Local SEO Question: Domain Wide Vs Specific Page
-
Hey Moz Community,
Question about Local SEO authority and how it applies to a domain vs. landing page. Let me elaborate...
Company is launching a new local out reach sales channel and merging it with our inbound sales channel under one brand. The plan thus far is to create a targeted landing page for local customers/leads.
I have been tasked with creating the written content and making sure we are optimized as much as possible for this landing page to show up for our city. Funny enough for a lot of relevant terms we are already in the top 10 with little optimization (Also due to low competition for most of these terms) Two questions:
1. Should the whole site be optimized for local - appropriate schema markup, G+ business local set up, contact page with correct address formatting, building citations/local links etc.? To accompany our targeted page?
2. Will taking a local first initiative hurt reaching our non-local target market? If so will a very targeted landing page for local customers do the trick minus rest of local optimizations ?
I guess what the question really boils down to is will optimizing for local hurt our broader inbound search reach/ranks in the long run? I want to be sure we are competitive to our broader audience and local audience on the same site with trying to get into sub-domains or considering re branding what is essentially the same department but for local purposes.
Responses and sharing previous experience would be greatly appreciated
-
Thanks for the Wisdom David! This really helped out ! I totally agree on EMD's - that said I don't believe I could swing this one on management and the developers. A lot branding already tied to the domain that would make this into more of a total re-brand project vs. just a merger.
Thanks again!
-
Hi Dylan,
Would you be able to explain your business model in a bit more detail? Is the business primarily local, with face-to-face transactions with customers in a given city, or is the business primarily virtual/non-local. The better you can paint a picture of what the business model looks like, the more tailored answers I believe you'll receive from the community here
-
1. Should the whole site be optimized for local - appropriate schema markup, G+ business local set up, contact page with correct address formatting, building citations/local links etc.? To accompany our targeted page?
If you are going to target that area specifically, then yes. If you still want to maintain a focus on national or boader match keywords, then no I would not modify the whole site.
2. Will taking a local first initiative hurt reaching our non-local target market? If so will a very targeted landing page for local customers do the trick minus rest of local optimizations?
You have to remember what the landing page's purpose is. You are trying to rank for one or a few things in a very specific area. One challenge I forsee in just having the landing page is that you are going to be up against companies that focus their whole effort to that one given area.
Depending upon what your long term goals are would determine how you move forward. To answer your question, yes it could hurt you on your national focus if you change your entire site to focus on that one given area.
Another aspect to look at is PPC and AdRank. Since you will have a local page that is highly targeted, your ad score will most likely go up for that ad if you choose to go the paid route. More on that here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBmPtduElkM. If you are going to run some ads, the landing page could work well for you, and not be that expensive.
So what are your options? Well, IMO the landing page may accomplish what you are trying to do if there isnt a lot of competition for the phrase and target area. If you have competition whose main goal in life is to rank for that one area and phrase then I do not see the landing page carrying enough weight to make a difference.
If there is strong competition for that area, you may want to investigate a exact match domain, and place your content on that site. Many people discount the value of EMDs simply because they do not understand the value and their purpose. True, an EMD will not be easy to get to rank for a lot of keywords, but that is not their purpose. An EMD is to target one specific area and keyword. Will one page be enough? Probably not, but by setting up 5-10 pages on an EMD could get you ranking very high if the content and site are put together well. You could also link to your local site from your main national focus domain, and help them both out since they are relevant to one another.
By having the other domain, you dont risk sabotaging your main sites traffic by changing to a local focus. This will also allow you the freedom to create local profiles (citation sites, Google+ personal and business, etc) for your new domain. I know it sounds like a lot of extra work, but I dont think that having the subpage on your main site will be enough unless the competition is weak, or you have a lot of ways to promote the new page through marketing.
-
Hi Dylan,
This is from my own experience:
1. If your local is a priority, then you have to do this
2. It won't, really. Since (I presume) that your company is primarily a local-first company, then you can just create other landing pages that can target those that are non-local. You can actually create a more targeted copy like that and promote it in more targeted channels.
It can also work the other way around but I'm just looking at your advantages by optimizing for local, especially with the new update.
Bottom line, check their priority and optimize for that first.
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
-
Seeing different Google 3-Pack results on Android mobile browsers vs. IOS mobile browsers. Why is this?
I am researching new SEO recommendations in lieu of Google's controversial "3-Pack" update. I am noticing very different results in the Google 3-Pack on a android mobile browser when I do a local search query versus a query in apple mobile browser. For example if I do a Google search for "Seattle Sporting Goods" I am able to see direction links and full address numbers for businesses in the 3-Pack. However the same query on a Android phone provides only "teaser" street name results, no direction links but still shows business reviews. Is it possible that the 3-Pack update is still in flux? Shouldn't the Google 3-Pack show uniform results across all different mobile browsers? This could impact my SEO recommendations.
Image & Video Optimization | | RosemaryB0 -
Question on following schema for local
Hello I built out a blog for a client and used Yoast Local SEO plugin for WordPress. Here is one of the pages generated for a physical location for the business. http://water-notes.generalplumbingsupply.com/?wpseo_locations=sonora-ca My client who manages a website for the same business built out a locations page and insists that their pages rank better for local search. I think the pages are spammy. Individual location page for the website managed by my client: http://www.generalplumbingsupply.com/American-Canyon-CA-v1.HTML Multiple locations page: http://www.generalplumbingsupply.com/Locations.HTML What page should we be using? Thank you for your help.
Image & Video Optimization | | edwardfrebow0 -
Tracking Numbers and Local Listings
Hello all, had a quick question about the pros and cons of claiming a bunch of local listings and using a tracking # on our business profiles with those listings rather than our actual #. Anyone have any insight into whether this is good or bad practice and why? Thanks in advance!
Image & Video Optimization | | goldbergweismancairo0 -
What are some strategies to outrank your retailers who use the same page content as you?
I do not want to piss off our retailers by complaining about copyright infringement for product content, so what are some ways to outrank them using the same content???
Image & Video Optimization | | odegi0 -
How likely it is to rank both locally and organically
I think the question summarizes it pretty well. Did anybody experienced this, to rank for one or multiple keywords in both local and organic search results?
Image & Video Optimization | | echo10 -
Use Google Places or Google +Local?
Hello everyone, My name is Zachary Russell, and I run a Philadelphia based WordPress Development and SEO firm, ProTech Internet Group. I have been doing work lately, and have been neglecting the fact that my own site needs work, I have now changed that. I have done a complete redesign and started repurposting content to have a well-rounded content strategy that can appeal the the widest possible audience. My issue I'm having now is this: I have both a Google Places page and a Google +Local page for my business , Obviously duplicate listings are a problem, but I don't know which one to get rid of. They both have 0 reviews and limited +1s, I just don't know which one I should delete, and which one I should push to get more reviews moving forward. Also, moving forward, would it make sense for me to have a Google +Business and a Google +Local page?I don't know if this would cause any conflicts either. Thanks for your help and have a happy new year! Zach Russell President, ProTech Internet Group
Image & Video Optimization | | Zachary_Russell0 -
What is the best way to host a video on my site from a SEO perspective?
Hi, we are in the process of creating a video about a topic that is highly relevant for our customers. Once it is completed we want to offer the video to our customers so that they can embed it into their own websites for free. What is the best way to do this and still receive maximum SEO juice? If we use a a video service like youtube or vimeo, then the link will go to vimeo or youtube and not our site. One thing we are thinking about is asking our customers to link to our site in return for embedding the video, but if there is an automatic solution then this would be a lot better. Any tips will be highly appreciated! If you have anyother tips regarding video content then the same of course! Many thanks! Daan
Image & Video Optimization | | daan.loening0 -
Competition leaving bad reviews on our places page, what to do?
I have flagged the reviews as not useful from multiple IPs. I have attempted reporting the review as well. Google does nothing. It's very obvious that the review(s) are fake. Often all the other reviews of the person's profile are for different cities and all 5 stars for businesses that they are most likely doing SEO work for. Are (blackhat) SEOs using bad reviews as a technique to keep the competition out in your business/market? What did you do about it?
Image & Video Optimization | | adriandg0