Is our office location keeping us from showing up in the local results?

[AndrewHill]

I’m the managing broker of Reilly Realtors, a real estate brokerage in Austin, TX. We are ranking fairly well for our targeted keywords, but we never show up in the local results. We serve the entire Austin area, but our office is in Bee Cave, a small town located a few miles southwest of Austin. Is our office location keeping us from showing up in the local results? And if so, how can we rank in the local results without moving our office to the downtown area?

Thanks,

Michael

[davidallen365]

Hi Miriam

Virtual office may not be the right term to use in this instance. In the UK we we can rent office facilities for a monthly fee and they are referred to as virtual offices. These facilities can include a myriad of services, such as telephone answering if required, mail forwarding, secretarial services and meeting rooms if required.

Many home based firms in the UK use these services so as not to show their home address and have one or a number of  physical "business based address" in particular locations as long as they can pay for them.

There is no hiding of address or "black hat tactics'. You are paying to have a  physical business location in a particular area. It may be different in the US.

Hope this clarifies it for you

[BizDetox]

Thanks for the great input. I will further investigate the validity of this by asking it on webmaster forums.

I still strongly feel ( as directed, conducting business in a city ) justifies your physical locale. That being said, it is users best interests basis, not spam .

Again doing good business and being honest when specifically ties into the city at hand then it is not against googles guidelines.  Because you are conducting business. Again i am referencing what Michaels case is.

Thanks Again Miriam this was very helpful. Lets deep in touch.

[MiriamEllis]

Hi Hampig, and Happy Holidays to you, too!

Here is the text from the Google Places Quality Guidelines: (http://support.google.com/places/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=107528)

Business Location: Use a precise, accurate address to describe your business location.

• Do not create a listing or place your pin marker at a location where the business does not physically exist. P.O. Boxes are not considered accurate physical locations.

Because a virtual office is a location at which a business doesn't physically exist, then it falls under these guidelines. I can understand where there might be some grey area in people's minds because Google doesn't actually use the words 'virtual office' in the guidelines, but the language precisely describes what a virtual office is. I wouldn't be surprised if Google eventually updates the guidelines to include the words 'virtual office', but for now, they are counting on people reading their definition and understanding that this would apply to any misrepresentation of physical locale, including a virtual office, P.O box, etc.

For further discussion on this, you might check out this Google Forum thread (http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!msg/business/kFP-9-BIcBE/ny6z00BAgr0J) in which a Level 11 MapMaker RER states:

"Google considers UPS boxes, other private mailboxes and most virtual offices the same."

I also highly recommend this thread on The Local Search Forum:

http://localsearchforum.catalystemarketing.com/google-places-help-support/978-virtual-offices-home-address-google-plus-local.html

I understand that startups and small businesses have budgetary concerns and could be tempted to try to bend the rules to help themselves appear as though they are physically located in cities where they actually aren't, but I would strongly advise avoiding that temptation, because of what I consider to be totally clear guidelines against it.

And, regarding service area type businesses (like carpet cleaners), where they serve in multiple cities, Google is quite clear on that as well. You can have 1 listing for your physical location, but should hide the address of the business, as the location is not a place people can come to. You are not allowed to create listings for every city in which you serve.

As I see it, you've got to play by Google's rules (even if they don't make sense sometimes) if you want to participate in their products. Yes, there are countless examples of people getting away with bending and breaking the rules, but it's certainly not a strategy I would advise.

At a very basic level, the founding principal of doing good business is being honest, and I couldn't call misrepresentation of locale honest, nor could I call doing this in an attempt to manipulate search engine rankings honest.  And, beyond this concept of civic ethics, there is the very real fact that if Google ever catches you doing something they don't like, punishment will be swift and lasting and Google does not make a point of trying to see things 'your' way. They see things their way, so knowing and playing by the rules is just good insurance against disaster.

Hope my reply helps further explain the virtual office issue. I'm glad you came back to discuss this further!

[MiriamEllis]

Hi David,

Thanks for returning to talk more about the concept of the virtual office. If you have a staffed physical location that clients can come to and out of which your staff is working, then that is not a virtual office. It's a real one. If Michael's firm could acquire an office like this in Austin, his troubles would be over.

But, if the physical space is an empty one that's being rented for the purposes of misrepresenting locale...Google definitely does not want that, and unfortunately, there are ton of people doing that. With the hide address penalty in full swing these days for business owners who don't comply with this year's ruling, Google has made it really clear that the only addresses they want listed are those where human beings can visit and that all others must hide their addresses. So, this is clearly something on Google's brain. While this isn't exactly about virtual offices, it does show how focused Google is on physical, staffed locations, which to my mind, lends more oomph than ever to the advice regarding avoiding virtual offices.

Thanks again for coming back!

[BizDetox]

Miriam thank you for the awesome feedback you placed with this post. Who says you cant learn something new everyday

I would like to ask you if you can give me a link to a post where google directly says or indirectly frowns upon use of virtual offices. This is the first time I have heard of it not being a viable option.

I take two examples into consideration and i would like to politely disagree with that and " only that " comment you made.

First there are a lot of office buildings that offer virtual offices with Suite # as box numbers, even UPS does that ( not saying ups is an option ) A Po. Box, well obviously we all know you cannot get listed with a po box address, but where i live in Los angeles and around my surrounding area a lot of people get a virtual office . ( i.e.: use of an office building facility, conference room for meetings, use of business services with dedicated phone lines, use of conference halls, and of course a mail box. ) So i would not think that google would not be in " favor " of someone conducting business in an environment such as that. Can you please explain how a business with a unique address can come under scrutiny? ( unless they specifically do something wrong ). I am not sure i understood that portion.

A lot of start up internet business's utilize this feature due to the extensive cost of getting an office and getting off the ground.

Just like actually getting an office in an office building, a virtual office will be just as fine, ( As long as business is being conducted in that facility or in the surrounding area ) Also, i am not condoning going and getting a virtual office in evert metropolitan city. Just does not make sense.

So that being said in Michaels case getting listed for a Major city in VERY CLOSE proximity, where he is conducting business, does make sense.

Second, i would have to take into consideration conducting business outside the city where you are located. ie: ( if you provide legal services or even if you are a contractor and your main business is outside the city you are located in then it would only be fair to get listed for the city you provide service to. Don't you agree.

If i am a user and i am searching for a contractor in the city of los angeles , i ( from a user stand point ) would like to see a good mix of contractors ), not only people located in my immediate zip code. Because we have to consider that major cities , like Austin , or Los angeles cover a big area on the map.

I hope i was able to clear up on my part what i meant by getting a virtual office and from this perspective I think it is only fair for Michael to properly get listed in the city he conducts business in.

This is not  black nor a gray area subject, just straight facts based on the needs of a business.

Best wishes and Happy Holidays

Hampig M

CEO

BizDetox

[davidallen365]

Hi Michael and Miriam

When I was talking about a virtual office I am talking about an ongoing cost to your business for office space/facilities in the centre of Austin, not just a one off cost. This office will forward post for you and act as a bespoke facility in the centre of Austin.

Google has no problem with this as it is a physical location that you will work from. In fact it could be a benefit to you in terms of meeting rooms etc.in the centre of Austin.

Unfortunatley many service based companies like carpet cleaners (me) can not justify this ongoing cost, however as realtors you certainly could justify the cost as the opportunity cost would be substantial.

I do agree with miriam regarding your citations and general management-optimisation of your places listing.

You will need to set up separate review (yelp etc.) accounts for the Austin location.

You need to educate your reviewers on how best to present their reviews and also try to get video reviews.

[MiriamEllis]

Hi Michael,

I must politely beg to differ with the advice being given by David and Hampig regarding a virtual office. Google is not in favor of these and, in fact, should such an office come under scrutiny, it could cause serious damage to your whole local profile. Because of this, I do not advise purchasing a virtual office, using a P.O. Box or anything along those lines.

You are quite correct that lack of a physical office in Austin will make it next to impossible for you to rank in the local set of results for Austin-based searches or searches containing the word 'Austin'. Google considers a business as being most relevant to its city of location - not to neighboring cities - so in Google's eyes, you are a Bee Cave business, not an Austin business.

I empathize with the frustration of this. Tons of business models (carpet cleaners, chimney sweeps, realtors) serve within a wide radius, and tons of businesses are located just on the borders of big cities like Austin or Dallas, but Google's local product just isn't set up to favor these business models.

This means that your attempts to rank for Austin are going to have to be organic rather than Local. Now, that being said, Michael, I am seeing a couple of areas of concern that I thought I'd point out as I noticed them while taking a look at your business. Here is the Google+ Local Page I found for your business: https://plus.google.com/111099812929349352484/about?hl=en

On it, I see the address being listed as: 13500 Galleria Circle #115 Austin, TX 78738

As you've stated, you're not in Austin, so where did this address come from?

Also, in the business description field, I see this:

The Experts in Austin Real Estate

This needs to be rewritten to avoid possible penalties. Never put geographic terms in your business description.

Further, I see that a bunch of your reviews mention the names of agents at your business. You have little/no control over what others write, but there is some thought that the use of names may be a cause of lost reviews. If they disappear (as thousands/millions of reviews have done lately) you may want to remember this, because it could possibly be the cause. Google is just a nightmare for reviews right now.

One other thing that can be very difficult for multi-partner or multi-agent firms such as realty firms, law firms or medical practices is the allowed use of creating unique Places-based listing for each partner in the firm. Google allows this, but rankings can tank if multiple partners are using the same categories, or, listings can be merged because of similarity in business name, address or phone number. I don't know if this is an issue with your business at this point, but if you were actually located within Austin and having trouble ranking, this would definitely be a point I'd investigate.

So, bottom line, short of getting a legitimate office in Austin, ranking in the local results for things related to that city cannot be seen a very realistic goal for your business. It's not that it never happens, but it's very, very rare. Perhaps the business will be able to relocate there at some point in the future, but until that time, your true local efforts should target and appropriately reflect Bee Cave, while your organic efforts can target Austin. Hope this helps, and good luck. You are in very enormous amounts of company in wishing Google handled things like this differently!

[BizDetox]

David. You took the word right out of my mouth !

Before i read your response my guess was Virtual office right off the bat.

But there are a few other things you need to do.

1. get your citations on your website in order. You must display the address of the virtual office and phone number for the austin city. But take a look at how powerful and well ranked that keyword is first before you proceed might not be a good idea.  you also need to place a site-wide footer on all your pages of your site.

2. Go to getlisted.org or yext.com and manage your citation.

What you can do is make a secondary office in austin as your virtual office .

hope this helps

[davidallen365]

Hi Michael

I see you're located 17 miles from the centre of Austin on Google Maps. This may be a probem for you as I understand google looks at 15 miles.

My location has a similar problem, being 13 miles only from my main city, yet i can only get local listing for my home town!

You may need to look at a virtual office location in the centre of Austin, create a local tracking number and create a landing page or small site for that location. In the UK virtual office addresses are around $75 per month, which is too much for me, but I guess this price would be small for you.

Hope this helps

David