Should I Use Location Extensions?

9 replies
  • PPC/SEM
  • |
Let's say you are advertising a local business where 80% of their customers are going to do business with them purely over the Internet (email exchange of documents/signatures) or in-person at the customers location. Let's say this business offers services confined to customers in a large county (say the county measures 40 miles across N/S & E/W). The business has two physical addresses but they are essentially just rental offices in two cities 7 miles apart (on either side of a large lake)

It seems using Adwords location extension, at least on the surface, makes sense. But since the business has physical location in only a small area of the total service area, wouldn't location potentially due more harm than good by showing on the map that the physical locations of the business are not close to many customers living in the area the business still does serve?
#extensions #location
  • Location extensions are a great way to show that you are local. When shown with your ad, they help get higher click rates.

    I'm not sure it matters in your case since you say the large majority will do business with you over the Internet. Seems a location extension will work best when wanting for people to come to your physical location. Say I'm looking to buy a book. I may not care to wait a few days or even a week for delivery. But I may not want to drive to your location just for it, especially if somewhat far away, unless I'll happen to go nearby for other reasons or I happen to live really close by. On the other hand, I will displace myself for something that I need right away, say my monitor broke and need it for my business.

    As for different locations fairly close together, I think it will still help. It will look as local to most, simply the next town over. But if you are worried, simply have separate campaigns for each. Target the first city and everything around it away from the other city. Should be easy since there's a lake in between. So city A and everything you want covered north of it (if city B is south). Do the same with city B with little or no overlap in geography targeted. This will show the closest and most appropriate location to your prospects.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[10320497].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Peter Gregory
    I second that. I would definitely use location extensions. And I would take it a step further and use structured snippet extensions for neighborhoods to include all major neighborhoods within the county.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[10323368].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author edwinx
    It's depends on your product, service and audience.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[10323654].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author maureendevore01
    Banned
    [DELETED]
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[10329361].message }}
    • Profile picture of the author dburk
      Hi consultant1027,

      You should test that.

      It doesn't matter what you, I , or anyone else in this thread thinks. Data always trumps expert opinion.

      Why guess when you can test?
      {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[10330085].message }}
      • Profile picture of the author consultant1027
        Originally Posted by dburk View Post

        Hi consultant1027,

        You should test that.

        It doesn't matter what you, I , or anyone else in this thread thinks. Data always trumps expert opinion.

        Why guess when you can test?
        You would guess first in cases where the data accumulation is so slow, it may take many months to accumulate enough data to be statistically significant and reliable. Unfortunately the four accounts I'm managing right now are small business accounts with low volume.
        {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[10330907].message }}
        • Originally Posted by consultant1027 View Post

          You would guess first in cases where the data accumulation is so slow
          There's a certain amount of guessing and hypothesizing with totally new campaigns. Experience helps as well as understanding advertising principles. Then you adjust from what you learn from the data. That's the testing part. It doesn't matter how long it takes to get the data. You just can't do anything or make a decision unless you have the data to back you up. I've created campaigns where it does take months and even a year or more before I had enough data to analyse and deciding on what action to take.
          {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[10332121].message }}
  • You can but that is totally depend on your business objective. if location extensions is benefits to your business then you can use it.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[10331404].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Platt
    It depends on your product but location extensions are a good idea most of the time, even though you only have to locations.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[10331493].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Oziboomer
    Originally Posted by consultant1027 View Post

    It seems using Adwords location extension, at least on the surface, makes sense. But since the business has physical location in only a small area of the total service area, wouldn't location potentially due more harm than good by showing on the map that the physical locations of the business are not close to many customers living in the area the business still does serve?
    Location extensions much like other extensions are really "buying real-estate"

    Not physical real-estate but "page" real- estate.

    Every extension you can leverage will buy lines in PPC so why wouldn't you push a competitor down a listing?
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[10332320].message }}

Trending Topics