Killing it in Yahoo/Bing...Sucking it in Google. What gives?

[Survive-a-Storm]

Our website http://www.survive-a-storm.com has historically performed well in Google for the search terms "storm shelters" and "tornado shelters."  Our geographic focus is nationwide, but we are particularly interested in ranking up for Oklahoma.

Right now we are hovering at about the third position in Yahoo/Bing, and in some geographic areas (i.e., as selected in Google's search settings) we are doing reasonably to quite well for these terms in Google (i.e., first page).

In Oklahoma, though, we are holding steady around positions 20-25.  We have just changed the title tag on our home page, cleaned up a bit of on-page optimization, and are going to work on getting some more optimized content on the page.

We are outperforming the competition on Domain Authority (38) and Page Authority (46), and as far as I can tell, other key metrics are respectable.  Our social isn't bad, but could always use improvement--which we are working on.

Any idea why we might be lagging so badly in Google?  Any help would be appreciated!

[MiriamEllis]

Hi Audra,

You've categorized your question as a local question, and in visiting your website, I see you have 4 physical locations listed, though precedence is being given to your location in Thomasville, GA, the partial NAP of which appears in the footer of the website.

It's important to understand that, of all of the search engines, Google has the most sophisticated approach to how it assesses and displays local businesses. Right now, the Local SEO of your website is not being handled properly and my guess is that it is thus not sending the proper signals to Google to achieve the visibility you'd love to achieve.

I can't provide a full audit here, within the scope of Q&A, but I can point out a few quick things to you.

1). Your footer has a section labeled 'Our Locations', listing the names of 4 cities in 4 states. Yet, within the footer, the only NAP being provided is for the Thomasville location. And, that Thomasville NAP is only partial.

2. Your NAP would be deemed 'partial', because the Thomasville, GA, location is being listed with a toll free number instead of a local one. Local SEO revolves around local area code phone numbers. So, we don't have complete NAP for this location, and when I visit the 4  location landing pages by clicking on the links in the footer, none of these are listing complete NAP either. In fact, there is no mention of a phone number at all on these pages. These pages are not giving Google the signals they expect and need.

3. There is nothing in the footer to indicate that Oklahoma is of premium importance to the company. Despite the fact that you've optimized the title tag of the homepage to mention Oklahoma, what Google is finding in the footer would signal to them that Georgia is really your most important location.

So, there are discrepancies and missing data here. You need to have a unique local area code phone number for each unique physical office you occupy. Seeing the way the site is set up, I am wondering how the company has handled its Local SEM, in general, especially in terms of the development of Google+ Local pages and citation building. Without those local phone numbers, the company's hands are tied in Google Land and you're unlikely to achieve the visibility you desire without complying with Google's basic standards for local businesses.

If the company has not hired a Local SEO to consult with previously, I would highly suggest finding a top tier one who can dig into the site and the off-site Local SEM that's been done and to analyze problems and develop a marketing strategy. There are about 20 questions for which answers are needed and, hopefully, by consulting with a pro on this, you can discover both your issues and your opportunities.

Hope this helps!

[Survive-a-Storm]

Thanks, Jane (and Eric, too):

We haven't actively made any effort to build links, so we haven't actively been doing anything that would attract undesirable backlinks.  I guess we'll have to comb through and maybe disavow any that are questionable.

Wouldn't any sort of  penalty affect rankings more-or-less uniformly, though?  That is why I was leaning toward social/local to explain the disparity in performance from one geographical location to another.

Thanks for the assist!

[JaneCopland]

Hi Audra,

Eric is right - it's generally easier to rank in Bing, with its engine behaving somewhat like we remember Google being a few years ago. The standard for links is a little lower, and if you have questionable links in your backlink profile, you're unlikely to get away with it in Google the way you can in other engines. It's not uncommon to see results like this, so I'd start looking closely at your backlinks and perhaps look at taking down those that potentially violate Webmaster Guidelines.

[GlobeRunner]

Audra,

One of the big differences between Bing and Google is how they deal with links. Google analyzes links to your site a lot more than Bing does, and is "pickier" when it comes to the types of links and how they're obtained. I would review all of the links to your website and make sure that they're all "high quality" links. A quick analysis of the links to your site shows some undesirable links pointing to the site that violate Google's webmaster guidelines.