Doing a few queries this morning, I’ve noticed a range of local sites being listed in Google alongside the regular SERPs for generic queries. Digging a bit deeper, this looks like much more than a personalised search feature, in fact Google seem to be emphasising local websites very heavily for competitive queries when completely logged out too.
Google have announced this week that they have applied 40 algorithm updates in Feb, with the Google Venice update rollout affecting local. So I’ve tested this out by performing the following queries in Incognito mode in Chrome – so hopefully this will restrict the amount of personalisation that is going on here. But Google does know my location – which is automatically set as Oxford. So I’ve compared the set of results for a range of queries – and have changed my location settings, from the automatic selection of Oxford – comparing this with Manchester.
Google UK SERPs Location Test: Oxford vs Manchester
Search Query = “Eye Test” Location = Oxford:
Search Query = “Eye Test” Location = Manchester:
So for very generic queries, you’ll find that location is now a key factor towards deciding which sites rank on the first page of Google organically. The comparison doesn’t end there either; competitive queries such as “pizza“, “doctors surgery“, “eye test“, “online dating“, “car mechanic” etc are all providing local variations in the Google SERPs.
How unique/location optimised does your content need to be?
I’ve taken a look at how well-optimised the Vision Express listings are for local queries, so here’s their Oxford pages content:
Looking at this as an example of a page that is ranking as a result of the Google Venice update, you can see they’ve pulled in a large amount of local content. Most notably:
- Oxford title tags
- URLs
- Breadcrumbs/internal links
- Headings
Plus they have:
- Local phone number
- Local store address
- Location and facilities information
- Information on the local store manager
- Customer testimonial specific to that store
Is this a useful change?
What do you think about this? Do you want to find local results listed here? Is it useful, or would you prefer to see a higher quality non-local site listed instead? Plus what do you think about Google’s other local algorithm updates, such as switching to favour local domains over .coms (if you own both – e.g. Amazon/ebay) or Google’s rollout of the hreflang meta tag for international, but same language content?
Sites that once ranked on the 1st page, nationally for broad terms, for example “wedding photographers” may now lose rankings and traffic depending on what location the person is searching from. If they want to get this national traffic back they now have to spend money on Adwords. Although it does make sense from a user perspective, it is a clever move by Google to increase their Adwords revenues.
This is an interesting change – and makes sense for my market (wedding photography) as people are likely to want someone local-ish.
What I’d like to know more about (a future blog post perhaps?) is how to optimise to benefit from the increased local emphasis.
Optimising for Local SEO has been doing the rounds since past few months. Now with this Google update, it has become mandatory.
Also to note is the Custom Location filter on Google SERPs is now broken. Being on a UK IP and setting the Custom Location to United States still shows UK sites. I think they have dialed up the IP location too high.
Really interesting read, so if you have a ‘national’ type website, is it wise to spend the time contructing ‘regional’ or location specific webpages, complete with titles, localised information etc?
A mammoth job but would it have a significant seo benefit?
@Chris – interesting point, I’m not sure if it would encourage more geo-targeted PPC or not – can certainly see it being a big opportunity for optimising local content in SEO.
@Mark – I’ve updated a post with an example on how Vision Express have optimised their pages, which is working well as it’s ranking for the “eye test” term I highlighted.
@George – agree, you should have been doing it before. And if you weren’t, you definitely should be now!
@Brent – interesting, I haven’t experienced that to be honest, auto-location is normally pretty accurate for me.
@Mark – exactly – and yes, it is a bit job – but here you can see the potential benefits in doing so.
The future is local for many search terms. I think that local will be even more important when it relates to mobile devices and GPS positioning. You’ll want to punch in “milk on sale” and you want to see local results. This update is nothing compared to whats ahead.
So we who are are trying to sell our fine craft arton the web are screwed. No way we have time to create regional sites…
I like this update as it gives the end user theoretically better results to choose from… Here’s an old rant that I wish Google would fix: I don’t get how some companies get a monopoly on the top results sometimes. For ex= “Sherman Oaks Pool Cleaning Company”… really??? top 3 results??? Is it because they are chain companies with multiple locations?
Nice post Kevin! Just made the “eye test” check from where I am (Italian IP) and didn’t get any local results – so it seems to be smart enough to keep returning “non-local” SERPs when no information about local is available.
Ah that explains it then, March is when I disappeared from local! All google tell me is to be patient and keep updating the places page.