SEO planning: Franchise/multiple local sites
-
I am in the planning stages of franchising a cleaning business and was wondering if anyone had some ideas on SEO strategy. If money were no object and I had a team of hundreds of copywriters at my disposal, would the ultimate solution be to have the following sort of URL structure www.cleanbiz.co.uk/city within which there are numerous www.cleanbiz.co.uk/city/local-town pages?
If this is the best strategy then is it worthwhile to begin work towards ranking for cities and local towns within them prior to actually operating there? I understand that lack of physical presence will penalize me in terms of local search but would a lack of physical address and phone number render any foundation work pointless (for example, prior to having any franchises in say London, would it be worth while building quality content and links on a www.cleaningbiz.co.uk/london page, and then www.cleaningbiz.co.uk/london/notting-hill, alongside a blog and so on?)
Interested to understand the best way to go about this given the enormity of the campaign!
Thanks
-
All of the sites you mentioned seem to do this primarily through user generated content (ie reviews). This path makes sense as it is "unique and providing value." It looks like reviews may just be the table stakes to play this game at scale.
I do like how thumbtack created some localized content here http://www.thumbtack.com/tx/houston/#/2014/1. That looks like something I could use for inspiration.
-
If that content is unique and providing value to searchers, then that's exactly what's working well in the Hummingbird/Pigeon SERPs these days. Many national directories with trusted brands are outranking individual small businesses. Check Yelp, Avvo, TripAdvisor, Thumbtack, Angie's List, etc.
-
We're talking about something along the lines of http://www.searshomeservices.com/pa/philadelphia-air-conditioning-repair? The way this site does it seems quite redundant - creating lots of duplicate content that I can't imagine Google likes. Have you ever seen someone do this at scale properly? If so can you show an example?
Thank you for the help David!
-
No, I'd strongly recommend a page (or set of pages) about the location that lives on your primary domain. Non-physical locations can only rank organically, and you're much more likely to rank organically using the strength of a parent domain.
-
Would you recommend creating the dedicated website, even if there is no physical local location? Thanks David!
-
I generally agree with Matt about the two pronged approach. If money is no object, build out a completely dedicated www.cleaningbiznottinghill.co.uk website for Local results, but for organic results, a directory like
cleaningbiz.co.uk/locations/london/nottinghill
is likely to rank better, at least in the current Hummingbird iteration.
-
"If money were no object" then the best plan would be a two-prong approach. Your prong would be #1. And cleanbizCITY.co.uk would be the second prong.
This would give you the possibility of not only multiple results in each page 1 but a dedicated landing page to build maps/NAP and local SEO to as well.
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
-
No Appreciable Effect of Moz Local?
I've been using Moz Local for over a year and these are the results for $129?! ... https://moz.com/products/local/check-listing?ubrecheckid=152151793&ubrechecktoken=zc2pg9Ic2qkADDYL Please advise.
Local SEO | | ianpritchardphd0 -
How to go about SEO when the content on all the pages is in a regional language (with its own script which is non-roman) but majority of searches are in the same language but roman script?
For example, the entire content is in an Indian language called Gujarati and the script is also Gujarati. However, when I did a keyword research, I found that majority of the searches are in Gujarati langugage by roman script e.g. "gujarati sahitya" meaning Gujarati literature. Any ideas would be appreciated.
Local SEO | | Tumul0 -
Outbound Links for Local SEO
I am working on building an area guide page for a local hotel website. The hotel itself has a lot to offer in forms of on-site entertainment and they are concerned about sending people away from their website (and their business). However, it's also important to write about the area and local attractions in close proximity to their hotel for many reasons, including building local authority. Is there any benefit to adding links to the Google My Business/map listing of the local attractions? Or can we just simply not include external links?
Local SEO | | triveraseo2 -
Spaces between Letters and Numbers SEO question
This is a fun one - Example: Mercedes Benz is pushing to have all of there vehicle models to coincide with the world branding such as the "C300" is supposed to be "C 300" and the "E300" is supposed to be "E 300"... I have a few issues here as when I use Voice Search for "Mercedes Benz C 300" there is no way (that I know of) to add a space between the number and letter. In addition, when searching for the "C 300 for sale" Google corrects the text with "Did you mean: C300 for sale". I am seeking a way to accommodate both versions of the models WITHOUT adding the both C300 and C 300...etc. to the text on web pages. OR will Google eventually change the model names over time as Mercedes-Benz regulates the new U.S. naming convention. Tough question - any thoughts? Thank you for your help -
Local SEO | | MBS-MBA0 -
Moz Local Reporting - What are you doing?
I am a pro when it comes to reporting for paid search. However we came out with a new local product and use Moz Local. What are you doing for reporting? Automated reports? Are you tracking progress over time? Is there a reporting application that automates the process?
Local SEO | | PSLab0 -
Rank Locally and Globally (or at least Nationally)
I work with an interior design whom I've persuaded to purchase a virtual street address in the town she wanted to work in years ago. She has a Skokie, IL business address that has been claimed and confirmed across the internet. Now, she is growing and wants her new website to not only be optimized for the more affluent areas of Chicago but she also would like to gain Global notice, (I'd settle for National). My problems: She doesn't want to purchase a street address in Chicago because it is a pain to go get her mail. What do I do about all her directory listings and review sites that have her located in Skokie if I can persuade her to get a Chicago address? Do I leave the Skokie address and add more content targeting keyword phrases with Chicago? What should be my initial focus here? I feel it is a smaller target and less competition to go after Chicago but she wants to start spreading her wings and work all over the world. Help!!
Local SEO | | JanetJ0 -
Ranking http://www when its forwarded to https://www
Hello, I have a question about the best practices for assigning "https" and "http" versions. We have added https://www.mysite.com in Google WMT and was ranking. However I noticed with my other tools, that http://www.mysite.com version had better anchor text distribution and also had better Trust Flow were as the https://www.mysite.com version had no trust flow at all. Can I assign http://www.mysite.com in Google WMT and still have it do a 301 Redirect to https://www.mysite.com. This way I can capitalize on the better anchor text profile and trust flow, and still rank properly? Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks
Local SEO | | EVERWORLD.ENTERTAIMENT0 -
Local SEO?
Hello everyone, I've just been through the Moz Local learning area, which is pretty informative. However, a lot of it seems like good practice for general online marketing (mobile friendly websites, goals per page...). I'm new to all this - am I missing the point? William
Local SEO | | Seabrook0