Weird: Local Landing Page Not Showing In "City + Brand" Search Query
-
Hi Mozzers,
I've noticed something strange that I can't quite wrap my head around. I'm hoping it's an easy fix and I'm just overlooking something.
Backstory: I'm managing all things digital for a local flooring retailer that has 6 showrooms in the region. I've done basic local SEO - local landing pages with proper markup, GMB set up and verification, Moz Local scores are in the 80% range for each location and improving steadily, etc. However, one of my locations is way behind all of the others in both organic searches and the map.
Recently, I did a search for "city + brand" for this particular location in an incognito window and the page came up on the 4th page. When I perform the same search for any of the other locations, the respective landing page come up 1st or 2nd along with the homepage. I even searched using the title tag as well as a few more specific searches and still nothing on the first page.
This is weird, right? Has anyone experienced this before? Search Console came back perfect, so no penalties and it's definitely being indexed.
For reference, the page I am referring to is http://www.nextdayfloors.net/locations/columbia/ and the location query I am using is "Columbia, MD"
Any help is much appreciated!
Thanks!
Tim
-
Hey Thomas,
By a happy coincidence, I just happened to write a blog post on this here recently:
https://moz.com/blog/overcoming-your-fear-of-local-landing-pages
Hope it gives you some new ideas!
-
Thanks for all of your insight! The company rebranded from Bill's in 2014, so we're in the process of cleaning up the citations. It does take a lot of time for 6 locations!
One question regarding the content on the landing pages... what else would you recommend adding? I already have 300+ word body copy, hours, directions, map, photos, store manager, etc.
Thanks again!
-
Hey Thomas!
-
Perfectly fine that they kept the number as long as you are working on getting every possible old citation cleaned up to reflect the new address/new number. Moz Local will help with this, but you may need to do some manual work as well. Good to know that no locations are sharing phone numbers. That can be a disaster!
-
Regarding duplicate content, you might want to check out this post, https://moz.com/blog/how-to-defeat-duplicate-content-next-level but if you've only got 6 locations, I would honestly recommend also doing a manual read-through of each of the 6 landing pages to be sure they are actually unique and helpful (i.e. not just swapping out city names or making a minimum effort in some way).
-
Good idea to make the Locations its own link in the menu. That could help!
-
Getting duplicates like these resolved is going to be very important: https://moz.com/local/details/JTI1NUIlMjUyMk5leHQlMjUyMERheSUyNTIwRmxvb3JzJTI1MjIlMjUyQyUyNTIyMjEwNDUlMjUyMiUyNTJDJTI1MjJOZXh0JTI1MjBEYXklMjUyMEZsb29ycyUyNTIyJTI1MkMlMjUyMjY1MDUlMjUyMERvYmJpbiUyNTIwUm9hZCUyNTIyJTI1MkMlMjUyMjIxMDQ1JTI1MjIlMjUyQyUyNTIyNDEwNzQ0ODk1MCUyNTIyJTI1NUQ=
The shared phone number between your business and a business called Bill's Carpet Fair is concerning. I don't know if this stems from re-branding or something else, but this would be worth doing a full citation audit for to be sure Google is convinced that your business ... and not Bill's ... is located at that phone number.
-
On these pages, I recommend that you put the business name with the rest of the NAP. Right now, it looks like the name of this business is Columbia, MD Flooring Showroom and you have the address separate below with no name.
-
You might also want to consider putting the 6 locations in the footer.
-
Finally, the content on the landing pages is a decent start, but there's room for improvement, and if you want to convince Google that a landing page is more worthy of top billing than a homepage, assessing and improving the content could be an important step!
-
-
Thanks for checking in, Miriam,
-
So, what is interesting here is this store moved locations in 2014, but kept the same phone number. I've been using Moz Local to help clean this up. Other than that, absolutely not sharing numbers.
-
Yes, it's all unique as far as I'm concerned. Is there a good way to check this?
-
This is something I've heard a few times. We will be adding a Locations link to the top of the page (third nav where Specials live now). It's currently accessible via Ways To Show > In Store
Thanks!
-
-
Hi Thomas!
I see what you mean regarding the homepage rather than the landing page coming up, though the knowledge panel to the right is correct for this location. 3 Quick Questions:
-
Are you sharing phone numbers between any of the locations
-
Is the text on all of your landing pages unique, or is any of it duplicate text?
-
I am not finding an obvious option in your menu to see all of your locations on the website. Something like 'Cities We Serve' in the top menu. What's going on with that?
-
-
There's a lot that could be going on here. How are the citations for each of the locations? Also have you configured the local schema on each local landing page? I wrote an article here on Moz a while back that I think might be helpful:
https://moz.com/ugc/get-your-multilocation-business-ranking-in-multiple-cities-with-one-domain-21815
-
Hi Tim,
I'm seeing much stronger results for my searches on this end. With a query of "columbia next day floors" I have the correct in the 4th organic position. With a query of "columbia md flooring showroom" I'm seeing that same page in position 8.
I will say that this location appears to have tougher competition than the others. Reviews on your Google Local page will help close the gap. Also, it is possible to get the site-wide footer location text linked?
Happy Optimizing!
Lindsay -
However, when I put 'next day floors' in Moz's local search I see you may have some duplicates. Google could be choosing what they perceive is the best instance of the query in some searches and you may be seeing that listing being pushed further down in the SERPs.
-
When I ran a similar query the Columbia, MD location shows up on the first page. It is the Dobbin rd location.
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
-
How to Do Local Keyword Research
I am familiar with how to do regular keyword research, finding opportunity based on competition, search volume, etc. For local search, do I go to all the trouble of finding hidden gems or just pick higher volume terms that have local intent. For instance: A search for "physical therapy" is a high volume term that Google thinks has local intent. If i pick a low volume national term, that has 11-50 avg searches per month, I have lower chances...and even less chance that someone is searching locally. What say ye? Nails
Local Website Optimization | | matt.nails0 -
Ranking nationally but not locally
Hi everyone, I'm working with a client that has a strange situation. He's ranking for his target keyword on a national level but when searching locally, he's in the 100s (see attached). Any idea what could be going on here? He did have an old domain that got hacked that is redirecting to his current domain. Thanks, Tim lmSSXdT
Local Website Optimization | | TimKelsey0 -
Is this local guide best to follow?
Today I found below guide, Is this best guide to follow for the website and service pages content, layout design? http://www.ducttapemarketing.com/blog/guide-to-local-seo/
Local Website Optimization | | Michael.Leonard0 -
Multiple location pages are they bad?
Hello all, I am research some competitors of a client of mine. My client specializes in H.P. printer repair and over the last 8 years has lost market shares to the competition. I want to reclaim market share. As I was searching some of the service companies many have page that list multiple towns that they service. here is an example. http://printerrepairservice.com/locations-we-service/ Should I be recommending this to my client? To me it seems like a spam keyword process. I know an employee of this particular company and he say their online business is booming. I want my clients to boom too! What are your thoughts on these location type pages?
Local Website Optimization | | donsilvernail0 -
Structuring URLs of profile pages
First of all, I want to thank everyone for the feedback that I received on the first question. My next question has to do with the URL structure of personal trainer profiles pages on www.rightfitpersonaltraining.com. Currently, the structure of each trainer profile page is "www.rightfitpersonaltraining.com/personal-trainers/trainer/" and at the end I manually add the trainer's "city-firstname-lastinitial". Would it be to my benefit to have the developers change the structure so that the trainer profile URLs are "www.rightfitpersonaltraining.com/city-personal-trainers/trainername"? That way, each trainer profile would link directly to the trainer's city page as opposed to the general "personal-trainers" page. I don't mind paying a little extra to go back into the site to make these changes, as I think they would benefit the search ranking for each city page.
Local Website Optimization | | mkornbl20 -
Disproportionate Links to Home Page
I'm a professional magician and mentalist who travels nationally for corporate events, social functions, and trade shows. Unfortunately, the landing pages are all for different venues and locations, but the product stays the same. How do you recommend optimizing for somebody whose product is essentially themselves? The pages have similar content, videos, etc., so I don't want to be dinged for duplicate content.
Local Website Optimization | | KevinViner0 -
Best way to remove spammy landing pages?
Hey Mozzers, We recently took over a website for a new client of ours and discovered that their previous webmaster had been using a WordPress plugin to generate 5,000+ mostly duplicated local landing pages. The pages are set up more or less as "Best (service) provided in (city)" I checked Google Webmaster Tools and it looks like Google is ignoring most of these spammy pages already (about 30 pages out of nearly 6,000 are indexed), but it's not reporting any manual webspam actions. Should we just delete the landing pages all at once or phase them out a few (hundred) at a time? Even though the landing pages are mostly garbage, I worry that lopping off over 95% of a site's pages in one fell swoop could have other significant consequences. Thanks!
Local Website Optimization | | BrianAlpert780 -
Local SEO: City & County Pages
I'm working on developing some local pages for an HVAC company. They cover two counties, so I was planning on having two county pages, then linking them to individual city pages to keep the menu simpler and not cluttering it up with a couple dozen city pages for people to slog through. Has anybody ever done county pages before for local SEO? Or at least seen them? Just curious to see if there's any real benefit overall for have separate county pages, or if I should just stick to city pages.
Local Website Optimization | | ChaseMG0