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It does seem evident there is a correlation between keywords closer to the beginning and their search performance, a reality Moz notes. There is also however something to be said for branding, a direction Google also increasingly looks at.  In other words, you wouldn't ever want to "over" optimize anything really, ever.

I suggest trying out Moz's On-Page Optimization tool - it goes a long way towards positioning a page for a particular keyword/phrase, with helpful tips along the way.

Good luck!

David,

If you're not already, perhaps incorporate stakeholders and vertically aligned entities into your content process. By interviewing, featuring, and providing useful reasons for them, you have a good shot at building both goodwill and quality inbound inks, the latter being crucial to getting over the hump.

Good luck!

If there ever was a reason to, from what we can tell there isn't anymore. Far more effective to get authors set up through G+. Those suckers are like mini websites. Then you can move forward with an online byline and secure picture-in-SERPs glory!

Google no longer favors my client's industry with Google reviews in local Snack Pack results, but a national competitor has markup for site-based reviews that are showing up in organic results, which is a big, shiny, advantage.

Rather than have to solicit reviews in two places (Google and the site), I'm wondering if it would be possible/advisable to copy and paste the Google reviews into the site and mark them up there, in an attempt to get Google to feature the rating in the organic SERP result?

I don't know if this would work though, since I'm guessing part of the reason that Google accepts the competitor reviews is because they are verified purchases, which wouldn't be possible just cutting and pasting. But is it worth a try?

It's too bad though, Google is effectively only showing handpicked, "national" reviews, which does local customers a disservice.

Thank you!

I agree. Anecdotally anyway, sharing on G+ in particular makes for a pretty rapid index.

Up to 70 showing up in SERPs is certainly a good rule of thumb, but apparently not absolute. If you do a search for "title tags" you may see some, like Search Engine Watch's long title, gets truncated with ellipses at the end, while Usability Geek's age gets 71 characters by my count with an omission of "SEO" in the middle. From what I can tell, best practice is keeping them 70 or under, particularly since any keywords out there in the eastern wild aren't likely doing you much good anyway.

Sounds like we should push to collect reviews in both places, thanks!