http://www.geolocalseo.com/blog In the trenches of local search Fri, 20 Jan 2012 21:07:02 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Search has been going through changes. Lots of changes. A search ranking position is no longer a number as much as it is a probability within a range. Localization, personalization, search history, logged in or out Google users, mobile device users - from one searcher to the next your position ... http://www.geolocalseo.com/blog/encouraging-google-1-votes-for-local-business-websites/ Have you spent hours cruising through Google Maps? Looking at, or for, features and landmarks near your home or places you've been, or places you wish to go? Have you used street view to take a stroll down your home street? The streets of places you've lived in the past? ... http://www.geolocalseo.com/blog/google-maps-as-entertainment-story-telling-with-street-view/ I just read a great post by Yousaf Sekander, a local SEO colleague based in the UK. He was speaking about the conundrum faced by many small businesses who's expertise is in running their business, not in being a blogger and spewing out content to satisfy the search engines and ... http://www.geolocalseo.com/blog/blogging-as-a-content-strategy-for-local-seo-youre-doing-it-wrong/ Yesterday I ordered pizza for home delivery. I turned to my smartphone, dialed up Google, clicked the Restaurants icon as a short cut into Places, searched for "pizza" and scrolled through the results. I was on a mission to find a new pizza joint. My long time favorite independent pizzeria had ... http://www.geolocalseo.com/blog/why-details-in-google-places-pages-should-be-essential-content/ Google has officially announced that it will now be charging for directions in Adwords where advertisers have location extensions activated for their ads. Myself and all my clients got the email notice today. Needless to say my clients are asking how it will effect them. Honestly, I'm left scratching my head ... http://www.geolocalseo.com/blog/paying-for-directions/ A long held belief amongst SEOs is that meta descriptions, on their own, have no bearing on search rankings. I believe that to be the case. But I also believe that well crafted description tags can have significant impacts on click through rates, regardless of were you actually rank. Compelling ... http://www.geolocalseo.com/blog/the-power-of-meta-descriptions/ [caption id="attachment_274" align="alignnone" width="650" caption="Faster is Better. My 1980 Honda CB750 with modifications for speed and style."][/caption] Google apparently has begun looking at page speed/load times as a ranking factor in the search results. So if you want to stay competitive with your SEO, speeding up your site can help you ... http://www.geolocalseo.com/blog/speeding-up-your-website-for-seo/ I've noticed, for many cases, if you have great organic rankings for your local terms having the additional visuals of a map marker, logo image, and address/phone info, plus maybe star ratings, review snippets and review counts, from a Google Places listing, does not matter at all. I have a certain ... http://www.geolocalseo.com/blog/google-places-listings-dont-really-matter/ Nearly a year ago Google added the ability to set a service area for local businesses in Google Places. At the time there was speculation as to how it might influence rankings and many local SEO's quickly realized it had little to no influence at all. Except that if you ... http://www.geolocalseo.com/blog/yelp-beats-google-to-service-area-based-rankings/ It's YP ad season again. A number of my clients have been asking for advice for their ads. Some are wondering if they should scrap them, some want to re-adjust things and looking to just make them more effective. Some who don't advertise in the phone book wondering if they ... http://www.geolocalseo.com/blog/yellow-page-ad-buying-tips/