800 number on website
-
Hi,
My client just sent me an 800 number that he would like to use to replace his number on the website. I know that it is best to keep a local phone number on the website and across all citations for NAP/Local SEO reasons.
Is there anywhere that I could still incorporate the 800 number and not have it affect SEO?
Thanks,
Erin
-
Hi Erin, Thanks for clarifying. Technically, this should not cause a problem for Google, but because of their history of issues with phone number confusion, when I'm optimizing a Local site, I put the 800 number in image text only. I don't include it in real text. I guess you could say I take a better-safe-than-sorry approach, just to avoid possible hassles down the road.
-
Miriam,
I am aware that it should be on the google listing. In this case, I am referring to the website. In other words, if the local number is at the top-right of the page, I would list the toll free number below with 'toll free' labeled as an option for the user. The toll free number would also be placed below the NAP in the footer of the page.
Thanks,
Erin
-
Hi Erin,
Do you mean add your toll free number to your website, or to your Google listing? If the first, what do you mean by adding it 'below' the local number? Where on the site? If the latter, yes, you are allowed to list a toll free number.
-
Miriam,
Thanks for the comment.
What about if I add the 888 number below the local number. Will this cause confusion with the search engines?
Thanks,
Erin
-
Hi Erin,
Chris' advice is exactly what I would have given. Go ahead and add the 800 number to the masthead of the website or elsewhere in image text. Just be sure that the indexable text on the website features the local number, and be sure that this local number is the one being used on all of the client's citations. Consistency is king in Local SEO. -
yes. That would work, just to keep with NAP consistency. You don't even necessarily need to put in numbers in the alt-text. If the alt attribute is just text like it says "call in line for Joe's pawn shop" google wouldn't get confused. Then any screen reader would pick up the phone number you left in the footer for the person using it.
-
Interesting suggestion... so the image would display the 800 number, but the alt-text would have the other (NAP) number?
Thanks!
-
I would consider putting it an image with an alt attribute of"phone number for X" , then putting that in the header or somewhere very noticeable. Then still maintain the regular phone number in the footer or somewhere unnoticeable.People will most likely never notice the second phone number
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Disadvantages of Migrating Website to New URL
Hi There, I am currently struggling with the ranking of my website. No matter how many initiatives I try (backlinking, blog commenting, social posting, etc.) I can't seem to make any progression in Google Search. I've done competitive metrics through Open Site Explorer and can't seem to really find the reason why my site is not ranking as well as my competitors. The only one possible glaring element I've thought about is my website URL. This company is in the heating and cooling industry and majority of my competitors have either "heating" or "cooling" or both in their website URL's but mine does not. Does anyone have any thoughts or recommendations on if changing my URL and then redirecting my current URL would be a step in the right direction help me to climb the rankings in Google Search? Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | MainstreamMktg0 -
Seeking guidance setting up hreflang en-gb for international english website and en-us for North American site
Our website is configured like so: MyCompany.com Websites /en-gb - International English /fr-fr /zh-hans /m/en-us - North American site - completely different structure The first three bullets share a Drupal instance where the North American site uses a different PHP framework and has it's own unique look and structure. Currently none of the websites have hreflang tags which means that sometimes when searching in the US the en-gb results creep in. I want to turn on hreflang tags for the international english website (en-gb) but my fear is that Google may not return the en-gb results to English speaking users if they are not in the UK. We want these results to appear for anyone who is not in the US who speaks English. Just a note, Canada is not included in this since they'll be added to the North American site soon and will have their own hreflang tags.
On-Page Optimization | | bearpaw0 -
Best website IA/structure for SEO?
What's the current thinking on the best structure of information on a website for SEO? Structure for visitors can be best achieved through navigation menus, but I am more interested in how I should organise my URL structure so Google can make sense of the depth of my site topics. The website is an Asian travel blog so there are essentially two specific types of post on the site. One type is location specific (may be about an attraction, a city, a region or a country). The other type is general (usually about an aspect of travel like travel cash, visas, scams, etc). At the moment, all my general posts are organised like www.asiantraveltips.com/blog/[post-name]. My location-specific posts are organised like www.asiantraveltips.com/[country]/[region-or-city]/[place-name]/ so that Google can see I have depth of topics about each country and region. But I find it hard to keep consistency in this arrangement of URLs and I don't know if I might be better off to just have everything flat and tagged as a blog post like www.asiantraveltips.com/blog/[country]-[region-city]-[post-name]/? What's best practice these days? How are others organising travel blog websites?
On-Page Optimization | | Gavin.Atkinson0 -
Index / Monthly Click Number
Hi,
On-Page Optimization | | HypermediaSystems
This is a general question, so sorry in advance if inappropriate. Once I was told, in large scale EC / Forum Site,
the following number should be around 1,
and if it is below 1, it is a good sign ... Google Indexed Page Number / Monthly ( 30days ) Click Number I was told this is just a general idea, and real world situation varies, then
if you don't have any standard, this could be a start. (not dogmatic rules, just reference) Does this sounds about right? or do you have any other formula? I was tasked to do the site wide SEO, and diagnose the general state of SEO-wellness/fitness..
and right now, the number is 1.5, so I am about to report we can do more to get more SERP presence or something... If you guys point me relevant blog article / Q&A forum, I would really appreciate. Thanks!0 -
Language for URLs on new international websites
We are due to launch our new site and it will be targeting an international market. We have setup these new sites in the following way www.website.com/fr/content-goes-here www.website.com/es/content-goes-here This has been done in conjunction with setting up the parameters in GWT and making sure it is optimised for the language itself, and that countries search engine. But our web dev team have said that the URLs at the moment will be in english and not the native language, so if you were on the french version of our site you would see the url in english and not french. Will this negatively affect the site for SEO, and who else would think it would be negative from a usability perspective? Any help is appreciated.
On-Page Optimization | | RyanCrawf19840 -
Question about Multi-national Websites
I am about to work on a multi-national site and need some more information about what I should consider regarding: content keyword research anything else My biggest question is regarding content. The company would like a UK version of the site with a different URL, but plan to keep the content essentially the same, with the exception of a few minor details. In this case, would duplicate content still be an issue? If so, any suggestions for working around this? Any strategy information on multi-national sites would be really helpful. Thank you! Erin
On-Page Optimization | | HiddenPeak0 -
Number of characters to duplicate content
I wonder how much characters in a page title so it can be characterized for Googleas duplicate content?
On-Page Optimization | | imoveiscamposdojordao
Sorry for the English, I used Google Translator.
I'm from Brazil 😄
Thanks.0 -
On my site, www.myagingfolks.com, only a small number of my pages appear to be indexed by google or yahoo. Is that due to not having an XML sitemap, keywords, or some other problem?
On my site, www.myagingfolks.com, only a small number of my pages appear to be indexed by google or yahoo. I have thousands of pages! Is that due to not having an XML sitemap, keywords, or some other problem?
On-Page Optimization | | Jordanrg0