Local Search Engine Ranking Factors

Getting a better ranking in Google Local is always difficult. The main reason is that it continues to be a “black box” that is hard to reverse engineer. It often seems to irrationally rank one business over another.

In a nutshell, they survey a bunch of local search experts on what they think most important factors are. They tally the results, and voila, you have an instant resource on what the true experts believe works and doesn’t work.

Here are their top 20 factors:

1. General Importance of Claiming Place Page / Local Listing
2. Business Address in City of Search
3. Associating Place Page with Proper Categories
4. Volume of Citations from Major Data Providers + IYP Portals
5. General Importance of Off-Page / Off-Listing Criteria
6. General Importance of Customer Reviews
7. Quality of Citations from Major Data Providers + IYP Portals
8. Product / Service Keyword in Place Page Business Title
9. Volume of Customer Reviews associated with Your Business
10. Quality of Unstructured Citations
11. Volume of Unstructured Citations
12. Proximity of Address to City Centroid
13. Customer Reviews Left on Third-Party Websites
14. Product / Service Keywords in Place Page Description
15. General Importance of On-Page Criteria
16. Quality of Inbound Links to Website
17. Velocity of Customer Reviews Associated with Your Business
18. Volume of MyMaps on which Your Business Is Included
19. Associating Photos with Your Place Page
20. Associating Local Area Code as Primary Place Page Phone Number

And here are the top negative factors that hurt you (the worst one is the last):

1. Negative Review Sentiment
2. Negative Ratings
3. Location Keywords in Categories
4. (800) Phone Number on Website w/o Local Area Code
5. (800) Phone Number on Website w/o Local Area Code
6. (800) As Primary Place Page Number
7. Multiple Locations on Places Landing Page
8. Multiple Place Pages w/Same Business Title
9. PO Box on Website w/o Physical Address
10. Multiple Place Pages w/Same Address
11. Hiding Address on Your Place Page
12. Multiple Place Pages w/Same Phone Number

Also, they provided a list of the top data providers and top review engines at the bottom of the report.

I recommend you read every word of this important report if you want to learn how to get better results in the world of local search.