’ve continued to be excited about ranking local businesses on the web, and I’ve lived through many evolutions.


What about online reputation management? Is there really something that you can do to help business owners manage and earn more reviews?

As more and more people started using the web to find information about goods and services they wanted to buy, it was only natural that other people’s opinions became a part of searchers' decision-making process. This need gave birth to what we all know as Online Reviews and the likes of Yelp, Angie’s List, Google Reviews, etc. Currently, review quantity and ratings, aka ‘sentiment’, are one of the ranking factors search engines use to position one site compared with another. Thus, along with other reasons, it’s a good idea for business owners to be aware of how their business is perceived on the web and take action to keep it in the best light. There are definitely strategies to accomplish this; some are common sense, others are a little more technical. But the main thing is execution, and that’s where a marketing agency’s help can really make a difference.


What is the proudest thing you’ve accomplished for a business?

Every time I’m able to help a new business become visible on the web and compete with other businesses that have existed for years beforehand makes me very proud. Also, just having the answers to business owners' questions is quite satisfying.


Tell us about your family and the Rob Scutti “zoo”.

This is probably not a good question for me, as my answer is that I’m patiently waiting for the numbers to decrease naturally while at the same time, trying to convince my wife to come to enjoy life without an overabundance of animals running around the house…


If you won the lottery, what is the first thing you would do?

Since I only play the lottery when it exceeds a billion, I’m assuming that is the amount of money we’re talking about here… That said, I’d be a terribly boring winner because I’d be one of those who did not want to go public. Also, the first thing I’d do before I even got the money would be to partner up with my wife so we could start out on the same page. After that, I’d like to give 10% off the top to our church and other charities that mean a lot to both of us. Then divide up the next 40% between friends and family to be given according to need, anonymously. The rest we would keep to do all the things we’ve only dreamed of. For me, I have about a half dozen kinds of cars I’d like to own and a few motorcycles too. I’d also like to resume my traveling plans and finally get to see some of the places I didn’t get to during my airline years and also return to some of my favorites. And lastly, I’d love to fund some startups and help folks with some promising business ideas get a start.


The Early Days: Directory Listing Management and Local Citations


Our journey started as a white-label partner for marketing agencies and website design firms who needed specialized local search optimization support. In those early years, our primary focus was claiming and managing Google Places listings along with profiles on up to 75 other influential online directories—Yahoo, Bing, Yelp, Merchant Circle, Insider Pages, and dozens more that have since disappeared from the digital landscape.


For small business owners in the early 2010s, claiming and optimizing these listings across the web was one of the most powerful things they could do to increase their online visibility. The work itself was straightforward but incredibly time-consuming. By developing efficient processes and leveraging specialized software, we claimed and optimized thousands of directory listings for our agency partners' clients throughout those foundational years.


Evolution Through Change: Adapting Our SEO Strategies


As anyone in digital marketing knows, change is constant—especially when it comes to Google's algorithms and ranking factors. Over the years, we've continuously evolved our strategies and processes to deliver meaningful local search optimization results that actually move the needle for businesses.


But we didn't stop at local citations. We recognized that our agency partners needed more comprehensive support, so we expanded our services to include the labor-intensive SEO functions that were keeping their teams from focusing on client relationships and strategy.


Today: Full-Service Digital Marketing for Small Businesses


Now based in Olathe, Kansas, We Do Local serves small businesses and marketing agencies throughout the Kansas City metro area and beyond. Our expanded service offerings include:


Who We Serve: Our Ideal Clients

We specialize in helping service-based businesses dominate their local markets, including:


  • Auto glass shops and automotive services
  • Carpet cleaning companies and home services
  • Restaurants and hospitality businesses
  • Wellness practitioners and healthcare providers
  • Marketing agencies seeking white-label SEO support


Why Partner with We Do Local?


What hasn't changed since 2011 is our commitment to making local search marketing accessible and effective for small business owners. We handle the technical, time-consuming work of SEO and website optimization, allowing you—or your agency team—to focus on what you do best: serving your customers.


Whether you're a small business looking to improve your local search rankings or a marketing agency needing a reliable partner for white-label SEO services, we bring over a decade of experience helping businesses get found by customers searching in their area.

Ready to improve your local search presence? Contact We Do Local today to learn how we can help your business grow.

About the Founder

Hi! I'm Rob Scutti


I started We Do Local on April 1st, 2011. No Fooling! But I didn't start my career as a marketer. However, through my journey in many businesses, I know I was learning and doing marketing for a long time before I started to focus on it. Coming into marketing this way prepared me to be an excellent helper for businesses facing the wild world of marketing.