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Video Summary
You probably know by now that to get more traffic, your business must appear at the top of the Google search results.
Whether your customers and clients live in your community, or they travel to your community from outside, chances are they go to the internet and search for businesses that are available nearby. Read more to know the local search ranking factors to get you a boost in the search results…
Video Transcript
Hello, my name is Jeffrey Kirk.
Do you want your website to rank higher in the search results? You probably know by now that to get more traffic, your business must appear at the top of the Google search results.
Whether your customers and clients live in your community, or they travel to your community from outside, chances are they go to the internet and search for businesses that are available nearby. And what they see near the top is a group of 3 businesses with a map. This is the section of the search results that I call the Money Zone.
I call it the Money Zone because it’s so prominent in the search results that the businesses showing up there are easily seen. Some people refer to the Money Zone as the local map pack. I think that sounds stupid and it diminishes the value of what that space really means.
After all, there are only three businesses in this spot, it usually appears above the organic search results, and it generally includes your phone number or address along with reviews and other important information. And on a mobile phone, it can even bring up GPS for driving instructions.
That’s not just a map pack. That’s money in the bank! In this video, I’m going to cover some of the factors you need to consider to make Google happy. These are things that you can do to help you improve your local ranking and get into the Money Zone.
Local Search Ranking
According to Google, the first thing you should do is claim your Google Business Profile and update your business information. Not only does a verified Google Business Profile help improve your ranking, it also gives your customers more good information about your business. This is important, especially when you want customers to easily find your business online. I have separate videos explaining how to get and optimize your profile if you need to do these things. You can find the link here for easy access.
Another thing that Google considers important is a combination of three factors: relevance, distance, and prominence. When your Google Business Profile is complete, it helps Google match your business to what consumers are searching for. This is what makes your business relevant in the search results. At the same time, your distance is calculated based on how far your location is from the searcher.
And the third factor is prominence. This refers to how well-known your business is. Prominence includes your other information on the web, like articles, or links, or review counts, and rating scores. And it also includes offline information like how often clients actually visit your location. Altogether, these things contribute to the credibility of your business.
Claim Your Google Business Profile
Now let’s go in a little bit different direction. According to a survey of SEO professionals, there are eleven factors that impact your local search ranking. Nine of these are directly related to your Google Business Profile. The other two are external to your profile.
First, within your Google Business profile, you have to choose the best primary category for your business. Google offers nearly 4,000 categories to choose from. But how would you know which one is best for you?
Sometimes it’s easy and obvious. And other times, you might have to choose more than one category to better explain your business. You can choose up to 10 categories, but it’s the primary one that has the biggest impact on your local ranking. So, choose wisely! And get as specific as possible. For example, instead of simply choosing “Restaurant”, a better option may be “Pizza Restaurant”.
The second factor is your business name. You must use your legal business name. Using keywords in your business name is actually against Google’s terms of service, unless the keywords are part of your legal business name. For example, if your business is “Dave’s Pizza,” that connects nicely to your chosen category, but do not call your business “Dave’s Pizza and Italian Restaurant” in an attempt to show up in more searches. If having those extra words is important to you, then you ought to change your legal business name first.
Third is your physical business address. As I previously mentioned with distance, your physical address will matter significantly depending on where the searcher is located. The nearness of your address to the searcher’s location is vital to Google’s algorithm. The closer you are, the better.
Fourth is also address related, but not proximity, but rather city. What that means is when you’re in the same city as the searcher, there is a high possibility for you to outrank businesses that are outside the city. Or if you’re in a larger city, being in the same neighborhood as the searcher will position your business stronger than businesses outside that neighborhood.
The opposite is also true. If the searcher is outside your area, and in an area with other nearby businesses, then those businesses will have the advantage. If there are particular cities or metro areas you want to be visible in, you’ll need to understand how near or far you are from the city center when compared with your competitors’ locations. This is vital information for understanding local Google ranking.
The fifth point to focus on is additional categories for your business. As I already mentioned, it’s important to prioritize your main category. But Google also relies on secondary categories. This is considered supplemental information that helps Google understand your business along with your products and services.
You should also consider these additional categories to be keywords that you want to rank for. Back in the Pizza example, Dave’s Pizza could add “Italian Restaurant” as one of the additional categories. That’s a legitimate way of expanding the representation of Dave’s business.
Google Reviews
Number six. You need high numerical ratings for your Google reviews. Online reviews continue to grow in value and have a significant impact on your visibility within your local area. In a previous video, I talked about how you need a constant stream of high-quality Google reviews and a reasonably high numerical star rating because these things affect your local ranking. You can use this link to watch that video.
With constant visibility, more prospects find your business and can convert to potential customers giving you more sales. So, it’s always best to provide a positive experience to your customers and properly encourage them to leave positive reviews. In my webinar, I show you a system that takes the guesswork out of all of this. I’d like you to click my webinar link so I can help you too.
The seventh point is that you need to have a complete and accurate Google Business Profile. This helps Google match your business with nearby searchers. Some of the previous points I mentioned contribute to this.
It’s important because when you optimize your profile, you differentiate your business from others and you show up more often. Those future customers are also more confident to connect with businesses that have complete profiles, so it’s best to update and optimize your profile as soon as you can. Again, I’m going to point you to another video that covers the optimization process in more detail.
Overall, optimizing your Google Business Profile is the most important thing you can do for your local search ranking. And your profile is not just words. To be complete you need photos, and you need reviews.
Quality and Authority of Inbound Links
For number eight, let’s consider a factor that’s not part of your Google Business Profile. I’m talking about the quality and authority of inbound links to your website. This has traditionally been one of the most important ranking factors for showing up in the organic part of search results. But it also has an impact on your local ranking.
What’s the best way to get quality links? Have good quality content in your site so that others are confident to link to your site. When other websites link to yours, it boosts your site’s credibility and thus improves your ranking. It also drives more traffic to your business. Those who see the links, click the links.
Another source of links you can get to your site include links from relevant publications or associations in your industry. These links are viewed as authoritative because those sites already have a lot of credibility. So, by getting their links, it also tells the search engines that your information is relevant to that industry.
Number nine… The words used within your Google reviews. When your clients or customers leave text reviews, some of that text contains keywords that are valuable in influencing your rank in the search results. For example, someone could say, “Love the food! We think of Dave’s Pizza as the best Italian restaurant in Summerville.” Not only does this influence a potential new customer, but Google sees words which reinforce “Italian restaurant” as well as “Best”, and that it has a location in Summerville.
When you have more impactful reviews, you get a boost to your site’s credibility, you improve your rank in the search results, and your potential customers trust your business more.
More Reviews are Better than Fewer Reviews
Point number ten is also related to reviews. More reviews are better than fewer reviews. A study of more than 200,000 businesses showed that, “Businesses with more than 83 reviews earn 54% more annual revenue than businesses with fewer reviews.
In addition, businesses with more than 200 reviews earn twice as much in revenue compared to the average business.” And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Unless you have a large number of reviews, there will be potential customers that skip your business in favor of another that has more reviews.
Think about it. If you do a search and see 3 businesses in the money zone, and one has 87 reviews, another has 65 reviews, and the third has 2 reviews, do you even bother looking at the third business? But you cannot get by for long with empty reviews either.
As I mentioned in point 9, the words make a difference for the search results. Those words also make a difference for searchers. That’s why it’s important to encourage your customers to leave detailed and positive feedback. You need a strategy to manage customer reviews so you don’t get empty ones.
5‑stars, without any reason, offers no chance at getting quality keywords and it does little to convince future clients to engage with your business. You must encourage your customers to provide feedback and let them know you value their opinions. This helps you make improvements in the services you offer which helps you get more quality reviews in the future.
You see how getting quality reviews, and large quantity reviews, is beneficial? What if you had more and better reviews than competing companies? You would win more searchers. Join me on an upcoming webinar and I’ll show you how to get quality new reviews on autopilot.
Citations
And, finally, point number 11. The last, but not the least, is citations. Citations are simply listings of your business name, address, and phone number. If customers can’t find your business contact information listed in directories, or on maps, or in other platforms, then how are they going to reach you? This is the most controversial point that I’m bringing up today because some say the impact of citations is decreasing. And that may be true, but citations are not dead yet.
According to research, when you compare a business with more citations to those without, the business with citations is more visible. And, as we all know, visibility is where it starts. You need to be found, in order to get that click. There are many ways, and many places, where you can get good citations.
The key is to make sure all of your citations are correct with complete information. Then get citations with popular social sites. These could include Facebook, Foursquare, Bing Places, Apple Maps, Yelp, and even the Better Business Bureau. And then, find industry-specific sites that are relevant to your service. Also, consider getting listed in the top few dozen directories within your country.
Okay. Now let me summarize all of these. Your Google Business Profile is critical for your business. By improving all of these factors, you get a boost in the local search results. But it is still vital to provide an outstanding experience to your customers so you can continue to build a strong and credible business profile with solid reviews. As I’ve stated, I have included links to several additional resources in this post.
Take a look at those, and then join me on an upcoming webinar so I can help you more. Otherwise, I’m concerned your progress will stop here.
Your business deserves to be seen online, and I will help you get there.
Thanks for watching and have a great day!
