Local SEO + Best Practice for locations

[Mark_Ch]

Hi All,

Based on a hypothetical scenario, lets say you are a plumber. You live and operate within Chelsea in London. You have established a Google places profile and incorporated schema data to tell Google your fixed place location.

In addition you operate in several nearby towns with no fixed location presence. i.e Brentford, Bromley, Catford, Cheswick and Tottenham.

I create a feature rich page on 'How to find a quality plumber'. Within the page I incorporate the following description:

blah blah, as a quality plumber serving the community of Chelsea, we also offer our services to nearby towns of Brentford, Bromley, Catford, Cheswick and Tottenham.

I create hyperlinks for the towns (Brentford, Bromley, Catford, Cheswick and Tottenham) that allow the user see in details a full list of services, operation hours, etc. Naturally all towns will have there own unique content (no duplication).

Question
Is the above scenario the correct way to provide local seo or is this approach considered spammy to Google?

Thanks Mark

[Andy.Drinkwater]

Hi Mark,

Local SEO is a pretty big subject, and I would highly recommend you have a read of this post over at eConsultancy to gain some valuable information.

MOZ also have what is probably the best local search resource I have seen here. You will find info there from over 30 SEO professionals and is probably where I would start.

Edit- Sorry, I should also say that I wouldn't personally handle local SEO in that way, as my own feelings are that this has been done to death, and is what everyone tries.

-Andy

[Mark_Ch]

Hi Andy,

Thank you for the information. I will read this shortly.
May I ask you for your advice and how you would tackle such a grey area.

Thanks Mark

[Andy.Drinkwater]

Hi Mark,

There are so many ways to try and achieve the same results, but in the past I have had good success by creating a page based on the key location (London), creating a title something like "Plumber in London and covering surrounding counties".

Make sure you have your address and telephone number on the page, then create a section that explains you also cover the following places "Brentford (TW8), Bromley (BR1 to BR8), Catford (SE6), Chiswick (W4) and Tottenham (N17).

I would then be looking to create cocitations and gain links from local sites / directories that offer the ability to do this.

I hope that gives you a little to work on.

-Andy

[vmialik]

Hi Mark,

If the client has a blog, I also had good success, creating articles on talking about a plumber in [other city you want to focus on] and having this be a solid article at least 750-1500 word article with maybe a contact us or a business info on the sidebar for that location. These articles would rank organically for the the city plus industry that you are interested in.

Being a blog you have the flexibility about being creative in what you write in the article about the certain area you would like to rank for!

Hope this helps, and if you have more questions about this definitely ask!

[Mark_Ch]

Hi Andy + Vadim,

Thank you for your thoughts.
I have the following questions and concerns.

I have read that web directories offer little or no seo value. Google simply see's them as link farms.

I'm confused with regards to placing a 750-1500 word article on a 3rd party client site. Is this not the same as 'Guest Blogging'. Again, I have read how Matt Cutts frowns upon this practice.

Please kindly clarify....

Thanks Mark

[vmialik]

Hi Mark,

Very very good questions!

1. There is a distinction between general web directories and link farms and local citation directories.  Local citations in relevant directories is still a must method for local seo ranking. As Google Local itself aggregates information from authoritative and relevant web directories such as: Yelp, Yellowpages, Foursquare, Yahoo Local, Bing Local, Citysearch, etc. **The distinction is that Google uses this for local results for your local business, and not for organic results, for an online business, as an example. **So for organic results, online businesses, you can still have few solid and relevant directories such as BBB or Best of the Web, but you dont want to over do it here. For local results as much relevant and authoritative directories is the name of the game. Hope that clarifies this, if its still confusing let us know.

2. By if the client has a blog, I was going off your hypothetical example of the plumber. What I mean here is writing **on your own blog **if you have one. Again it does not even have to be a blog, you can create a page, you can even call it a landing page appropriately.  It will be a quality content rich page, that you are trying to rank for organically.  Good you are aware that Guest Blogging is now considered by many an abused tactic that is now crossing over into the spammy category. So you are correct in this.

Hope this clarifies it for ya, again let me know if you have any more questions!

[Mark_Ch]

This post is deleted!

[Andy.Drinkwater]

Hi Mark,

Sorry to butt in...

Have a look at Whitespark. They are great at finding niche sites for cocitation purposes and I have used them myself many times (read, monthly subscription).

Some directories are not really frowned upon because they aren't selling links, but listings. Take Yell, Thompson, etc. You will get links to your website, but not something that would benefit it in the way Google would object to.

-Andy

[Mark_Ch]

Hi Andy,

Thanks for the additional info.
Had a quick look into Whitespark and see they offer a $200 yearly package.

From your experience of this product are the results provided (lets say for directories) of significant value. Are most directories provided subject to annual/monthly costs or can you get quality free sources?

Thanks Mark

[vmialik]

Hi Mark,

1. It comes down to substantial editorial discretion/review by the paid directory for it to be legit in Google's eyes. Best of the Web, BBB, and many other paid services that have substantial editorial process to review the business leads to a high quality paid directory and Google is totally okay with that, as Matt Cutts states in the link above. The video explains it well the difference between acceptable paid directories and those that are not.

2. Andy mentioned a great source Whitespark that I use as well.  However, I would start here: http://moz.com/learn/local/citations-by-category its free and Google approved if you will citations, to start out with. Sure enough they have the plumber category: http://moz.com/learn/local/citations-by-category#Plumbers

Also: https://moz.com/local/search and http://moz.com/learn/local/local-search-data-uk

If you take care of these especially all if not most in the last link I sent, you should generally be in good shape, if not you can them get even more with whitespark!

Hope it helps!

[Andy.Drinkwater]

Hi Mark,

There is a mix of both paid and free sites listed. Before you commit to a year, perhaps just try a month for $30 to see if it meets your needs?

Well worth a punt

-Andy

[Mark_Ch]

Hi Andy,

Thank you very much for the great advice.

Thanks Mark