How do I increase my client's Google Local listings?

[oomdomarketing]

Hi Guys,

I have a hypothetical question for you. Let's say I live in a town that has two pizza places and in the maps section of a Google SERP the other place outranks my client when I type in "Pizza Place Smalltown NY."

What would be a list of things that I could do to make "Pizza Place Smalltown, NY" rank better in that portion?

Thanks!

[TheeDigital]

Optimize the Google+ page, ensure NAP (name, address, and phone#) consistency, build NAP listings (Check out Moz Local to cover the data aggregators and Whitespark for additional opportunities,) ensure you have listings at any local directories such as city specific, BBB, chamber of commerce, and work on building any industry specific pizza links to increase their organic rankings as well. Other items such as adding schema markup to the NAP on site might help.

Check out http://moz.com/local-search-ranking-factors

[JVRudnick]

Or...give this link a click to see what the continent's top LOCAL search experts have ranked as factors to consider when building new LOCAL search serps!

Disclaimer: yup, I'm one of same for the last few years but the knowledge in that survey is terrific, eh!

[MiriamEllis]

Hi Michael,

Definitely check out the link Jim Rudnick has shared to the Local Search Ranking Factors 2014 survey. As you'll see from that, local search rankings are made up of a tremendous number of factors, with some having more weight than others. So, first, you want to be sure your client has all of his ducks in a row with the basics. Then, you should analyze his competitor to see if you can spot any weaknesses.

We just published an interesting tutorial here on Moz for using our Check Listing tool for some cool competitive analysis. Check this out:

http://moz.com/help/guides/local/check-listing

The above how-to also gives some other research suggestions.

Essentially, what your client needs to do is:

• Do all of the basics right

• Make a superior effort in some areas, such as content development, review acquisition and, possibly, social engagement

• Remember that rankings are not static. Over the past few years, it has been clear that one of the most important local search ranking factors relates to the physical location of a customer at the time he is making his search. You may hear this referred to as the customer/using being the 'centroid'. Particularly on mobile devices, where a customer is in town will influence whether your client or his competitor comes up first, based on the distance between the searcher and the business. It's really, really important educate all local business clients about this!

Hope this helps!