Any advice for better results for local search in the UK ?
-
Hi there,
I have tried the tools here, and they are BRILLIANT but maybe to much for me. I just wondered if anyone in the UK had time to give me some advice. A lot of my customers are small businesses (mainly trades, like plumbers, builders etc etc), and I am trying to find best practices for getting them more quality traffic amidst a lot of competition. One customer I am working with currently has 50+ competitiors for his small plumbing business that are within 5 miles of him and have an effective web prescence. In those circumstances (take it as read that I have killed myself creating quality content that I am proud of for this client), does anyone have any killer advice for me that could make my sites more effective ? If anyone does have the time I am more than willing to PM the URL I am working with at the moment.
Thanks for your time..
-
Yea they are a bit of a waste of time,
The client is better to pick a decent brand type domain, ie proplumbers.co.uk
then create landing pages within the site ieproplumbers.co.uk/plumbers-townname
then optimise the page for that area with unique content, customers quotes, service map, and if possible local phone number of that area. As in my opinion this helps with conversion.
Google has been moving away from keyword rich domains for years now, yes they are still effective but nothing like they used to be. I would definitely stay away from this practice.
-
Hey Will,
Thanks so much for taking the time to respond to me, its really appreciated. Your points are valid and there is a couple of things you have mentioned which had completely passed me by.
I wonder if you have time to answer another "local" question. I am increasingly getting clients come to me with what can only be described as a portfolion of local domains such as plumbercity.co.uk, plumbercitysuburb1.co.uk, plumbercitysuburb2.co.uk etc etc. Am I right in thinking that these additional domains are pretty much useless as possible type ins and might even cause reputation problems if they are linked in as landing pages ?
Thanks in advance
Nick
-
Hi Will here
for me the best way is first off good content, you will find that when your dealing with plumbers, plasterers and builders getting links from guest blogging, infographics and giveaways is not practical.
here is what i would do for a local company
-
Join all the industry forums and start talking getting involved with your clients community
-
Start doing some keyword research into your clients business, ie plasterers, Rendering, Machine plastering ect
-
Start Creating content on this ie "how to Render a wall" , "how to plaster a wall"
-
For every job your client does locally write a blog post, ie "Plastering Job Glasgow"
-
Start Following other local tradesman or services like your clients business
-
Tweet your client work to other tradesmen or like wise service
-
Join all the local services directories that are related to your niche
-
Make sure your business address matches across directories you join,
-
Create a google business plus account,
-
Create a nice A5 Flyer offers something a small discount on your clients jobs in return for a honest review of your services
-
Join Facebook and do the same, if a customer leaves a review give them a little discount
This is just some of my tips
Also one last tip
If for example your client is a local service for example "plumbing" company and your in Manchester. Then try find a area thats more competive than your area, ie London. Complete a few searches ie Plumbing London, plumbers in London, then complete the following
Check their backlinks
Check their google plus profile
Check their sites onsiteThis should give you an idea of their strategies, as sometimes when looking at your competition in your own backyard can distract you.
-
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Site property is verified for new version of search console, but same property is unverified in the old version
Hi all! This is a weird one that I've never encountered before. So basically, an admin granted me search console access as an "owner" to the site in search console, and everything worked fine. I inspected some URL's with the new tool and had access to everything. Then, when I realized I had to remove certain pages from the index it directed me to the old search console, as there's no tool for that yet in the new version. However, the old version doesn't even list the site under the "property" dropdown as either verified or unverified, and if I try to add it it makes me undergo the verification process, which fails (I also have analytics and GTM access, so verification shouldn't fail). Has anyone experienced something similar or have any ideas for a fix? Thanks so much for any help!
Reporting & Analytics | | TukTown1 -
The difference between organic searches in Acquisition and organic searches in Default Channel Grouping
Hi guys, We have a question. In Google Analytics, there are 2 types of identifying organic searches: through Acquisition and through Default Channel Grouping. On our website, we have some differences between the number of organic sessions. Which one do you think is more relevant? Which one do you use? Many thanks in advance!
Reporting & Analytics | | RIDGID_Europe0 -
Differences in site search revenue in GA
I just put in a piece of software to replace a really bad built in site search engine on my 3dcart website. Now I am trying to measure the change, but I am having some issues. When I check the ecom data in the conversions section of GA with the built in segment Performed Site Search, I get promising results. Approximately 5% revenue increase over LY. But if we jump to behavior, site search, usage, and then check the visits with site search, I get a decrease by 4%. And the actual revenue is off, by like double (150k compared to 80k) Anyone have any idea why I am getting these results? The site search function is set up. Tracking is enabled, query parameter is keyword and search url is /search.asp?keyword=
Reporting & Analytics | | ShockoeCommerce0 -
Exact Match in Google Search (Not Adwords)
I was going throught the list of keywords that have sent traffic to my site over the last 7 years and cam across one "A516 grade 70" that had hundreds of variants. Now in a lot of cases search volumes were different as were SERPS. We've tested a few variants with reworked pages (70% similar to original but optimised for variant keyword) and see good SERPS and traffic results. Theres obviously some diminishing returns here for us but the interesting question is when to these variants become an exact match and when not? In some cases the variants are unique because of the spacig, periods and hyphens used. there isn't a clear correlation with exact matc though. Insight appreciated. (Sorry for spelling errors. Form doesn't play nicely with iPad)
Reporting & Analytics | | Zippy-Bungle0 -
How can I easily combine moz page difficulty, google search volume and SERPS position?
I want to produce an excel spreadsheet that I can use to identify the best use of my content Writing time. So Looking at a keyword list I want Current SERPS to show me where I am now? moz page difficulty score to show how hard I'll have to work google traffic estimate so that I can see the potential payoff. I can can generate all these separately but combining them is a huge time waster as invariably the results don't come back in quiet the same order and a line by line check is required. Part of the reason for doing this is keyword exploration so that we can find new niches by generating hundreds or thousands of keywords to test.
Reporting & Analytics | | Zippy-Bungle0 -
Best way to measure local search keyword rank
I have several clients that have a regional or local presence and want to track their rankings for various keywords, but only in the areas they are located in. What are the best ways to track keyword rank in specific locations or regions of the US?
Reporting & Analytics | | TheURLdr0 -
I have few similar job forms that were created for different positions. SEOMoz says, its "duplicate pages". So how do I resolve it? I want my jobs to be searchable in Search Engines.
Hi There, I have few similar job forms that were created for different positions. SEOMoz says, its "duplicate pages". So how do I resolve it? I want my jobs to be searchable in Search Engines. Thanks !
Reporting & Analytics | | pointstar0 -
Nofollow page is being reported as a landing page for organic search in Google Analytics
One of my client's websites includes a series of pages for an enrollment process. All of these pages are blocked by robots.txt. In Google Analytics these pages are showing data as landing pages for organic search traffic, and have been for quite some time. There was recently a surge of organic search traffic landing on one of these pages, coming from multiple search engines. The pages appear to be blocked and I'm not finding any of them in the search results for the keywords that are being reported in GA or by searching for the url. Does anyone have any insights into why this might be happening?
Reporting & Analytics | | rgibson1000