Links for Local Search: Relevance or Proximity?
-
Hi Mozzers,
In the best situation links for a local business should be relevant and come from a local organization, but this is not always possible. In cases where you have to choose between relevance and proximity which is more important?
-
Hi Wayne,
I vote for a good mix of:
-
Locally relevant sites, like local newspapers, local business organizations and possibly local blogs
-
Industry relevant sites, like industry publications, industry organizations and industry blogs
I wouldn't focus on one over the other. I'd go for both!
-
-
No problem, Wayne. Hope that helps.
Nope, but thanks! That was a hypothetical I created. I'm part of an in-house SEO team for an San Diego online printing service. If you have a spare "online printing" link, that's a different story...
-
Thanks for the response Andrew. Will a "dry cleaning" link from Oregon help your customer?
-
Check this guy out, he's one of the leading experts
http://www.localvisibilitysystem.com/
http://www.localvisibilitysystem.com/definitive-local-search-citations/
-
Thanks for the help. I Can
t use Moz Local because I
m in Canada. -
Proximity will get your business more targeted in a local sense, and that's still a hard case to make because the site you're getting the link from has to be set up in a way where they've geo tagrgeted as well. Don't forget to get the business listed on the well known places https://moz.com/local/search.
Hope that helps
-
Hey Wayne,
I prefer relevance over proximity much more.
When I think about keywords I want to rank for (e.g. a local dry cleaner), I think "dry cleaning" first (keyword relevance), "Los Angeles" next (local). I would rather Google know that I am a "dry cleaner" than "Los Angeles"; it pins your website higher up for the business type.
-- Andrew
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
-
National services provider and localized SEO (no physical stores)
Doing work for a telecom provider who operates in over 25 states. They are not trying to drive traffic to their brick-and-mortar stores. They want their marketing website to show products/services/pricing dynamically when a user enters their zip code. Previously, we could not show this until the shopper was already in the purchase flow that began with their serviceable address. They want to move these location-based details more forward in the shopping experience. They would likely have a "default" zip and set of services/pricing displaying until a user changes their location. My question is how does Google treat local SEO on a site where all location-targeted content is dynamic? Will the website suffer in localized search, when a shopper, say, in Colorado, wants to search for Internet providers? Is it better to have distinct landing pages for each territory with services/pricing?
Local SEO | | sprydigital0 -
Should local businesses focus exclusively on a local SEO strategy (and forget traditional SEO)?
Hello Friends! I work at a small, local company. We definitely want to rank high for local search , so we see the value of having a local SEO strategy. But does it make sense for us to also invest in a traditional SEO strategy? My understanding is that a traditional SEO strategy is focused on improving your site's visibility on a national or international scale. Does this make sense for my company if only local customers convert? If we had unlimited time and resources, I'd be all for a traditional SEO strategy. I understand that the more traffic, backlinks, etc. my site generates from producing relevant content, the higher my ranking. But my company has to be very strategic about where we spend our time since our resources are limited. So...How much can or does a traditional SEO strategy impact local search results? I'd hate to spend the time writing a beautiful SEO-optimized blog on dog grooming, for example, if that effort won't impact my SERP ranking when someone in my area searches for "dog grooming near me." I'd love to hear your thoughts!
Local SEO | | annav0520 -
How valuable is non-local organic traffic for local business?
Hey friends! I work for a local digital marketing agency in Greenville, SC – serving primarily local small businesses. Over the past six months, we've increased our monthly organic traffic by almost 100%. The majority of this traffic is coming to blogs we've written over the past year on industry topics and trends. I love seeing our traffic increase, but it hasn't necessarily translated to more quality leads. Conversion numbers have largely remained the same. I think one reason is that a lot of this traffic isn't local. Here's my question: as a local business, how valuable is content that ranks well and drives organic traffic, when the traffic isn't local, and from users we would never work with? A lot of this content has earned links and grown our authority, so I suppose we've seen benefit, but I'm struggling to convince myself that it's really that valuable. I know local content is key, but it feels like what we want to educate on isn't searched locally. Would love to hear your thoughts! Thanks!
Local SEO | | brooksmanley3 -
Search Results Issues
Hi All, I am having an issue with https://www.toyotaofwilmington.com/ If you do searches using Ad Preview for “2016 Toyota Camry in Wilmington, NC” or “2016 Toyota Corolla in Wilmington, NC” we are having issues with the website not showing up organically. We have the location set to Wilmington, NC, but their competition which is located in Jacksonville, NC which is over an hour away shows up organically on the first page. I am wondering if there are any obvious reasons as to why this would happen, or if there is something bigger I need to look at? Thank you, Cyrus
Local SEO | | Webstreak0 -
Local SEO Mastermind Group?
Howdy Folks - I run a small (but growing!) SEO agency in Tennessee. I serve, primarily, local service businesses with Organic SEO and website development. I'm a completely self taught SEO and had an average client rank last year of just over position 2. I have long been dedicated to running my own SEO experiments to try to stay on top of what is working. With the constant changes to SEO, and the growing agency, I find I don't have the time to run all of the SEO experiments that I'd like to ensure that our packages are still giving the best value to our clients. I'm looking to see if 1 - 4 individuals, also running local SEO agencies, would like to form a sort of "mastermind group". Share ideas, successes and failures on a level that wouldn't be practical in a forum setting. I'm happy to share what has been working for my clients and would welcome a fresh set of eyes to see what we're missing. **Discussions like: ** Link Acquisition Scaling Staff, Content Creation and Systems Scaling Social Media Outreach Local Outreach Successes - Email Templates White/Black Hat SEO Techniques If you think it would be a good fit. Please PM me or comment. Thanks!
Local SEO | | CRO_first1 -
Local Search - Google Mobile Results (Web&App)
Hi, I have a client with multiple locations. One of the locations manager is searching for branded and non-branded keywords on his mobile phone and not able to locate the business (within the parking lot of the location). Our ranking reports via a local search platform and manual checks indicate the location is actually ranking well. and we're seeing progress in GA. Has anyone deal with something like this before? This is a location that recently opened to the public. The concern is around mobile web and app results. I'm looking for some guidance around how to approach the situation. I'm sorry I cannot provide more details on the client.
Local SEO | | burnseo0 -
How to market web design and SEO company locally
Hello, I'm looking for easy (yah right, correct?) ways to market locally my web solutions company. I do web design, E-commerce web design, and I start informational and E-commerce companies for people starting at $1000/month - only new companies, later I'll do a little more E-commerce stuff. Looking for inexpensive, fairly easy ways to market locally. Thanks!
Local SEO | | BobGW0 -
Local SEO?
Hello everyone, I've just been through the Moz Local learning area, which is pretty informative. However, a lot of it seems like good practice for general online marketing (mobile friendly websites, goals per page...). I'm new to all this - am I missing the point? William
Local SEO | | Seabrook0