Local Citation with multiple offices
-
We have 5 different offices and each has its own google+ page and yell page. At first they were ranking poorly and the wrong offices were coming up for searches in that town so we change the name to :
BusinessName (Location1)
BusinessName (Location2)Etc. those listing all starting to rank top for searches in Location1 and Location2. We have now been told that it is bad for our overall SEO to have the business name appearing differently in different listings and this led me to look at Moz Local. My question is should I remove the (Location1) from the Google+ business listing so that all our offices have the same name (but obviously different addresses) even though it appears to have a negative impact on rankings?
Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks
-
Nice feedback here. The one thing you've asked about that I don't believe I've seen addressed is your question regarding having geographic modifiers in your business name. You are correct - Google does not want these, unless they are part of your legal business name or DBA.
This was a bit of a goofy situation. Originally, Google's guidelines expressly forbid the use of anything but the legal business name or DBA in the business title. Then, in the fall of 2013, they suddenly changed their policy on this, permitting business owners to add descriptors. So, at that point, lots of business owners jumped on this and added city names and other descriptors. A little over a year later, Google reversed their policy, returning to their original stance on this in which they do not want city names, state names, etc. in the business title unless they are part of the real-world business name.
You can read the guidelines here, under Name: https://support.google.com/business/answer/3038177?hl=en
-
Thank you that is very helpful. I have gone through and upated almost all of the listings but I am having real trouble with Facebook and wonder if you can help.
We have one Facebook page which is linked to our head office address. One Moz Local it says that our other 4 offices do not have facebook pages. Is there no way of adding offices to facebook or do I literally have to create a new facebook page for every office? This seems silly and a bit annoying as we only really want one single facebook page for our company rather than one for each office, but if this is the only way to do it then will the SEO benefit of having a facebook page outweigh the hassle of managing 5 and the confusion it will cause customers?
Thanks
-
Hi there
Take a look at Whitespark - or you can take a look at BrightLocal's list and vet out those that benefit your business most.
If you have addresses for your business dedicated directly to those cities, you should be fine and not needing to add in (city name). Search engines and crawlers are smart enough to pick up on the address and locality of your Google+ and other citations to return them in proper searches.
Let me know if you need any more help!
-
Thanks. Unfortunately I just tried to sign up to Moz Local but it is US only (I am UK based) so it wouldn't let me :(.
Each of our offices has its own google+ page as I couldn't see any way of adding all the offices to 1 page. The business has one name, the name is the same at all offices "Business Name" but each office does have a different address and phone number. Are you saying that it is better for all my google+ pages to be called "BusinessName" rather than "BusinessName (London)" and "BusinessName (Manchester)"?
-
Hi there
If your business locations have separate NAP information, then you will need to do a listing for each location. Moz Local has great bulk upload capabilities so you will be in great hands there.
If all businesses have the same name, make sure that all of those names are correct with different addresses and contact information - this is extremely important as Google and other search engines use this information to verify your business for search. You don't need to delete anything, just update the information in your Google+ page, and also make sure each location has a Google+ Business page - complete with their information and a link to the company website (if they don't have their own site). Make sure that the main Google+ page is verified as well. You may be able to verify all of those pages but that might take some research.
Hope this helps! Good luck!
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
-
Google Local Listing Visibility for Regional Queries
I manage a variety of small local programs that are located in areas that are more known by the region than they are by the town (the Adirondacks and the Catskills to be specific). In the past, the local algorithm understood that when the query was related to the region, it would show a variety of results from that region. It seems that for the Catskills they have changed the algorithm to pinpoint the center of the region and only show results that are in the near vacinity of that pinpoint, rather than a variety of results from the region. The Adirondacks however is still showing a variety of results. For those of you not familiar, the Adirondack are 9,375 square miles and the Catskills are 5,892 square miles and are both very rural mountain regions and popular travel destinations. Google clearly understands that these regions are geographically oriented and shows a local pack for relevant results such as "Catskills Resorts" or "Catskills Restaurants", but over the past few weeks, they have started only showing 2 results for the query Catskills resorts, both located near Shandaken, NY becasue that is where Google has deemed the marker for the Catskills is (https://www.google.com/maps/place/Catskill+Mountains/@42.009289,-74.3996212,14z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x89dc665668f82f31:0x3b012376423b8efa!8m2!3d42.0092908!4d-74.3821116) In reality, there are hundreds of resorts within the Catskills. (Note there is a Catskill, NY within the Catskills, however Google is not even confusing this town with the region). Does anyone have ideas on how to get Google to understand that the Catskills are more than Shandaken, NY? I feel like we suddenly have no hope of ranking locally and most of the businesses I manage are located in very small towns that people are not specifically searching for.
Local Listings | | Your_Workshop0 -
Higher Value: Google Local Listing or .edu link?
A client of mine is putting together a partnership with a local university to offer a certain type of medical test through several of its clinics. They are writing up the contract now and asked me if there is anything they should ask for that would benefit us in our listings. Since we do not have an actual local footprint, my first inclination was to ask for them to help us get verified as owners of "practitioner" local listings at their business addresses (as discussed here). We would provide local numbers that would ring our call center. My thinking is that these listings and backlinks would benefit on searches similar to "medical testing in San Antonio". I have a number of concerns with this track but would love to hear from the community on why or why not this might be the way to go. Another potential option is to ask for a link from the university's website outlining the partnership. Something along the lines of "Our labs have partnered with BIZNAME to provide medical testing in San Antonio to our valued patients." I'd obviously love the EDU links, but I'm hesitant after Overstock's penalty a few years ago to try to set something like that up. I'm not sure which (if either) to ask for in the contract. I'm leaning toward the latter since it seems more in line with a long term strategy, and Google seems to change their treatment of the local listings pretty frequently. However, getting that high visibility real estate in the local listings is really appealing to me. What does everyone think?
Local Listings | | Andrew_Mac0 -
Local Citation Building Services Similar to Yext
I have several clients looking for local submission services similar to Yext (since they are already subsribers). Can anyone suggest a service similar to Yext for an SBO. Likewise, do any of you know any local citation services that are similar to Yext, but specifically for the hotel/hospitality industry? I was considering localeze.com, but I'm skeptical because I believe the citations I will be getting there will be similar to the ones I'm getting on Yext. Any and all suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Local Listings | | maxcarnage1 -
Home Page Online Citations, Blogs, etc
I have 400 backlinks to home page no backlinks to the other 20 pages, i have used yelp, free index and other online citation sources all lead to my home page as do articles, blogs etc. My home page ranks position 1 page 1 google for keyword, should i know start adding backlinks to the other 20 pages via links from blogs, articles, youtube, etc Site is 2 months old thanks
Local Listings | | nickowain0 -
SEO strategy local service area business
Hello, I run a service area business that rents and delivers moving boxes in the San Francisco Bay Area. Our service area spans 75 cities and many millions of people, and several major metropolitan areas, including San Francisco, San Jose and Oakland, but there are also numerous smaller cities that collectively represent a large number of monthly searches. I would like to rank well for the higher level search terms, like “moving boxes” and “moving supplies”, but also city-specific searches like “Moving Boxes San Francisco.” What’s unclear to me is the best strategy for organically ranking on the specific cities in our service area. As I see it, it seems there are several approaches. Is the best approach to either to: A.) Create clean “universal” web pages for pricing, products and landing pages and use blogs to build up content keywords for each of the cities B.) Create 10-15 city-specific web pages with the hope they'll each rank well (e.g. Moving San Jose, Moving in Cupertino) C.) Other? Thanks for your comments.
Local Listings | | bruteboxmoving0 -
Google Local: When moving locations, is a new website/content needed?
I've effectively moved companies before, but I've heard that ranking locally in a competitive market after an address move it is necessary to redesign the entire website/content/domain as Google associates the old website/content/domain with the old location. Is this true? Does anyone have any direct experience with this? NOTE- I have updated citations across the internet and have regular social signals going to the new location, and this has been the case for almost 6 months now.
Local Listings | | mgordon0 -
Why does it take so long for citations to get listed?
I understand that several citation places take over a month to get listed, but I just don't understand why. Granted, there's nothing I can do about it, but I'm just curious what the hold up is based on. Thanks, Ruben
Local Listings | | KempRugeLawGroup0 -
Google+ Local and a Google+ Company Page
I have an established G+ company page but also want a G+ Local listing in order to appear on Google maps. The company does have a physical address, phone number etc. to qualify for a G+ Local listing. No current local listing exists to claim. Should I: a) Switch the currrent G+ company page to be a G+ Local page; or b) Create a new G+ Local page and keep the G+ company page; or c) Ignore G+ Local and create the listing through Google Places Thanks
Local Listings | | bjalc20110