How does Google handle local searches?

[StevieJK]

Hi everyone,

I am a bit confused as to how Google handles local searches?

For example if I had a keyword of 'landscape gardening service', I know I can just add a city name to it to make something like 'new york landscape gardening service' and this is a way to target local searches for people looking for landscape gardening services in NY.

However, I know that Google also knows your IP and the location where you are searching, so can it be that if you are in NY and search for 'landscape gardening service' - that it can still trigger your site somehow?

have I got this right? If so, how would you optimise a webpage for this kind of search behaviour?

Thanks,
Steve.

[junne]

it give more emphasis on local listings like local classifieds,local directories,google places,yahoo places and bing places reviews.

[Anshugarg]

Originally Posted by StevieJK

Hi everyone,

I am a bit confused as to how Google handles local searches?

For example if I had a keyword of 'landscape gardening service', I know I can just add a city name to it to make something like 'new york landscape gardening service' and this is a way to target local searches for people looking for landscape gardening services in NY.

However, I know that Google also knows your IP and the location where you are searching, so can it be that if you are in NY and search for 'landscape gardening service' - that it can still trigger your site somehow?

have I got this right? If so, how would you optimise a webpage for this kind of search behaviour?

Thanks,
Steve.

As with all other Google search results, Local listings ranks results based on relevance, location/distance & prominence.

location/ distance: Your business address & proximity of your location
relevance: Business category, relevancy to the search query (relevant keywords) & some other traditional SEO factors
prominence: This is based on information we have about a business from across the web (like links, articles, and directories), rating, reviews, user content about business etc.

If you want to optimize your website for relevant local searches, you should take care of the following things:

- List your business on Google Places and build citations on other local sites. It's also very useful to be cited on blogs, articles, and other web properties.

- Optimize your website for the relevant keywords & include your phone number and address with complete info like Zip code etc.

- List your business on some good local directories with full address (including ZIP code), phone number, relevant business categories, and relevant service / product keywords

- focus on getting reviews from the 3rd party authority sites like: Yahoo local, Yelp, etc. to fit into the new way the local SERP's look