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Category: Local Listings

Examine the impact of maintaining consistent and accurate local listings on your local SEO strategy.

  • WP-Pro


    I'm seeing, for several different locations, single businesses suddenly coming up for searches on local services, where there used to be 3-Pack results.  Now it's like a knowledge panel result on the right. Anyone else seeing this?  Any ideas as to what's going on... and if there's anything that can be done to revert it? (influence the type of local result). Thanks!

    | WP-Pro
    1
  • Wizkids964


    Anyone tried to decipher the factor in the default sorting order on Yelp?  I've not done any formal testing but from experience my gut feel is as follows (chime in with your own opinion based on your own observations). On searches - #1 factor is of course keyword(s) appear in category business is in or business name
    After that, or for just browsing categories 30% proximity of business location to location entered in address field
    20% number of reviews and average rating
    20% if they are paying Yelp for any services - the is unfair but I'm pretty sure it's a factor (call to action button, advertising, etc)
    15% Business Profile is filled out 
    15% keyword (if using search) appears in specialties section (which interestingly Yelp started charging to display!) This is a TOTAL GUESS.  I'm wondering if these factors may effect it: Quantity photos and/or keyword matches photo captions How long business has been listed on Yelp How long ago business was started Whether a street address is entered or not (a factor of Google Local Results I think)

    | Wizkids964
    0
  • WompM


    We have a client with multiple locations, and Google Business listings for each location. We've also created AMP pages for each of those location landing pages, and they're ranking on page one of their main queries, just below the local pack. We're wondering if anyone has tried pointing a GMB website listing at an AMP page, or if there are considerations to keep in mind before testing it out. So far, we've discussed whether to use the AMP url (amp.domain.com) or the Google viewer url (google.com/amp/s/amp.domain.com), and potential concerns for desktop users.

    | WompM
    0
  • formandfunctionagency


    I'm working with a dental practice that has one location that they use to serve a service area radius of about 15-30 mins drive time, which encompasses several other small towns. I understand the value of having individual location pages for a multi-location business, but is creating a location page for a business with a single office considered best practice as well? The entire site will be optimized for the city name that the business' physical office is located in. I'm considering creating a single location landing page that I'd link to from the footer and about navigation of the site, which would be similar to the template Miriam Ellis laid out in this awesome post: https://moz.com/blog/overcoming-your-fear-of-local-landing-pages In doing this, I'm hoping to create a place for office photos and driving directions from the nearby towns in order to name the different cities in the service area. However, I'm concerned about the location page competing with other pages on the site, which will be better optimized for conversions in my opinion. Does anyone have advice on best practice here?

    | formandfunctionagency
    0
  • groovehive


    I work at an agency, we have a client that has 20 locations (all different websites and google business listings). We are trying to pick the best and easiest package for each location. We are trying to improve their SEO and ranking and their Google My Business pages. Can you explain the packages that you have to offer and which package you think would be the best fit.

    | groovehive
    0
  • innovative.rohit


    hi there, Google has Suspended By Google Business Listing Google has suspended your page due to quality issues. there is No spam Things in My Business, i have Requested Google, But It has not made active Since 10 Days, Is there any way to make My listing Publish on Google please Guide me to which steps Need take Thnx

    | innovative.rohit
    0
  • Wizkids964


    We've expanded our business to be in multiple cities.  We are tracking our local rankings in each city and have Adwords campaigns for those cities with location extensions.  We have a separate contact page for each city but haven't setup landing pages for each city which would be fairly tricky as our services are identical for each city.  So really the landing page would be almost identical to our home page content with maybe a photo of the city and the city's name thrown in here and there - definitely a risk of duplicate content detection. What I'm wondering is if anyone knows if there a Google Analytics report we can run to show us links from our Google Places for Business Listing segregated by location?  My guess is that we would need to make each URL for each Google Places listing unique to that location, like http://www.oursite.com?{name of city}  Or is this not even necessary by using some report settings in Google Analytics? -- update -- Well this is a 7-year old article but I suspect it might still basically hold true?  In other words, it's not easy and straight forward.  What I'm wondering is, if I use the ?{cityname} URL only in my Places listings URLs, well, let's make it ?place={cityname} then really all I need to do is run a report filtering by URL contains ?place=    Can it really be that simple because if it is, then this old article and others like it seem to be really over complicating the strategy for simply seeing your googe places listing traffic in total and by location? https://moz.com/blog/tracking-traffic-from-google-places-in-google-analytics Furthermore, if we plan on eventually building home pages for each location, maybe the better URL structure would be mysite.com/places/{city name}  and just do a 301 to the home page until the custom page is built.  The big question then arises if we are only using this URL in our Google Places listings does it have any farther reaching effect on Google's organic view of our website?  In other words will it try to add a unique Google Places URL to the organic results database?  Will it cause a suspension of the Google Places listing?  If we create the URL as an alias to the home page instead of a 301 will it risk dupe content penalty.  Wait a sec... if we use a 301 won't that render tracking in Analytics useless as it's only then going to count the pageview for the home page and not the original URL, right? I guess we could use an alias and then in the robots.txt dissallow indexing of any URLs with /places/  ? Now I think I'M over complicating things.  Seems like the best/easiest/safest method is to just a ?place={city name} to the Google Places URL. Then once we have unique places landing pages, just go update the URL in all our places listing.

    | Wizkids964
    0
  • ichorstudios


    Hey, everyone! As a business owner who works from home and doesn't have a physical office location. Is setting up a Google business listing without location going to hurt my local search ranking? Should I get a virtual office so I have a physical location? Thank you!! 😃

    | ichorstudios
    0
  • iepl2006


    Hello, I have Client Who ran, Gym Business. he is having 5 Gym Location, After head Branch. So my Question is : How We can promote All his 5-6 Location Keyword wise, For an Example, Gym in sydney, gym in Melbourne, Etc As in Website Title we have Given Title Like For Yoga Service, YOGA & PILATES Australia How i can Get result for Yoga Center in Sydney, in Melbourne Etc Kindly Suggest What are Steps I need take to apply perfect onpage Title, Description For location wise Keywords,, Thanx, in Advance

    | iepl2006
    0
  • rswhtn


    Hi Everyone, I've got a question about citations. My website is in a niche where there are 3 main competitors - ourselves and two other sites. We have around 300 citation links and around 50 high quality links within our niche from people like bloggers, editorial links within news sites etc. The other two competitors have 900 and 2000 citations each, but nothing else. None of the high quality links we have worked hard over the past year to get. We're generally ranking lower than the other two sites. Should we focus on getting more citations to "catch up"? Until now we haven't because we've been worried a lot of the citations our other competitors are on look spammy, but it seems whatever we do we can't beat them. On the face of it though, we are a better company with a better site and we've got more/better real links, so I'm starting to wonder if citations are holding us back.

    | rswhtn
    0
  • KempRugeLawGroup


    When we type in our business name, our google business profile comes up on the right-hand side per usual. However, the photo that is displayed is not the one we want to be displayed. Is there a way to change that? Is there a way to tell google "this is the photo we want to display in search?" Also, the photo that is being displayd is not one that we even have uploaded to the google business page. It is on our website, but not on the photos for google business page. Thanks, Ruben

    | KempRugeLawGroup
    0
  • a_toohill


    Hey everyone, I'm working with a local catering company that does not have a physical address available for use.  Because of privacy concerns, the company is not open to using their home address.  The local competition in the targeted area is fairly strong and established already.  Does anyone have ideas on how I can work around this?

    | a_toohill
    0
  • Shorefield_Holidays


    Hi All, Simple question, but I'm struggling to find the answer, so I hope someone is able to help. The business I run is Oakdene Forest Park; Google Maps URL: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Oakdene™+Forest+Park/@50.8114372,-1.8598721,18z/data=!4m12!1m6!3m5!1s0x4873980ce90e4ef7:0x755579d631c25b33!2sOakdene™+Forest+Park!8m2!3d50.8114796!4d-1.8582842!3m4!1s0x4873980ce90e4ef7:0x755579d631c25b33!8m2!3d50.8114796!4d-1.8582842?hl=en Under the business name, it has a small description and for the life of me I don't know where Google is getting it from because a part of it is wrong. It looks like this: Oakdene™ Forest Park Rural Resort with Entertainment & a Spa I would like to remove the term 'Rural Resort' but where do I find it?? Thanks in advance for your help.

    | Shorefield_Holidays
    0
  • Dions


    Hello, During the site crawl in the week of Jan 29th, my site experienced a somewhat significant dip in search visibility. While all my dashboards for the brand experienced a dip, it was most noticeable in a dashboard focused on a specific region. Overall, I didn't make any major changed to the site, nor did the competitors I'm tracking. FWIW, the competitors I'm tracking stayed steady and didn't move up or down in visibility during my dip. I stay fairly up-to-date with SEO best practices and I don't believe there were any algorithm changes during this time. Now, there is one possible reasoning for this dip. Sometime before the week of Jan 29th, we began a new web promotion. To track this promotion, I added some minor JavaScript in the header. This additional JavaScript did slow the site speed slightly, but only to a rating of "Average" based on PageSpeed Insights. Does anyone have any insights as to why my site may have suffered a dip during the week of Jan 29th? Thanks.

    | Dions
    0
  • r1200gsa


    It looks like ExpressUpdate.com is down and while I know nobody actually uses Citysearch anymore I was wondering if anyone else had a solution for updating NAP data there.

    | r1200gsa
    0
  • camarin_w


    This is not my area of expertise, but I have a customer with a unique problem. They are primarily an agency that assists student-athletes nationwide with the college recruiting process. They also have a non-profit organization that runs soccer camps for local kids only.  The soccer camp would of course benefit from having it's own GMB page, but they've been told by Google that they can't use the same address as their recruiting business. They are in the same office and moving/adding an office isn't an option at this time. Does anyone have any ideas on how to overcome this issue without risking penalty from Google? Should they change their business name to combine both and add categories for their non-profit? They're such disparate businesses that I'm reluctant to have them do this, but is that the best/only option? Thanks all!

    | camarin_w
    1
  • MPlata


    Our company has multiple (3) offices, including our headquarters, and each has its own Facebook page. Other than the primary company page, the other two locations have only been claimed and do not have posts, reviews, check-ins, etc. Now, Facebook recently granted us access to Facebook Locations, which, if I understand correctly, would remove 2-out-of-3 office pages and add a "Locations" tab to our primary company page where people can see the other offices. _See Starbucks Example: https://www.facebook.com/pg/Starbucks/locations/?ref=page_internal _ I've read mixed reviews regarding using the Locations feature, but nothing definitively answers whether or not this would negatively affect local rankings. Does anyone have firsthand experience going from individual business pages to a single parent business page with Locations? Is there any trustworthy documentation out there about this?

    | MPlata
    1
  • WizIQMarketing


    Hi, We are a SAAS platform offering cloud based solution for educators. We had a google business listing in India and recently added one for US as well. Our keywords rank significantly better in India than in US. Is it a good idea to remove these business listing? Also, what could be other factors that impact GEO SEO rankings for a online company like ours?

    | WizIQMarketing
    0
  • Sociable_Bistro


    Hi my client has two locations for his restaurants: Me Gusta Tacos He wants to have both his locations show up in the map pack, which they currently do when you type in Restaurants, Dinner, food near me etc... However, when you google Me Gusta Tacos the Google listing shows up on the right for one of his locations, but there isn't a Map Pack for his two locations. I wasn't sure if a map pack only shows up when there are 3 or more locations, for instance, a chipotle which I added an image below to compare too. HGOgln5 Jgdoi4Y

    | Sociable_Bistro
    0
  • Ria_


    Hi guys, This seems to be quite common (especially now with "hotdesking" becoming increasingly popular), but I've never had to do local SEO for a business like this before so was just wondering on best practice for a business who shares the same brick-and-mortar location with multiple other businesses. For Google My Business verification, it does seem you just have to get there first. With Google unverifying the first account tied to that address if you attempt to verify another - I don't want to do this, due to the relationship between my client and the verified business in question. Any suggestions?

    | Ria_
    1
  • Mike-i


    Hello, I have a client who is trying to rank in Maps for "city name house call vet." Their GMB name is NOT their business name... it is: "Business Name the House Call Vets, Dr. Jack Millen" I know that it is a best practice to have the GMB title be ONLY their exact business name. However, I worry if we take out the keyword "House Call Vets" from the GMB business name, they will tank for Google Maps "house call vet" searches. All the top ranking GMB pages have "house call vet" in the GMB  business name (even though it is not in the actual business name of all those businesses). Should I worry about deleting "house call vet" from their GMB page even though it is not a part of their actual business name? Will Google still rank them for "House Call Vet" searches in Maps? Right now they are ranking like 6 which is not great but not horrible in a very large market but also not as high as I think they could be. Thanks in advance for the help!

    | Mike-i
    0
  • TheKatzMeow


    I have a number of builders of new homes as clients. Typically, they build out a whole neighborhood at once and give the neighborhood a fancy name. We were planning to create Google My Business pages for these communities but then ran into some potential challenges. As new communities, they are sometimes not on Google's radar yet Some of them have model homes where you might take a tour with a realtor that serves the community exclusively but many don't. So here come the questions... Is there a way to make Google speed up its process of recognizing new addresses? I have to choose an address to associate with the GMB page, probably the address of model home. Is this going to create annoying problems for a buyer who someday buys that model home? Since some communities don't have a model home, I could arbitrarily assign an address of one of the neighborhood homes to the GMB page, but this leads to the same question about creating a GMB page that will exist after the builder has sold all the houses in the community. Will it be weird to have the GMB referring to someone's private residence down the road? My assumption is that claiming a GMB page would help with local ranking if someone searches for something like "new homes" in addition to providing easy driving directions to someone who has done a bit of research and Googles the name of the new home community while out driving and searching for homes. These seem to be the main benefits, but are the challenges associated with questions 1-3 even worth the trouble of trying to claim listings for these communities?

    | TheKatzMeow
    0
  • DigitalMarketingSEO


    Is local search data Included in Google Search Console? Or is it only in Google My Business? I'm having a hard time distinguishing what exactly is included in Google Search Console's reporting.

    | DigitalMarketingSEO
    1
  • nhhernandez


    Hi everyone, I tried to create a Google+ account from a client's Google My Business, but found that 'Enable Google+' is no longer available on the sidebar of the GMB dashboard. I used this tutorial to do that before  - http://onlineownership.com/create-google-page-connected-google-business-page/ An update on that article: Update: 31st October 2017
    Google My Business has confirmed that enabling a G+ business page will no longer be available. Users will need to now create a G+ Brand page for their business on G+. My question is: If we create a separate G+ Brand page, are we still able to tie it up with GMB or are they going to be completely different platforms? On the dashboard for our older clients we have a list that goes like: Your Business is Live on Google View on Search View on Maps View on Google+ In light of this new change. Do we still really have to bother creating G+ brand pages? It seems like the newly launched Google Posts is more user-friendly and easier to update. The posts could be created on GMB and it's going to appear on searches within the local knowledge graph. Thoughts?

    | nhhernandez
    1
  • Ayres-SEO


    I have a client with a small business with 4 different branches. Currently, we have a main landing page for the company, plus distinct landing pages for each branch with maps, territories, distinct phone numbers, etc., for each branch. The company recently sold one of the branches to a competitor  as they do not want to service that area anymore. They have asked me what they should do now. Obviously, we are going to remove the location page for that branch, but we also need to transfer the phone number to the other company for use as part of the sale. What tasks should I look into for separating the branch from the rest of the company while still maintaining best practice for the rest of the site/company? Thank you for your help and suggestions.

    | Ayres-SEO
    0
  • donsilvernail


    I have a new client and I discovered that someone has ripped off the business and established it in Texas (business resides in New Jersey) My client is ssscustomclosets.com/ the hijack artist has created forms and business listings such as this https://wirykanaird.wufoo.com/forms/zivaxni09ew6nb/ There is no google listing for Texas however, I have to think that this is causing some seo issues. Any ideas how to rectify this? I have never come across this situation before. Thanks, Don Silvernail

    | donsilvernail
    0
  • GaryT_SEO


    We are a digital marketing agency Our clients are (virtually all) retail automotive dealerships. We compete in various market places coast to coast (USA). Since Google puts retail automotive dealerships under Local SEO umbrella, is it known ( published ) how large is the radius around my client's Google My Business rooftop's address? How wide is their search 'reach' according to Google? Asked another way, in a triangular, three SEO geo area, with one city being at the epicenter of the population dispersion, and my client, versus my client's competitors being different distances from where the majority of the population emanates from, all other SERP factors being equal (assumption) between the two competitors, how far is each clients REACH from a Local Search standpoint. Is this known? Published by Google. ONE example: https://www.google.com/maps/dir/BMW+of+South+Albany,+U.S.+9W,+Glenmont,+NY/42.7662693,-73.8138088/@42.6727121,-73.7993527,12z/data=!4m9!4m8!1m5!1m1!1s0x89dde0fe8829c405:0xd915fb9b3b60bf33!2m2!1d-73.7973301!2d42.589211!1m0!3e0

    | GaryT_SEO
    1
  • photoseo1


    OK, SO, I am a wedding company in Maui, Hawaii and have an established business on one island with a physical address. http://simplemauiwedding.net We have started a new team in Oahu, Hawaii http://simpleoahuwedding.com and we provide service there and have a full team in place. How can I rank for Local Search on that Island with no physical address? I would love to hear some proven strategies. Thank you 🙂

    | photoseo1
    0
  • Mike-i


    For a chiropractic or other doctor's office with multiple doctors, should each have their own personal Google My Business page page AND a business page for the practice? If they just have a business page now, is it worth creating a page for each of the individual doctors? And what if some of them have different focuses (like a acupuncturist and chiropractor), does that mean you should make individual doctor pages when you otherwise wouldn't bother? And IF we should create pages for the individual doctors, should they all have the same address and website since they work in the same practice. Curious if there is a best practice for this... has anyone seen positive or negative results with or without the individual doctor pages? Thanks!

    | Mike-i
    0
  • vetofunk


    Hi, I have an issue. Our organization shares a church with another organization. Years ago they claimed the address. They have their Google Business category set up as "Religious Organization". About 6 months ago we started sharing the same church with them. We are a total different organization. We now have a verified listing (same address but with STE 100 in it) with the main category being "Church". There are a few issues I am seeing: When doing a search for our address, the icon is the default one, whereas all the other churches in the area show the church icon. Is this because they claimed the original address as "Religious Organization" and because we only have STE 100, even though labeled as Church, Google doesn't see it that way? If you search for the location + church, neither of our organizations show, even after 6 months. They only show if you search for the organization name or address. Could this be because Google doesn't consider this address (therefore both of us) as a church and doesn't show it? Here is our Google local listing and the one we share with. Any help would be greatly appreciated. https://www.google.com/maps/place/1018+Parkway+Dr,+Spring+Hill,+TN+37174/data=!4m2!3m1!1s0x8863828b8f17015b:0x59fd9715acc7e144?sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi7h5DCqfbXAhXBc98KHXcyA4gQ8gEIKDAA Thank you!

    | vetofunk
    0
  • Davey_Tree


    Hi all, I am wondering if anyone out there has cracked the enigma of figuring out how to accurately find local rankings for multi-location businesses. I do understand that "accuracy" should be used loosely given the numerous factors that come into play for local such as distance from searcher and business location being located directly in the city of the search. So I definitely get that nothing will be entirely accurate but the programs I have used and the incognito browser approach just seems so far off. Moz tells me something different than the Google Adword Preview Tool which is different than SEMRush which is different than serps.com and so on. I have done the appending to search strings with near=city as well. I unfortunately do not trust any of them at this point. I would LOVE if my company flew me out to every single city we are in so I could do local searches but that is probably not going to happen 🙂 Any thoughts or recommendations for how I can get the most accurate local rank, even if it is an incredibly manual process? Is there an easy way for me to change my location anymore since Google stripped that option away awhile back? That was the ONLY time I felt I was getting somewhat accurate results. Thanks! -Ben

    | Davey_Tree
    1
  • Davey_Tree


    Hey all, Wanted to run something by you. I am getting pressed to use tracking phone numbers for all of our GMB pages for over 100 locations across the country. Has anyone done this for their own listings or for their clients? Because I will have to do it for GMB, this means I will be sending these same phone numbers out to the other major directories and data sources around the web. The phone numbers do contain the local area code for each city and do directly connect our customers to their specific location without any kind of redirecting. How is Google looking at this? I have read before it is a no-no but have also read it is not a big deal. Any thoughts would be much appreciated! -Ben

    | Davey_Tree
    0
  • Dions


    We recently switched to a new site and I realized that our developer changed our locations page from /locations to /location. Our developer set the redirects correctly, so we most of the "juice" should still transfer fine. Even though most of the link strength should transfer to the new site, the language is misleading and according to MOZBar, the previously established links to /locations do not show up. The best option in my mind is to have the developer switch back to /locations and redirect /location. Do you feel this is the best option as well and is there anything I should be cautious about when doing this?

    | Dions
    0
  • GVZH


    Hi, Our website is currently (and has been) ranking 1st for a number of keywords but is not listed under the Google Local list. I have double check that all the (physical) info is correct. I do not have a duplicate page. When I order the Google Local results in rating order, we then appear on top! Has anyone come across such a situation and would you have tips on how to solve this issue? Thanks!

    | GVZH
    1
  • Patrick_at_Nebraska_Medicine


    My core question is just: How do you fix a Google My Business Location Issue if the road doesn't yet exist on Google Maps? Do I have any other options other than to just wait on Google to catch up with reality? Here's the background: I work for a hospital. We just opened a clinic on a street that is real and has a U.S. Postal Address, but Google Maps doesn't recognize it, and redirects people to a house . This is our postal address: 8343 S 168th Ave Omaha NE 68136-1677 If a patient enters the following into google maps, 8343 S 168th Ave, the location the map autofills the wrong zip code, and sends them to a home that is on S 168th Ave. (where in theory a home would exist if it had that home number). The road does exist in that portion of town. If a patient enters 8343 S 168th Ave, Omaha NE 68136, google maps takes you to the correct location, but it automatically changes Ave to St. The verified Google My Business listing also lists it as Street, even though on the back end I've put in the word Avenue, and it shows up in the right place. If however someone just searches by name "Chalco Clinic" the right Google My Business comes up. This is the Google My Business page I'm referring to: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Nebraska+Medicine+-+Chalco/@41.1754796,-96.1787153,15z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0xf77aefb4e27f865!8m2!3d41.1754796!4d-96.1787153 And even though it says it's on a Street, on the back end of the claimed listing I've used "Avenue". In case it matters, this is the landing page for the location: https://www.nebraskamed.com/chalco

    | Patrick_at_Nebraska_Medicine
    0
  • Davey_Tree


    Hey everyone, So I'm noticing lately that Google is showing ads via AdWords for my locations in the local pack. I am fine with that, but unfortunately it is now driving me a little bit insane wondering how much Google really cares about NAP, distance from centroid and or user, links to domain, completed business profile and so on. They will pull an ad into the top of the local pack for my location, yet, my actual organic business listing in some cases will not even show up until I hit the second page of business results. I get that it's Adwords, it's pay-to-play, but from most accounts, the differences in ranking for traditional listings results compared to business results on both desktop and mobile are pretty different. For example, by doing my traditional SEO best practices, I can rank high in traditional listing results even when my business does not show in the local listings. I have done this time and time again. I am able to accept that since we have 100 locations in the US and our lists were an absolute mess before I got here, that some of our NAP across multiple directories and listing sites are not exactly up to snuff which I have been working on. So I guess the thing is, if my location in Google's eyes is not good enough to be shown organically for the user even at the bottom of page of one of business results, why is it good enough to show an ad for my business location for that query as the absolute first result? Again, I know its Ad Words which basically allows you to cut in line like that special pass you can buy at a roller coaster park, but still. Isn't their goal to provide the best possible experience for their user? If they feel something is worth holding back my organic listing from the user, why is it fine with them to show the user that same location with the top possible local pack spot in an ad? I guess this is more of a rant than anything but I wanted to know if anyone else is dealing with this or anyone has any info they have found that could help shed light on this? It kind of just kicked everything I thought about trust, authority, links in order to rank in the local pack organically out the window. Thanks! -Ben

    | Davey_Tree
    0
  • Coppell


    I've only ever had a mailing address for my business, but I now have a new physical address which I use to meet clients at, and it's in a different city.  There's no mailing address at the physical location though, so I'm keeping my mailing address at the post office where's it always been. What should I do about changing my address? Should I change it, or leave it alone? I could add it easily to my website, as a physical address and a separate mailing address. But what about my Google Maps listing, social sites, and citations? I rank at the top for my keywords in my original city, so I don't really want to lose that. Would it be a good idea to add a location/landing page to my website for the new city, to help me rank there? Hope that made some sense - thanks in advance.

    | Coppell
    0
  • Davey_Tree


    Hello everyone! I manage SEO for a pretty large brand that has close to 100 office locations nationwide. In the last year we have completely revamped our Yelp pages. This has been a great secondary source of traffic and conversions for us because of the type of industry we are in. The problem is, it can be exponentially better if we were more visible. We have done almost everything we can to make our pages as good if not better than almost any competitor regardless of geographic location. We even have the enhanced profiles (extortion) that remove competitors ads from appearing on our listings. Here is what we have done in the last year to each listing: Uploaded tons of photos Increased reviews Added proper categories Fine-tuned all of our CTAs Added in a unique and optimized business description ( Available with enhanced profiles) Set the proper service area range on their map Increased our review response rate ( both negative and positive) to 100% Still, even after months and months have gone by we struggle to rank on the first page for our service category. Doing manual searches often turn up competitors, who do not even have their listing claimed, have no photos, little reviews will rank higher than us. Even though we have an account rep because of our business size, bringing this issue up to them is about as useful as talking to a blanket. They push CPC so hard that its the last thing they are willing to help with. It has gotten to the point where I am honestly starting to believe in a self-curated conspiracy theory that they purposely hold larger brands back in organic to sell CPC harder. Obviously certain brands that hold the branding clout like a "Best Buy" would be hard to get away with. But still, we do all the right things and we are getting very minimal results compared to where we should be. Has anyone else had issues with Yelp or have any ideas on some steps we could take to appease their particular algorithm? Thanks! -Ben

    | Davey_Tree
    1
  • SummitAuto


    Has anyone had luck choosing photos to display on SERPs for their Google My Business profile pages? Recently, Google has been overriding our photo choices and they've picked some terrible, user-submitted photos to show on SERPs. Our clients are understandably upset about this and we've tried flagging photos which works only a small % of the time. When we call Google they say they can luckily remove individual photos, but this isn't too scalable across dozens of clients we work with. How can we have better control over the photos that show on GMB listings? Any suggestions or best practices would be appreciated! Attached is an example of one we have showing on SERPs for a dealer. Screen-Shot-2017-10-25-at-2.16.52-PM.png

    | SummitAuto
    1
  • Gavo


    We recently have a chiropractor client who came to us to do SEO for his newly opened myotherapy practice. We were very surprised he managed to request and got approved a GMB for the myotherapy practice under a different business name but the exact same address. Has there been changes in Google policy recently that 2 businesses are able to share the one same address? If we built citations for the myotherapy practice with the same address, will it send conflicting signals to Google? His chiropractor practice is currently ranking no. 1 in local pack and SERP for his main keyword "chiropractor + location". Any insight would be greatly appreciated!

    | Gavo
    0
  • Tariq_Jameel


    Hi guys, Anyone know good service that helps optimize and create citations to google map listing? Also is there recommended WP theme that helps the ranking on google map? Thanks in advance!

    | Tariq_Jameel
    1
  • SS.Digital


    We are a solar company with three locations.  When claiming our business listings on Yahoo (Yext), we noticed that one of them had already been claimed.  The name of our company and our phone number were changed to a lead generation company.  Upon further inspection, this company has hijacked hundreds of listings throughout the state and the country. To see the extent of it, go here:
    https://search.yahoo.com/local/s;_ylt=A0SO8odHUOZZdVUAYwBXNyoA;_ylu=X3oDMTByNWU4cGh1BGNvbG8DZ3ExBHBvcwMxBHZ0aWQDBHNlYwNzYw--;_ylc=X1MDMTM1MTE5NTExOARfcgMyBGdwcmlkA3loNXdiQlJqVE9HMm9MdXlUSklLdEEEbl9zdWdnAzEEb3JpZ2luA3NlYXJjaC55YWhvby5jb20EcG9zAzAEcHFzdHIDBHBxc3RybAMEcXN0cmwDMjIEcXVlcnkDc29sYXIgY29ubmVjdG9yIGlydmluZQR0X3N0bXADMTUwODI4MTk4MA--?fr2=sb-top-search&p=solar+connector+irvine&fr=yfp-t- Or, just search in Yahoo's Local search section for "Solar Connector Irvine" or pretty much any city in California. On every hijacked listing, the company name is changed to "Solar Connector" and the phone number is changed to a unique local number, but all the other information is left the same.  Now when people think they are calling our business, they get a shady lead gen company instead.  I have submitted a request to Yext and have tried (and failed) to find a support phone number.    This is a widespread, blatant fraud, and I would hope they would have interest in fixing it. Solar Connector (fake name) is associated with SolarAmerica.com, which is run by Clean Energy Experts, which was purchased by Sunrun (a publicly traded company). My specific question is, does anyone have any insight on the best method for getting help from Yahoo/Yext?  Other than through their "help portal" on the website.  I need to speak with a human being.

    | SS.Digital
    1
  • AtlasGlobal


    One of the companies I work with has purchased a business complex they plan to move their offices into. The current tenant is fairly reputable in the community, but ran into some financial issues, hence the sale. For easy, I'll refer to this place as the Simmons Center. So, currently, the Simmons Center has a Yelp!, GMB and other pages devoted to what it offers (mostly restaurants and small shops) but the new company will be turning the location into a large corporate campus. We'd like to bring naming conventions in line with the new center title and remove (where applicable) citations for the Simmons Center. What would be our best way to go about doing this? I'm thinking our best option is to: 1) claim current listings, where applicable, 2) mark the Simmons Center as closed, 3) Create new listings for the new name at the same address, 4) Use Moz Local and Whitespark to help clean up citations where needed. Is this the best approach for this type of situation?

    | AtlasGlobal
    0
  • MrSem


    I'm curious if when anyone has submitted a new business citation, once it appears in Google, Bing, Yellow Pages, etc, do you notice if junk mail starts to flow in?

    | MrSem
    0
  • RayflexGroup


    We rank #1 for our main keyword and location, however, the top 3 google maps listing doesn't include us. We have more reviews than any of our local competitors (they have around 1/2, we have 25 all 5*) & we only seem to appear as an ad on maps listings. What can we do to resolve this?

    | RayflexGroup
    0
  • MrSem


    Is the effect of NAP inconsistency on search rankings basically a myth to justify business citation management services? I've been doing SEO for over 10 years but only recently started doing local businesses. I have yet to find any sort of published study that clearly shows a significant ranking effect by correcting an inconsistent NAP on any business directory site other than Google and Bing Business Listings. In fact, the publishers of any such articles claiming NAP inconsistency has a significant negative SEO effect are almost always businesses or people that are charging for such services. Gee, could they be a little biased? Obviously if you have an incorrect address that is far from the actual address, correcting it will help your ranking (think 3-pack) in the area close to your business but that's not really the type of ranking effect I'm talking about here.  I'm talking about a missing suite #, or an old address that is 1/2 block away from the new address but still the same phone number, or identical address but different phone (a toll free versus a local number). That kind of stuff. Of course you don't want to have an incorrect address or non-working phone number on places like Superpages, Yelp, Yellowpages, etc, but does anyone know of any place I can find good factual proof that having inconsistent NAPs on these sites has any significant effect on rankings? I'm sure some of the big SEO companies have the data to determine the effect. Or is this more of a "tin foil hat" / herd / OCD mentality on this subject that no one can prove (or disprove?)

    | MrSem
    0
  • BSessions


    I have been working out of co-working space for about 6 months, and I have had good results in local results here. I have also read that Google does not look favorably upon the inclusion of these locations. Has there policy on the inclusion of these spaces changed? Can I safely use other co-working spaces to expand to other locations? Thank you for your guidance. Ben Sessions

    | BSessions
    0
  • MrSem


    For Google, has anyone got a finger on how much of a factor the address type "service customers only at their location" versus "service customers at my business location AND customers location is" is as far as local search ranking especially for 3-pack results?  (The former they hide the address the latter they show the street address) It seems to me the primary factors are obviously (a) proximity of user's location or location intent to the business location, then (b) natural organic ranking (age of business, domain authority, inbound links, quality content, relevance to the actual keywords searched for).  But where does the address type rank amongst all the "secondary factors" like is business currently open, number of reviews and average rating, etc. etc.  My guess would be reviews and average rating along with is business currently open would be third, and then address type would factor in - but for all I know the address type could be given much more importance than I am guessing?

    | MrSem
    0
  • EBKMarketing


    If I have a page of 20 local business listings, do I need to provide structured data for each business listing? is that necessary and would it help with SEO? So if I have a page of  Vancouver Brain Injury Lawyers, and list off 20 local law firms that focus on that type of injury, should I have structured data for each law firm that I list?

    | EBKMarketing
    0
  • coolhandluc


    Hi There I work for an international train company which operates in multiple locations across several European countries.
    I have been asked to claim our Google my business profiles for each location so we can manage reviews, images etc.. The problem i have is that our physical location (ticket desk, check in area etc..) in each country is in a train station (obviously).  We share the same address and postcode with the train stations ( i have personally phone them to make sure that was the case) My question is, can i claim our business in GMB using the same details as the train stations?
    If i can, it is literally  impossible for me to verify each profile through the use of coupon as I can't travel to each destination. I heard i could do bulk verification if we own more that 10 properties but I am not quite sure how to do all of it Any help on both these questions would be greatly appreciated

    | coolhandluc
    0

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