Ranking UK company in Google.com

[seowoody]

Hi all,

I have a UK client with a .com domain, hosted on a US server, but the physical business premises is based in the UK. Their product is a really great product and available for export to the US.

I want to rank them higher in the US, more specifically Google.com.

I've helped them rank very well organically in the UK (google.co.uk) for some great terms, however they rank almost nowhere in google.com (gl=us) for the same terms, for example:

In Google.co.uk they rank #3 for the key-phrase.
In Google.com they rank #90 for the same key-phrase.

I've got them some great US focused links with PR coverage including MSN Cars, nydailynews.com etc.

I just wondered if there was any one "golden ticket" for boosting US rankings? I've read that a physical business premises located in the US helps a lot. Can anyone confirm this and if so, would a rented PO box in the US help?

The site has great social signals too, growing twitter following and many FB likes/shares etc.

Any other tips/advice?

Thanks in advance,
Cheers,
Woody

[CleverPhD]

Basic level, you should go into Google Webmaster Tools and make sure that your Geographic Target is set for the US on the .com. Otherwise, all Google has to go on is your UK physical address.  You may also want to set the UK domain to the UK geographic location in GWT.

Another question, is the US site just a duplicate of the UK site as far as content?  It may be that Google sees both, but since the UK site is the original then it focuses on the UK site.

I would agree that a US address (and not a PO box) would help and you can get an actual virtual street address by using services such as Earth Class Mail.  https://www.earthclassmail.com/  They have various street addresses you can use, they then scan everything in and you can login and see your mail.  If you need something ultimately delivered they can forward that too.  It is a pretty cool service and we have been using it for over a year.  I work for a virtual company (we have folks all over the US) and we use this and it is great as we used to have to forward mail and it would take forever.   Now we can login online and access it almost immediately.

[seowoody]

Hi CleverPhD

Thanks for taking the time to answer, and I'll certainly look into Earth Class Mail

Perhaps I've mislead you or you have interpreted my questions incorrectly, but there's not two domains, just one.

companyname.com

It's an international business, with HQ located in the UK. Unfortunately it's only physical location is in the UK but it's products are available internationally. You order from through the website, the product is built in the UK and then exported to the US (or any other country).

If I set the Geographic Target to US in GWT wont we lose rankings in google.co.uk? Which is by far our biggest market, (only because we rank so well in google.co.uk), the potential is in the US.

Just seems strange that the en-us keywords are identical to en-gb keywords, so why are we so far behind on google.com?

Any other ideas?

Cheers
Woody

[CleverPhD]

Well, then, ignore what I said.  It did sound like you had a .com and a .co.uk.  Google likes to keep sites in a given country.

I would suggest you look at this Moz post

http://moz.com/community/q/what-is-the-best-way-to-rank-well-on-both-google-co-uk-google-com

[seowoody]

Yep, that's a useful post, thanks

I was planning to continue building US links anyway but just wondered if there was anything else, any fellow SEO's, in the same position, found to work well?

Cheers

[irvingw]

Make a US section of the site and target that subfolder for US rankings. That subfolder should have a US address if you can make that happen and be geotargeted for the US. Or you could create a second site, keep them hosted differently and not interlinked. Might actually be a good idea if you want US customers to feel you are a US company and not that they are hiring a UK company to do work in the US which makes companies a bit leery sometimes.

[US_Delivered]

If you are still looking for a business address to sound like a US company, try US Global Mail - www.usglobalmail.com - cheaper and better service than ECM.