How can we geo-target our website optimization for cities besides our physical location?
-
We have a client that is a solar energy installation & leasing company in Austin, TX that wants to target the Houston and Dallas markets. We can do a Place Page for their physical offices in Austin and San Antonio to drive traffic for those cities. But we’re not sure the best way to help them rank for Houston and Dallas, where they don't have a physical address. We’re considering a separate landing page for each city, optimized for the geo-term. Will that help them to rank in the 7Pack in Houston and Dallas, if there’s no Place Page? Will it help them rank in the organic listings for that region? Can you offer any other suggestions for how to help them rank in 2 cities where they don’t have physical offices?
-
"Do not create listings at locations where the business does not physically exist. P.O. Boxes are not considered accurate physical locations. Listings submitted with P.O. Box addresses will be removed."
http://www.google.com/support/places/bin/answer.py?answer=107528
Yes.. I believe you recalled that correctly.
-
It could be possible to rank in the 7 pack with an address outside of the target city, but it's very very difficult to do. You would need the local signals like local landing pages, and you would need a very non competitive term. I believe you would have better luck getting a small office in the Houston or Dallas and manning it with some staff.
Outside the 7 pack you can easily rank for cities that you are not located in by traditional SEO methods. Creating a landing page for the GEO area and then creating local links and anchor text links will get you to the front page.
-
Thanks for the info about UPS stores. I didn't know they offered this service.
-
good point on the PO Box. UPS store offers address with suite numbers as opposed to PO boxes, but as I said it isn't necessarily "Best practices"
-
If I recall correctly, Google Places only accepts physical addresses, not PO boxes.
If you wanted to move in that direction, then a virtual office would be the preferred method. You can have a physical address, mail forwarding, and even a local phone number with an answering service if desired. Prices usually range from around $100 - $150 depending on your needs and location.
You can achieve the desired result with a strong landing page and links with proper anchor text from the target area. I would only go to the extreme of using a virtual office if there was a lot of money involved and there was an urgent need to improve your rank after you are already on the 1st page of SERP.
-
Landing pages are always effective - especially for localized geo marketing. If you want to do a physical address, you could always do a PO box or a UPS store box that will provide an "Address" location. I am not sure if that is necessarily "ethical" but if you are offering the products in those cities, I don't think you'll encounter too much grief. I wouldnt add the PO box or UPS Store address to google places, but you could create a landing page that would have a little more content on it.
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
-
Is it a legal requirement for a website to have alt tags for all images?
Someone told me it is a legal requirement for a website to have alt tags on all of their images. Is this right? Or is this bad for SEO?
Image & Video Optimization | | RachelBev0 -
Schema for a local business with multiple locations
Hello I am trying to add schema to a website that has several locations. Is the best way to do this is by tagging the home page of the website as the business main location and then create a page for each location and then mark them up accordingly? Thank you for your help.
Image & Video Optimization | | edwardfrebow0 -
Multiple Google Places Accounts - Same Physical Location
Hi there, One of my clients is a local law firm. I have created, populated and verified a Places page for them, but now I have discovered that they had previously created one for each of their attorneys at that location. According to Google's quality guidelines, this is totally fine. However, I am wondering if I should try to verify each of these accounts within Places to enhance their listing coverage? One thing I've already tried is modifying some of the listing details via Map Maker, but it would be nice to just make edits en masse, I think. Any suggestions?
Image & Video Optimization | | G2W0 -
NAP - Name on a local website
From a local perspective, if the legal name of the business is "Rising Realty, Inc", when you added in your footer should I loose the "Inc" part to be consistent with all the other mentions of the business across the web, which are without "Inc"? Thank you!
Image & Video Optimization | | echo10 -
To have a location (that is really not a location)
So here is the problem that I am facing. The physical location of our business is located in a suburb of a large metro area market (which consists of 3 different cities). Our company services all of the cities located in the metropolitan area market. I have seen over the past year with Google+ and Google places that Google gives preference to businesses in local search based on their location (specifically to businesses that are located near the center of the city). My suspicions were confirmed by the following: http://www.davidmihm.com/local-search-ranking-factors.shtml In the past we went out and played the game where we purchased UPS boxes in our service cities so that we can compete in Google local search local (recommendation from a SEO company that we were using at the time). I did not really want to do that, but at the time it seemed as though we had no other option with how Google was ranking businesses in those markets. Now Google has caught on to this strategy and has killed those local listings. It is frustrating that Google assumes that a listing should have higher rank based largely on physical location. We never had the intent of violating Google policy, but what are we to do? Not trying to play victim but it is true. My question is how can we rank extremely well in local search for the different cities of the metro area considering that we are physically located in a suburb? Has anyone else successfully overcame this obstacle? Any ideas on how we can rank well in Google+/Google Places in these cities? Frustrated Business Owner.
Image & Video Optimization | | dshelton0 -
Is city name really a no-no in Google+ Local description field?
I know that adding one's city name in the business name and category tags for Google+ Local is a no-no. And Google says so in its quality guidelines. But what about in the business description? I don't see that in Google's guidelines. Can anyone clarify?
Image & Video Optimization | | HammerandHand0 -
Google Places Multiple Locations Strategy
Hi, I have client who is a psychology college that has multiple locations across the United States. We currently have a Google places setup for their main location which is in Chicago. They also have multiple locations in California and Washington d.c. My question is what is the best strategy for setting up Google places for each one of their locations? can it all be done from the Chicago Google places account or do I have to build out individual Google places accounts for each location. Thanks!
Image & Video Optimization | | MasonInteractive0 -
Anybody knows of agencies who produce/optimize/market video content?
Hi everyone. Hope someone can help me hook up with a video content provider. Need one to produce optimized video content and market it, too. Did a Google search and found some. But I trust a crowd-sourced answer so I try here at SEOMoz. Anybody?
Image & Video Optimization | | macmallseo0