Local Results for Regional Headquarters
-
A potential client of mine is an appliance and furniture retailer in the region with several brick & mortar stores. They have their headquarters (and main store) located here in town, and then in several towns within an approximately 25 mile radius, they have satellite stores that specialize in certain products.
They see their best results both for hits and for in-store conversions from Google Local results, wherein people search for "Furniture" or "Television Stores" and they appear in the top two or three results. The problem is, the satellite stores have a limited inventory (they are actually brand specific stores operated by the client in a sort of franchise concept. Each one has their own website). The client wants to optimize for the headquarters, and I am considering various options.
I know that since they have a presence in these towns that are within 25 miles, I could set up an "area of service" listing by verifying their other stores as locations for the main store, which would get their central store and main website listed in the local results in those towns. However, if this project comes together well, I will also be doing SEO for their satellite stores. I don't want to list those locations as part of the headquarters store, and then later be unable to list them as their own business locations, as well.
Example:
- Customer in HOMETOWN searches "Furniture" - They get headquarter's local listing and website.
- Customer in SATELLITE AREA A searches "Furniture" - They get satellite's local listing and website.
- Customer in SATELLITE AREA A searches "Television Store" - Satellite Store A doesn't stock TV's, but the HOMETOWN store does. Customer gets headquarter's local listing and website based on "area of service" set up through SATELLITE STORE A.
Is there a way to do this? This isn't black hat at all, even if it seems slightly iffy. The store is still local (just less local than some others), and the company does sell those products. Just not at the satellite locations. Because of the Franchise style of the Satellite stores, they're not allowed to associate those products directly with the satellite stores in any way.
-
Hi 20_Creative,
Linda has given a very helpful and on-target answer here. Your potential client is certainly entitled to having more than one website (though I find that can be a sort of complicated approach vs. simply having a landing page on the website for each store) and a Google Place Page/+ Local page corresponding to each physical store, but each location is only likely to rank for its city of location, so this needs to be understood as you plan your Local SEO approach. I recommend a quick re-fresher on the Google Places Quality Guidelines:
http://support.google.com/places/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=107528
-
"I know that since they have a presence in these towns that are within 25 miles, I could set up an "area of service" listing by verifying their other stores as locations for the main store, which would get their central store and main website listed in the local results in those towns."
Actually that's not how local works and would cause problems on a few levels. The service area setting is only for businesses that go out to the customer - like plumbers. It's not for retail stores.
Plus setting service area does not help the slightest bit as far as ranking in other cities. It only shows customers how far you will drive to service them on-site.
In local if the competition is medium to heavy and decent size town you typically will only rank in the city you are located in. So the main store is not going to rank in city A unless competition is very low. You can test by searching City A + KW and see if only businesses from that city show or if listings show for the city the main office is in.
So best strategy is to optimize each location for their primary categories in the city they are actually in.
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
-
44 terms dropped out of the top 3 results on google this past week.
Can anyone take a look at the site and offer suggestions as to what I can do. My visibility went from 13% to 2% over the past two months. I had 800 organic terms prior to this now I am falling off a cliff. Have no idea what happened. I just switched over to HTTPS 3 weeks ago and it has helped a little.
Algorithm Updates | | Boodreaux1 -
Confuse search engine result
When We check few keywords in Google.com from India, we can see these keywords perfectly listed in the first google search result pages. But when I checked these keywords in USA chorme, Mozilla, internet explorer Brower using one of our USA client pc using remote desktop, we really shocked that these keywords not listed in the USA country. Which means I am an Indian, if I check these keywords from India using google.com, I can see but if I check these keywords in USA country PC browser, I do not see. Please help us
Algorithm Updates | | Intellect0 -
How long does google take to re-ranking pages in results?
I mean when google dance, the pages in results go up and down frequency every minue, but finally your page will rank in any position in google, what is the time when you get another position in google
Algorithm Updates | | engtamous0 -
Should my canonical tags point to the category page or the filter result page?
Hi Moz, I'm working on an ecommerce site with categories, filter options, and sort options – teacherexpress.scholastic.com. Should I have canonical tags from all filter and sort options point to the category page like gap.com and llbean.com? or have all sort options point to the filtered page URL like kohls.com? I was under the impression that to use a canonical tag, the pages have to have the same content, meaning that Gap and L.L. Bean would be using canonical tags incorrectly. Using a filter changes the content, whereas using a sort option just changes the order. What would be the best way to deal with duplicate content for this site? Thanks for reading!
Algorithm Updates | | DA20130 -
Is it wise to conduct a link building campaign to a Google+ Local page?
Is it wise, while doing a link building campaign to not only focus on the main website target page, but also the Google+ Local page? Here are two strategies I was thinking of using: 1. Conduct a city specific link building campaign to direct traffic to the location specific page on the main website AND the Google+ Local page. 2. Use the main website to direct traffic to each cities specific Google+ Local page. Does it make sense to drive links to a Google+ Local page? It does to me, but I haven't seen anything written about that yet... or perhaps I've just missed it along the way. I'd love to hear the communities thoughts. Thanks! Doug
Algorithm Updates | | DougHoltOnline0 -
Google+ Local Optimization
What are the recommended ways to optimize the Google+ places page for clients. Do services like louder voice and customer lobby help? I'd love to get the group's opinion on what strategies are working for them on local optimization.
Algorithm Updates | | SEO5Team0 -
Ranking factors for national and local
What SEO impact factors am I missing if I am ranked 1st on Google for a keyword, but not ranked local search? The keyword being setup like {"company industry" "location" }. Its ranked 4th when searched on google and the location is specific to the location in the keyword. I've tried to varify that all of my citations are correct and identical. When I compare my sites Domain Authority and links to its competitors, I should be dominating that search. If you guys have any incite it would be greatly appreciated. MADD DOGG
Algorithm Updates | | MaddDogg0 -
If a page one result for a keyword is mostly directories, do I have a chance to rank for this keyword?
I feel like although directories carry a lot of weight and links, I'd think that my client would be able to gain a top position, since none of the others are competitor pages, nor are the directories engaging.
Algorithm Updates | | randallseo0