The parts that are identical are most of it. Positioning, pricing, what your site says, how enquiries are handled, what gets measured, and which tools make sense are all independent of geography. Those conversations happen the same way whether somebody is in the next suburb or three time zones away.
What genuinely differs is anything depending on knowing a specific market. Which local directories matter in your area, which publications carry weight, who the established competitors are and how they are regarded, and what a customer in your city expects. You know those and an outside adviser does not, which means that part of the work runs the other way.
Local search still works remotely, since the mechanics are the same everywhere. Your business profile, your reviews, your citation consistency, and pages about the areas you serve are all things that can be built from anywhere. What cannot be supplied remotely is the relationship with a local partner or the introduction to somebody who refers work, and those are worth pursuing yourself.
Time zones matter more than distance in practice, and it is worth being explicit at the start. Within the continental United States this rarely creates difficulty. Beyond it, the question is how much overlap exists in a normal working day, because a relationship depending on two hours of shared time each afternoon works differently from one where a message sent in the morning is answered before lunch.
Communication needs to be more deliberate than it would be locally, which is a benefit rather than a cost. Written updates that can be reread, decisions documented as they are made, and a stated rhythm for contact. Those practices produce a clearer record than an in person relationship where things are agreed in conversation and remembered differently.
Video calls handle almost everything a meeting would, and the small amount they do not is worth naming honestly. Reading a room, the informal conversation before and after, and the ease of drawing something on a whiteboard together. Those are real and they are not decisive for this kind of work.
Consider whether anything genuinely requires presence, since occasionally something does. Photography of your premises, a walkthrough of a physical operation, or training a team in person. Those can be arranged locally to you rather than being reasons to work with somebody nearby for everything.
Then judge it on the same terms you would judge anybody local. Whether the questions asked are the right ones, whether the reasoning holds, whether the work arrives when promised, and whether you are told things you did not want to hear. Distance affects none of those, and they are what determines whether an engagement produces anything.
Establish the working rhythm early rather than assuming, since the arrangement that suits a remote relationship is more deliberate than one where people are nearby. A stated update schedule and a route for anything urgent removes most of the friction that distance is blamed for.
Confirm the practical details early, including how documents are shared, how meetings are scheduled across time zones, and what happens if something needs an immediate answer. Those are minor arrangements that cause disproportionate friction when left until they are needed.
Expect the same standard regardless of distance, since a remote arrangement that produces slower responses or vaguer answers is a working relationship problem rather than a geography one.