The Definitive Guide To Local SEO. In this post I will share with you my guide to Local SEO.
Running a small business is tough these days. But you don’t need me to tell you that do you? You’ve been doing it for years and you’ve built up a loyal following of customers who are happy to recommend you. But there’s something nagging at the back of your mind. You’ve been meaning to ‘do some online marketing’ for some time now. How To Do Local SEO You’ve noticed that there are a few new players in town, muscling in on your patch. If you’re thinking that they’re picking up the lion’s share of the traffic then you’d be right. But if you’re concerned that local seo is either complex or expensive then relax. So let’s get started… Local Listings – How To Setup and Optimise Before you do anything, you need to set up your main local listings. These are really important and you don’t need any special skills to do this. Also add photos and videos – nothing flash, you just need to put in a little more effort than your competitors.
Why? How You Can See Google Search Results for Different Locations. What you and I are likely to see in Google differs a lot even if we search for the same thing.
The results we get depend on our: This makes perfect sense to users who often search Google for places and services nearby. At the same time, this leaves marketers blind to what customers really see in Google in all the different locations their business targets. So, today we’ll dig deeper into localized search results and look into every possible way to search Google from another location – both manually and using tools. Do All SERP Elements Depend on Location? The short answer is “yes.” How to Optimize Your Google My Business Description. The re-addition of business descriptions to Google My Business is a welcome change for agencies and businesses alike.
Here guest blogger Ben Fisher takes you through the process of writing and submitting the perfect business description. Google has been making big “updates” to Google My Business listings! These improvements are making Google My Business more and more appealing for both searchers and business owners. No longer does your optimized Google My Business (GMB) listing have to contain just the basic information about your business, like your company name, address, phone number, hours, and types of payments you accept. Google Mostly Crawls From The US But Can Crawl Locally In Your Region. This is just one of those reminders that Google's spider, GoogleBot, mostly crawls from the U.S., Mountain View, California region but it is possible that GoogleBot can also crawl locally in your region outside of the US.
This is something Google began doing in January 2015 and not all SEOs remember this. It is still highly recommended that you don't block crawlers from the US. Google spends most of their time and energy crawling from the US. But if you are playing country specific or regionally specific games, Google can technically pick up on those games both automatically with their local GoogleBots or manually with their manual actions team. Map of all Google data center locations - Pingdom Royal. Data Center Knowledge recently published a “Google Data Center FAQ”.
As most other web geeks, we here at Pingdom tend to find this kind of information quite fascinating. We have extracted some interesting tidbits, and also used the information to construct a map with all current and under-construction Google data center locations that are known today. So how many data centers do Google use, and where are they? Move a business on Google - Google My Business Help. If your business moves, update your address in Google My Business so customers can visit your new location.
Do not create a new business listing if you’ve moved from one location to another. You may be asked to verify your new business address once you update it. Once you've updated your address, you can enter your opening date and promote your new location via posts. If you want to update your address but you don't own the Google My Business listing, you can request access from the current listing owner. You can also report the incorrect address directly to Google Maps. Remove duplicate locations. Ultimate Google My Business Optimization Checklist.
Last Updated April 10, 2019 Google My Business (GMB) is the most important online listing for any local business.
It drives the local business search results on Google search, maps, Google Assistant (voice search) and more. Claiming and optimizing your Google My Business listing is critical for not only for getting new customers, but helping repeat customers do business with you again. However, Google My Business changes frequently and the best practices for a well-optimized listing are not always clear. We created this checklist for Google My Business as a single point of reference and will update it continually to reflect the changes and best practices recommended by the most well-respected local search experts in the world. If you have questions, would like to request additions, or have suggestions to improve / correct this checklist, please post them in the comments section below.
Everything You Need to Know About Google My Business. First thing first, what is Google My Business?
Essentially, Google My Business is a business listing service. For example, if you search for Hootsuite you’ll see a box appear to the right hand of the results. This contains a short blurb about the company, social links, and other companies that are usually searched for by association. But if we were a cafe serving up coffee, you’d also see opening hours, address, what times the cafe is usually busy, and any other information that Google thinks you’d be looking for. Bonus: Download our free guide that shows you how to 10X your social media performance and beat your competitors. Get verified on Google - Knowledge Panel Help. Note: If you’re verified as an authorized representative of your organization, you’ll see a box at the top of the organization’s knowledge panel.
This box allows you to suggest edits to the knowledge panel. Verification also allows some to participate in Posts on Google. How Google My Business Affects SEO Locally. Get verified on Google - Knowledge Panel Help. Managing multi-regional and multilingual sites - Search Console Help. If your site offers different content to users in different languages, countries, or regions, you can optimize Google Search results for your site.
Background: A multilingual website is any website that offers content in more than one language. For example, a Canadian business with English and French versions of its site. Google Search tries to find pages that match the language of the searcher. A multi-regional website is one that explicitly targets users in different countries. Some sites are both multi-regional and multilingual: for example, a site might have different versions for the USA and for Canada, and both French and English versions of the Canadian content.
How Google crawls locale-adaptive pages - Search Console Help. If your site has locale-adaptive pages (that is, your site returns different content based on the perceived country or preferred language of the visitor), Google might not crawl, index, or rank all your content for different locales. This is because the default IP addresses of the Googlebot crawler appear to be based in the USA. In addition, the crawler sends HTTP requests without setting Accept-Language in the request header. Googlebot crawls with IP addresses based outside the USA, in addition to the US-based IP addresses. As we have always recommended, when Googlebot appears to come from a certain country, treat it like you would treat any other user from that country. This means that if you block USA-based users from accessing your content, but allow visitors from Australia to see it, your server should block a Googlebot that appears to be coming from the USA, but allow access to a Googlebot that appears to come from Australia.
Other considerations. Avoiding Hreflang Issues by Following a 6 Steps Implementation Process. International SEO Guide & Tools by @Aleyda. Is Google Translate Bad For Multilingual SEO? Google Translate is a seemingly handy tool for content translation. After all, it’s free, readily available, and created by one of the Internet’s leading innovators. But ironically, Google’s own machine translation solutions fall short in one critical area: search engine optimization. You already know how important SEO is for your flagship site, but it’s equally important—perhaps even more so—as you’re establishing multilingual sites in international markets. You need your products, services and messages to be discovered, so it’s critical that your translated content be found by the search engines first. So why isn’t Google Translate enough? Machine Translated Content Penalties Google’s own quality guidelines penalize the search engine rankings of websites that use automated content.
So if you’re using a pure machine-translation solution to present content in multiple languages on your site, you run the risk of Google itself penalizing the site for doing so. Translation Quality. Website translation - How to do multilingual SEO in 8 steps. Acceptable Google Maps NAP Abbreviations and Variations. In our Citation Audit and Cleanup Service, we are frequently asked questions regarding address formatting. The enquiry often goes something like this: Does it matter if the street name of our business is “123 James Ave” instead of “123 James Avenue”? As you can probably imagine, this question comes in different nuances and versions but the answer (almost) always boils down to the same thing – Google and Bing are smart enough to understand abbreviations (or slight variations) and to associate them with their non-abbreviated counterparts.
If this was not the case, Google would only be able to associate a minuscule part of any business’s online citations to their actual existing Google+ Local listing. Even worse, there might be tons of duplicate listings for every single business, a result of even the smallest of inconsistencies in formatting (see my comment on MerchantCircle here for comparison). Top-Level Domain & Other Restrictions for International SEO. Selecting a domain for your website is like deciding a name for your baby. Everyone wants the best name for their website. In the U.S., most businesses go with a dot-com, which is a generic top-level domain (gTLD).
Some websites get creative with top-level domains (TLD) to complete the name such as “time.is”. But did you know that a top-level domain you choose may have an impact on your website? There are six different types of top-level domains: Infrastructure top-level domain (ARPA)Generic top-level domains (gTLD)Restricted generic top-level domains (grTLD)Sponsored top-level domains (sTLD)Country code top-level domains (ccTLD)Test top-level domains (tTLD) In this article, we’ll focus on the two most popular TLDs – ccTLD and gTLD. Note: If you’d like to find out about TLDs in general, go to IANA and ICANN for the information. ccTLD & gTLD: What’s the Difference? What are the differences between ccTLD and gTLD? Dealing With Duplicates: Google and Bing Local Listings. When conducting a review of your business's online presence, you might find that your business has multiple listings on Google+ or Bing Places. At first this might seem like a good thing - more listings means more SEO juice and a greater chance of being seen, right?
Unfortunately, that isn’t how it works. 9 Point Checklist To Optimize Your Google My Business Profile. Multilingual Sitemaps. Avoiding the SEO Pitfalls of URL Parameters. URL parameters are the parts of the address of a web page often visible after a question mark (?) , ampersand (&), equals (=) or other attribute. Parameters might also be referred to as “query strings” and are commonly used on e-commerce websites. Languages in Domains for WordPress Multisite Mode. This tutorial explains how to set up languages in different domains (or subdomains) in a multisite install. Please read carefully, as you will need to replace a file to complete the setup.
WPML offers support for setting up WPML to be using the ‘different domain per language’ option for the language url format when using WordPress in the multisite mode. This was not possible before this version since the implementation required a special set up involving a drop-in plugin. This can only be accomplished by using a drop-in plugin. Yoast SEO - Strip the category base does not work in the second language. Using Yoast SEO with WPML.
What is multilingual SEO? If your online business is doing well in your country, you might consider expanding to international markets. To be successful in new markets requires some extra investments in SEO though. You’d better start thinking about multilingual SEO, if you want to be sure your website will be found and used well in other countries! Here, I’ll explain what multilingual SEO is, why it’s important and which elements it consists of. What is multilingual SEO? Multilingual SEO deals with offering optimized content for multiple languages or multiple locations. The Ultimate Guide to Multilingual and Multiregional SEO. Top 5 Issues Wrecking Local SEO For Multi-Location Businesses. Guidelines for representing your business on Google - Google My Business Help. Summary: Listings on Google My Business can only be created for businesses that either have a physical location that customers can visit, or that travel to visit customers where they are.
Creating a successful listing that won’t be suspended requires avoiding prohibited content, accurately reflecting your business, and complying with the rest of the policies below. LocalPics. Create a link for customers to write reviews - Google My Business Help. Create a link that customers can click to leave a review of your business on Google. You can easily share the link with customers to encourage them to write reviews and rate your business. Local Consumer Review Survey 2016. Google My Business - The Google Advertiser Community. How to Optimize Your Google My Business Listing. My Business Help. Supported regions - Google My Business Help.
Top 5 Issues Wrecking Local SEO For Multi-Location Businesses. Établissements desservant des zones spécifiques sur Google - Ordinateur - Aide Google My Business. 4 Advanced SEO Features You Cannot Ignore in 2016. Verification benefits. About Google My Business - Google My Business Help. Use hreflang for language and regional URLs - Search Console Help.
Add <link rel="alternate" hreflang="lang_code"... > elements to your page header to tell Google all of the language and region variants of a page. The Ultimate Guide to Multilingual and Multiregional SEO. The Ultimate Guide to Multilingual and Multiregional SEO. Google free business.site domain to SMEs around the world. On 22nd August 2017, Google broke a good news to SMEs around the world, which could be one of the most talked about topics in 2017. Create your free website with Google - Google My Business Help. Après avoir revendiqué la fiche de votre établissement sur Google My Business, vous pouvez créer gratuitement un site Web optimisé pour les mobiles afin de représenter votre activité. Verification benefits. About Google My Business - Google My Business Help.
Get started with Google My Business - Google My Business Help. Create a link for customers to write reviews - Google My Business Help. View Google Search Results from any Location in any Country. International SEO - Learn SEO. Service-area businesses on Google - Computer - Google My Business Help. International SEO Consultant: Aleyda Solis. International SEO - Learn SEO. 10 Practical Tips For Using Geo-Location To Reach Your Target Audience. Knowledge – Inside Search – Google. Let’s Put Our Cities on the Map. Content — Audit, Measure, and Discover Your Best. Bing Places for Business. Local SEO in 2017: 5 simple ways to dominate local search. How to Crack Google Search Optimization for Your Unique Niche. Eat Local: Our Top 10 Local Search Columns of 2016. HREFLang Checker & Validation Tool. Advanced International SEO with rel="alternate" hreflang="x"
Someone else verified my business - Google My Business Help. Why Business Directory Listings Are Important For Google Places and Local SEO. How to Rank Your Google My Business & Maps Page. Analytics for Web (analytics.js) Multiple tracking codes on web pages - Analytics Help. Why Business Directory Listings Are Important For Google Places and Local SEO. Someone else verified my business - Google My Business Help. Everything you need to know about Google's 'Possum' algorithm update. Google confirms ads coming to Local Pack. Google 3-Pack To Become 2-Pack, With New Paid Listings. Local Consumer Review Survey 2016. Google Small Business: Updated summer hours make a difference for customers. Let’s Put Our Cities on the Map. Hreflang Tags Generator Tool by @aleyda. Hreflang Tag - Learn SEO. How to dominate local SEO: more challenging in an evolving local search environment.
Local Search Pros Google+ Community - Join Us! Local SEO Ranking Factors Study 2016. Cómo mejorar tu ranking local en Google - Ayuda de Google Mi Negocio. Building a Local SEO Foundation - "Coffee Break Marketing" The Top Tools for Marketing Your Services! The Ultimate Guide to Multilingual and Multiregional SEO. Multi-regional and multilingual sites - Search Console Help. Solved: Google Business Register a business in China - The Google Advertiser Community - 481208. How can I submit Baidu business listings if I live outside of China? Use hreflang for language and regional URLs - Search Console Help. Building a Local SEO Foundation - "Coffee Break Marketing" The Top Tools for Marketing Your Services! A lot of movement in the 3-pack / Local Finder - Page 10. View Google Search Results from any Location in any Country. Improve your local ranking on Google - Google My Business Help.
Google documents Google My Business local ranking factors. Local SEO Ranking Factors Study 2016. Plans For Local SEO Tools. Try Free For 30 Days. Digital Location Management Software.