Multiple Location TROUBLE!

[MarketingChimp10]

Hello Moz World,

I have a client that has three brick and mortar locations. After placing all three locations into Google Places, I discovered that 2 of his 3 locations are not brick and mortar stores. They are actually his house, and his Mother's house. He is a plumber, and services most of the state. My question is, as a professional SEO consultant who wants to do the right thing, what should I recommend he do? How long before Google catches him, and what will actually happen? Should I advise him to play the system till he gets caught? And Lastly, does anyone have any recommendations on how to rank a single website for multiple cities within the state?

Loaded Questions, Thanks ahead of time for all of the responses!

B/R

Will H.

[Lumina]

First and most importantly, I strongly advise against ever suggesting a client "play the system". Everyone gets caught eventually and it's silly to make such a big risk for such a small benefit. How long before he's caught? Who knows. But he will be, and neither of you wants that.

I recommend removing his home and mother's home as locations in terms of Google Places. Then, optimize the website for these locations. Make mention of the areas he serves often (but not to a spammy degree), and create **good, long, unique content **for location- or area-specific pages.

[MiriamEllis]

Hi Will!
I'm glad you've opened this up for discussion, as it's always a good thing when the question of business ethics arises for there to be a chance to think out loud about what the right thing is to do. There are really 2 parts to this:

1. Your client needs to run his business ethically. It sounds like the facts here are that your client actually has only 1 real physical shop but that, for ranking purposes, he's wanting to convince his customers and the search engines that he has 3. When you put it this way, it's really easy to see that the truth isn't being told, which automatically makes this a question of ethics. Who would want to do business with a company that operates by tricking its customers, right?

And as far as the search engines go, I totally get it that their guidelines for service area businesses may sometimes seem like unfair restrictions. Google has never given SABs quite the same treatment that they have accorded B&Ms. But, if we're using a Google product, they are asking us to abide by their rules, and doing so is only playing fair. Your client would not appreciate his competitors being untruthful about their business models in order to surpass him, and he might, in fact, want to report them to Google for doing so. If your client can put himself in the shoes of his customers, search engines and competitors, hopefully his sense of fairness will be a guiding light here. And, if not, he is likely to learn the hard way. Competitors will report him or Google will see a red flag in looking at their street-level imagery and the client may find not only his 2 fictitious locations removed, but also, his genuine location flagged as spam, too. No one can predict when these things may happen, so it's a very anxious situation.

If ethics don't work, and concern for the lifetime success of the business doesn't work, then this may not be a client you want to keep.

2. Now, let's take a look at why Bryan is advising you never to suggest that a client "play the system". Just like for the client, ethics really matter in the way you run your own business. Good marketing relies on knowledge, skill and experience - not tricks. And, for the long term success of your business, you need successful clients whose brands you are building to last. This is how you build your own, priceless brand. The polar opposite of this is going to be clients whose businesses may benefit from loopholes temporarily but who may then come crashing down, leading to a serious impact on their bottom line and, possibly, litigation against your company if they blame you for the advice you've given and your contracts don't protect you from this.

I sense from your honest question that you are standing at very important crossroad for your company. It's really good that you're thinking about this and wanting to discuss it. The Internet is still literally crammed with those crummy SEO companies that don't know what they're doing and make a strange living off of bad practices that hurt the businesses that engage them, but it's the agencies that commit to taking the high road that are standing the test of time. Companies like these ones: https://moz.com/rand/recommended-list-seo-consultants/

My best advice here is to imagine the respect you want to win for the brand you are trying to build and act accordingly.

Closing up: practical advice here for your client if he is willing to walk a better walk on this, organic optimization is the option open for the non-physical cities the company serves. If the business needs calls right now, invest in some PPC for these cities while you work to build organic authority for these target cities.

Good luck, and thanks for starting an important discussion!

[MarketingChimp10]

Hello Miriam,

WOW & Thank You! I want to be a high road business; I've been researching this all day trying to figure out how to 1) tell my client, we need to shut down the false addresses, and 2) formulate a game plan on how to drive traffic organically for surrounding cities. Tough task but, I am up for it.

Your response is insightful, and I know what I need to do. Thanks Again!

B/R

Will

[MarketingChimp10]

Hello Bryan,

Thank you for your response and tips on creating good local content. I have to do some research on how doing this effectively, but I'd like to follow good ethics. I'm glad that a forum like this exist, I don't know where else I would get advice. Thanks Again

B/R

Will

[MiriamEllis]

That's great, Will. Wishing you very good luck ahead!