SEO For Local Searches
-
I run a driving school of over 100 instructors in the UK. We cover around 60 different areas.
My homepage www.driveJohnsons.co.uk is optimised for 'driving lessons' and 'driving school' search terms mainly.
My area pages are optimised for the same but with the area included ie: Driving Lessons Birmingham or Driving Lessons Leeds
I've taken a drop in many areas...
I've cleaned up my incoming links using the disavow too and upped more relevant links associated with the same industry as myself.
The question i have is should i change my URL's for my area pages from www.driveJohnsons.co.uk/driving-lessons-leeds to: www.driveJohnsons.co.uk/leeds
I've been told stuffing the URL with keywords for an area actually dilutes the strength of my homepage and all the other areas.
At the moment i have 60 area pages with: www.drivejohnsons.co.uk/driving-lessons-area
It use to work a treat, but i've started seeing some companies change their URLs to: /area and excluding the driving-lessons
If i make this change then i'm either going to have to bit the bullet on build up links for those areas again or do a redirect for each area.
I've added most areas to google places and i've added google map to many of area pages too.
If anyone knows a bit more, please let me know...
-
Hi Anthony,
So glad the resource helped!
-
Hi Miriam...
I found the local listings article very interesting, quite frightening in fact. It all makes sense but you have put a lot of things back into perspective.
-
Unfortunately, these kinds of pages, regardless of the URL, can present problems for organic SEO (even when they have some local SEO benefit). If the 60 pages are basically cookie cutter - the same content except for the city/region, then this is the kind of thin content that can cause problems with Panda. The keyword-loaded URL might marginally increase the problem, but I think the risk is real either way.
As Miriam said, if it's a few locations, it's not usually a big deal. Hundreds is definitely a risk. Sixty is a bit borderline, IMO. If your site had 1,000 indexed pages and 60 local pages, probably no big deal. If you have 100 pages total and 60 local, then I'd be concerned. There's no easy solution. Either you: (1)focus the regions and pare it down a bit, or (2) work to create more unique content on each of these pages and make sure they don't look thin.
-
Hi Anthony,
Back again. You might like to check out the good examples of multi-location businesses in this article from Local U:
http://localu.org/blog/designing-business-location-website-pages-part-2-multiple-location-business/
I'm still pretty much sticking to my original suggested URL structure, and I think these examples may be useful in your planning.
-
Hi Anthony,
You've raised an interesting point. I've asked some of our traditional SEO experts if they would weigh in on this with you. My clients typically have just a handful of locations, in which case, it's been a no-brainer for me to go with the /service-city url structure, but I think what you're asking is a valid question. It might still be the best choice to go with this structure, but if you're really concerned about it, you could go with just a /city URL structure for the office landing pages. On the other hand, the URL is only one step in your optimization work. Even if you did just go with the /city structure, wouldn't you be optimizing the tags and text of the pages with the core service phrase? Another thought, too, would be to go with /business-name-city, but when one considers that many business names may contain the core service phrase (Superior Driving Lessons, for example), this brings us back to square one.
When things become messy like this, I try to step back and ask myself if what I'm doing is natural. In this case, I think having pages on your website that specify that driving lessons are offered in X city is totally natural. It's not like you're trying to game anything with explaining this. You're giving an honest representation of what the business does and where it does it. Sometimes, I can over-think things about my clients, in which case, coming back to what is natural and honest can often provide a guiding light.
As I've said, I think your question is worthy of an answer. I've shared my thinking on this, but I really hope you'll get feedback from some of our other staff on this as I believe several heads may be better than one in hashing out the technical specifics of this.
-
Hi Miriam
I've got physical addresses for the areas. A google postcard has been sent to the area to authorise.
I'm not bothered if i rank on the first page locally or organically.
My concern with the URL was if i have 60 URL's saying /driving-lessons-AREA
Would that not dilute dilute each areas strength because of the heavy use of driving lessons and also dilute my home page optimisation which is for the whole of the UK for driving lessons.
As for links, i've had a good clean up around 2 months ago but it seems the disavow tool takes time as these horrible links are still present in my webmaster links to site section.
It's weird i have another website that is spammed to hell, bad links and poor content and that sits on the first page of local listings and i've done no work on it since the penguin update - as there was too much to do and i had other priorities.
All i've tried to do with my main site is good seo practice.
So you think the driving-lessons for every area page shouldn't make a difference ?
-
Hi Anthony,
Are you saying that your business has a physical office in each of these cities? I am assuming this is so, as you are only allowed to create Google+ Local pages for physical offices. If there is some chance that you've done so, lacking physical offices, then you could expect Google to remove these listings if they become aware that they don't represent physical offices.
I see no problem with your URLs. I'm curious as to what you read. Those look like perfectly fine URLs for local landing pages to me.
Are you aware that there is currently a shakeup going on in Google's local results? It's possible that this could account for any fluctuations you are seeing.
If not, it sounds like you may have had some link problems in the past. Is there any chance that you might have run afoul of the Google Places Quality Guidelines in some way? Here's a link to them: https://support.google.com/places/answer/107528?hl=en
Ranking fluctuations happen in Local. Sometimes they are caused by tweaks to Google's algo. Other times, they occur when you are surpassed by a competitors' efforts. And, in some cases, a business drops because of engaging in bad practices. Consider these three scenarios and see if one of them fits your business most closely. Hope this helps.
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
-
Can a Google Local listing be merged with a Goolge+ page?
I have a google+ company page set up and have recently added a Google local listing but have noticed it automatically sets up an additional company G+ page. Is there a way to merge the two? Can not see any reference to this issue on Google Q&A. Thanks, Stacey
Industry News | | skehoe0 -
Great SEO Agency
Hi again all, I have appreciated all the help from the community as we are rebuilding our site. Currently we are looking for a great SEO consulting firm to help us with a number of key SEO related tasks and strategies. I have looked through the recommended list MOZ provides: http://moz.com/community/recommended, but I wanted to get everyone's take on who they thought was the "best" - on that list or otherwise. We are looking for an agency that can help us optimize the site, create an ongoing strategy, help with link building, help with sitemap creation and management (5 million + pages, primarily dynamic) and possibly help with content. Anyone have recommendations they could share? Thanks David
Industry News | | BestRide0 -
Displaying desired domain in search engines
Last year I registered a hosting and domain account for Mummyzboy.tv. Then we added Mummyzboy.com domain to the account. Then the client wanted the .com to be the main domain so we: Made the .com become primary domain for the hosting account. Changed the webmastertool account url to the .com Changed all .tv for .com in the sitemap and re-submit it. It's been a month now since the last mods and over a year the the primary domain was change but Google still displays Mummyzboy.tv in his results, any tips?
Industry News | | escteam0 -
How to pick an SEO pro?
I run a community site that has over 1 million pages of user-generated content specific to a very defined vertical. I recently switch to the Drupal CMS and have paid the price in the search rankings. I need to find someone to help with my site's SEO efforts. What should I be looking for when selecting an SEO professional?
Industry News | | proforums0 -
Punchy Friday: Too much SEO Education?
This is not a question really, just an observation. Yesterday I was listening to "Stuff You Should Know" podcast, and it was about "Tickling". They were addressing how it is impossible to tickle yourself, and they theorized it was because our brain is AWARE that it's your own hand doing the tickling. The first thought that came to my brain was that our brain had put a "NoFolow" link on the tickling page of our brain website when it is from our own hands. I'm reading WAY to much about SEO . . . Happy Friday everyone.
Industry News | | damon12123 -
Anyone else seeing a new google search result look?
Just noticed my google search results page has changed. Anyone else seeing this? Screenshot http://cl.ly/2h0v2i2w191O32082U0T
Industry News | | JohnTurner791 -
Did Google's Farmer Update Positively/Negatively Affect Your Search Traffic?
See the attached image, showing a comparison of SEOmoz.org's search traffic from Google over the past 6 days and the prior week. farmer-3x.gif
Industry News | | randfish2