What are tips for ranking on Google Maps?

[jonnyholt]

I have another thread going where everyone is saying to keep both the Places profile as well as the Google Plus Local profile I have for my company.  I have another person telling me that it has a negative effect to have both accounts at the same time so I'm assuming thats why the listing never comes up on places unless you zoom all the way into the map to the address of the storefront.

With that being said, can anyone provide some good tips for ranking first page on google maps?

Goole Plus Local - https://plus.google.com/114370561649922317296/about?gl=us&hl=en

Google Places - https://plus.google.com/103220086647895058915/about?gl=us&hl=en

[MiriamEllis]

Hi Jonathan,

Would you like to link to your other thread? I'd be interested to see it. In the meantime, Google's Local algo has several hundred factors involved. Some of the most important of these are:

1. The business having a physical location in the city it's trying to rank for

2. The consistency of NAP across the Internet

3. Compliance with all Google Places Quality Guidelines (i.e. a lack of guideline violations)

4. The authority of the website

5. Proper choice of categories

6. The quality and quantity of citations

7. The number of Google-based reviews of the business

This is a start. For more information on this subject, I highly recommend that you study the 2012 Local Search Ranking Factors report. *Note, several big changes have happened since this was published but most of the data is still completely accurate:

http://www.davidmihm.com/local-search-ranking-factors.shtml

Hope this helps!

[toddmumford]

Hi Jonathon, David Mihm's study has stood the test of time, and in many ways is still relevant today

http://www.davidmihm.com/local-search-ranking-factors.shtml

Best,
Todd