Descriptions missing from rankings associated with Google Place pages.
-
Can anyone help me figure out why my rankings that are associated with Google Place pages are missing descriptions? I have a number one result for the top searched keyword in my category but it just doesn't look the same without a description and I'm sure it's affecting CTR too.
-
Hi Michael,
It really depends on how Google decides to display the local results which can vary based on the keyword being used. The most common way of displaying results is called the 7-Pack (see example) in which no description is used for the map listings.
Occasionally, you will see a local search result that does include a description, but this usually only happens when the search phrase is specific to a single business (see example).
So it really depends on Google and there isn't a way you can force them to show a description. It all comes down to the keyword you're ranking for. On the upside, Google Places pages tend to a get a lot of attention when they appear in organic search results. Here an interesting article by Dr. Pete about it. Please note that although some of the examples Dr. Pete uses do show descriptions, Google has since changed the way they typically display local search results.
Hope this helps!
Tim
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
-
Pages with duplicate meta descriptions
We have around 17 pages have underscores in the URL. From the 17 pages, we have changed 3 pages URL for example if the url is test_sample_demo.html, we have changed as test-sample-demo.html After the updates, we have made redirect as follows Redirect 301 test_sample_demo.html test-sample-demo.html Presently google webmaster tool shows as "Pages with duplicate meta descriptions" & "Pages with duplicate title tags" for changed pages How to fix this. Please help us
Technical SEO | | Intellect0 -
How fast should a page load to get a Green light at Googles PageSpeed?
So, trying to get e big e-commerce site to work on their page loading issuses. Their question left me without an answer, so how fast should a site be, so that it will get a Green light at the Googles Page Speed test? Is there a number in seconds? Do we know that?
Technical SEO | | ziiiva1230 -
Why Google ranks a page with Meta Robots: NO INDEX, NO FOLLOW?
Hi guys, I was playing with the new OSE when I found out a weird thing: if you Google "performing arts school london" you will see w w w . mountview . org. uk at the 3rd position. The point is that page has "Meta Robots: NO INDEX, NO FOLLOW", why Google indexed it? Here you can see the robots.txt allows Google to index the URL but not the content, in article they also say the meta robots tag will properly avoid Google from indexing the URL either. Apparently, in my case that page is the only one has the tag "NO INDEX, NO FOLLOW", but it's the home page. so I said to myself: OK, perhaps they have just changed that tag therefore Google needs time to re-crawl that page and de-index following the no index tag. How long do you think it will take to don't see that page indexed? Do you think it will effect the whole website, as I suppose if you have that tag on your home page (the root domain) you will lose a lot of links' juice - it's totally unnatural a backlinks profile without links to a root domain? Cheers, Pierpaolo
Technical SEO | | madcow780 -
How do I influence what page on my site google shows for specific search phrases?
Hi People, My client has a site www.activeadventures.com. They provide adventure tours of New Zealand, South America and the Himalayas. These destinations are split into 3 folders in the site (eg: activeadventures.com/new-zealand, activeadventures.com/south-america etc....). The actual root folder of the site is generic information for all of the destinations whilst the destination specific folders are specific in their information for the destination in question. The Problem: If you search for say "Active New Zealand" or "Adventure Tours South America" our result that comes up is the activeadventures.com homepage rather than the destination folder homepage (eg: We would want activeadventures.com/new-zealand to be the landing page for people searching for "active new zealand"). Are there any ways in influence google as to what page on our site it chooses to serve up? Many thanks in advance. Conrad
Technical SEO | | activenz0 -
I have custom 404 page and getting so much 404 error on Google webmaster, what should i do?
I have a custom 404 page with popular post and category links in the page, everyday i have 404 crawl error on webmaster tools, what should i do?
Technical SEO | | rimon56930 -
Can you have the same brand name for two distinct Google Places Pages
Hello Mozers I'd like to know if two existing GPP can have the same name 'spabycar'. At present 'mobile nail technician' based in W1 and 'spabycar 'WD' are ranking (ironically the one that has the old brand name is very high!). Both need to be 'spabycar' If this is feasible, is there a down side, and is there a good tutorial source for an aspirant to follow? Thanks Catherine
Technical SEO | | catherine-2793880 -
Duplicate Meta Descriptions From Pages That Don't Exist
Hi Guys I am hoping someone can help me out here. I have had a new site built with a unique theme and using wordpress as the CMS. Everything was going fine but after checking webmaster tools today I noticed something that I just cannot get my head around. Basically I am getting warnings of Duplicate page warnings on a couple of things. 1 of which i think i can understand but do not know how to get the warning to go. Firstly I get this warning of duplicate meta desciption url 1: / url 2: /about/who-we-are I understand this as the who-we-are page is set as the homepage through the wordpress reading settings. But is there a way to make the dup meta description warning disappear The second one I am getting is the following: /services/57/ /services/ Both urls lead to the same place although I have never created the services/57/ page the services/57/ page does not show on the xml sitemap but Google obviously see it because it is a warning in webmaster tools. If I press edit on services/57/ page it just goes to edit the /services/ page/ is there a way I can remove the /57/ page safely or a method to ensure Google at least does not see this. Probably a silly question but I cannot find a real comprehensive answer to sorting this. Thanks in advance
Technical SEO | | southcoasthost0 -
Why won't google rank my homepage
I have a site that ranks high on the first page for it's main keyword at both Bing and Yahoo but horribly at Google. It's a domain I recently acquired and am in the process of optimizing. My goal is to improve the relevancy for the site in Google so that the site shows up better for it's main keyword. With that said I've been working on building valuable links to the page and I would like some opinions on why the homepage is not ranking for the main keyword. Instead I have a junky content page that is ranking for the term. So in the event that you have a exact match domain showing up very high in Bing and Yahoo but not in Google for the homepage, what factors would you look at? Add in the complexity that a page other than the homepage is making grounds on the exact match keyword having moved up from "not in the top 100" to the 50's, what's my best solution to ranking the homepage? The site is optimized well and most inbound links predominantly point to the homepage.
Technical SEO | | DotCar0