Is getting a top position in a local results block acheiveable if you are outside of the central zone ?
-
Most of the keywords / phrases we are targeting have the city (London) appended to it ie. service name London, service name in London etc.
The business of the site we are working on is located in London, but not in central London. Because of this i think the site is not being ranking as well as it could be (compared to other sites that in the centre or nearer to the centre with seemingly lower profiles, including have no reviews on their Google + Pages).
The site itself is relatively strong fluctuating between 3rd and 5th spot for the target phrases in the organic listings, but because of the local block which sits under position 2 our site always towards the bottom of the first page.
We've submitted the site to all the relevant local directories and listings sites, got 3 google reviews on the Plus profile and added the correct local html schema markup to any of our sites pages where our address is mentioned, but still we are sitting at around #12 on the local listings block (when you click Map results for...) at the bottom of the 7 local listings. So the site dosnt seem far off being on the front page, but I feel ive exhausted the optimisation i can do, any ideas how i can make any gains in these local listings ?
-
Hi Sam,
You're getting some great feedback from the community - I have a couple of thoughts to add. While the concept of a city centroid has long existed, this has gradually given way to the concepts of:
-
An industry centroid
-
The user as the centroid
You can read more about the industry centroid concept here: http://localsearchforum.catalystemarketing.com/google-local-important/8906-google-local-centroid-not-city-center-affects.html
And I highly recommend watching the Bright Local webinar in which some expert Local SEOs weigh in on key local search ranking factors and touch on this emerging concept of the user as the new centroid:
http://www.brightlocal.com/2014/11/13/insidelocal-webinar-local-ranking-factors-discussed/
I hope these are helpful tips!
-
-
Sam,
Here are a few thoughts.
"We've submitted the site to all the relevant local directories and listings sites" - If you haven't already, I'd use Moz Local or White Spark, just to make sure you really have hit them all. I used to have a list of the ones I considered important, but was blown away by all the other listings available, after visiting those tools.
Also, make absolutely certain you have the exact same name, address and phone number in all your listings. I've seen slight variations lead to long-term issues for small businesses.
That said, you're not the first person who has voiced frustration over not being near enough to the centroid, being the issue.
Is your address prominent on your website as well, ideally listed on every page in some form if it's a highly localized page? I've heard (not sure it's true) that Google is looking more and more at your own website property to impact how well Google+ does in search rankings.
You might also want to look at Moz's latest local search engine ranking factors report. I'm sure that might spur some other ideas.
-
Sam -
Quick question: have you changed your Google+ listing to a Service-area business?
If not, you'll want to set up the business so it not based on the physical location / address (i.e. your business address in Sufolk), but serves a greater area (i.e. London). In order to do this, you will need to set up your Google+ account as a Service-area business on Google.
This is perfect for a trainer, local plumber, tree trimmer or construction crew that works at customer's locations (either homes or businesses) vs. your home address.
My recommendation would be to go here:
https://support.google.com/business/answer/3038163?hl=en... and set up your service areas based on the zip codes or cities that the business serves.
You also have the option to check or uncheck, "I serve customers at my business address."
You might need to go through another round of verification to make this change, however.
I hope this helps!
Thanks,
- Jeff
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
-
Disconnect MOZ Local and Google My Business
I've had problems with one of our eight branch locations when I connected GMB to Moz Local about a year ago. The location was suspended for being a duplicate. I would like to sever the connection so I could keep Moz Local live but at least temporarily delete the suspended Google My Business. Also, if you might have any guides or tutorials on performing this task it would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.
Local Listings | | gallowaywebteam0 -
How do I treat multiple buildings on the same college campus on Google for local SEO?
Should I delete them? Simply give them a different address like "City, State, Zip"? I see the benefit of having key buildings on campus in Google Maps, but I don't want those to affect my accuracy score and, thus, my local rankings for SEO.
Local Listings | | GabeGibitz1 -
Unique Local Citation Descriptions?
Hello! As SEO’s we have always understood that it’s best practice to craft a number of unique descriptions when submitting to local directories, rather than using one generic description across all directories. However, if we look at this logically; An average business owner (even if Google didn't exist) wouldn't bother to vary descriptions. They would have a generic brand template and simply submit the same description to each directory. What do you think? Is having unique descriptions a MUST for Local Business Citations, or is it ok to use one generic one? I look forward to hearing your thoughts, Lee.
Local Listings | | Webpresence0 -
How do I get Google Knowledge Graph to display my schema snippet added on our official website?
Right now, Google is connecting our company google query to a Knowledge Graph that contains Wikipedia information, and a map to the location of our place but with the name of the company spelled wrong. It also says 'Claim this business'. I would like to override this. We have a G+ page for our company , and as well i have added a Schema to display the information correctly in the Knowledge graph. But these changes have not seemed to help to change the knowledge graph. Any help or ideas would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
Local Listings | | uthealthsa0 -
Anyone know how to filter by location-neutral results?
Google dropped the ability to filter your search results by location, and it's now using your precise location to give results. Here's an article from Search Engine Land that covers the removal of location setting: http://searchengineland.com/google-drops-change-location-search-filter-from-search-results-237247 Anyone know a work around for getting location-neutral results? Before I was using "Location: United States" to find unbiased results, but that's not an option any more.
Local Listings | | Gorilla760 -
Local Search and Schema.org - Do I need to tag up the "same as" Property to all my citations to help with local rankings?
Hi All, We have implemented Schema.og on our website and this also includes the local business schema for all of our branches.However I've read an article (see below ) which says we should also be doing "same as " property and linking this to ALL of our citations such as google plus page , yelp , bing places, city search etc etc as this will help with citations. I am wondering if anyone has done this ? - And if so , has this helped with local rankings etc - I don't really want to invest the extra costs to get this done if I can't find anywhere that says its made a difference - The article from whitespark - says - "when you create new citations for your business (or for your client’s), it’s a waiting game hoping that Google and the other search engines will find your new citations quickly and make the connection between those listings, the business, and the website. The “sameAs” property can help make that process much quicker _and _easier. Schema.org explains that the “sameAs” property is used along with the “URL of a reference Web page that unambiguously indicates the item's [or business’] identity.” By using the “sameAs” property in your NAP schema markup, you can tell search engines that the business you’ve marked up is the same one found at a certain citation URL Of course, Google+ isn’t the only important citation source. There’s also Bing Places, Facebook, Yelp, Citysearch and a few others. The nice thing about many schema.org properties is that you can use them multiple times in your markup." I am wondering what peoples thoughts were and whether they has implemented this and if so , did it help ? thanks Pete | [sameAs](http://schema.org/sameAs) | URL | URL of a reference Web page that unambiguously indicates the item's identity. E.g. the URL of the item's Wikipedia page, Freebase page, or official website. |
Local Listings | | PeteC121 -
Google Local Feeds - Cover & Profile Photos??
Hello - I am trying to help a biz w several dozen locations with their Google+ local pages. However, I'm not sure automation is the best solution: https://support.google.com/business/answer/3370250?hl=en In particular: Can you stipulate a Cover Photo and Profile Photo via Google's automated feeds? I see that you can add "images", but not much more than that. Do we have to manually upload cover photo/avatar info? If it turns out we have to, IMHO would be totally worth it even if time-consuming, but just trying to figure out the balance between automation vs manual factors.
Local Listings | | mirabile0 -
Local SEO Benefit
Hi Our company is looking to increase our local SEO footprint and wondering what is the industry average for traffic increase to quantify investment. Can’t really find anything online. I understand this can be very subjective in relation to market size, competition, localization, etc but just trying to get a sense of opportunity if we cross our t’s and dot our i’s, what's the potential? Context: We’re a national brick and mortar with eComm. We’ve already done a lot of leg work in optimizing our NAP but very little citation building/claiming. Please provide resources for stats Thanks for any input. Cheers
Local Listings | | WMCA0