Something super weird just happened with Google 3 Pack

[tigger286]

something super weird just happened, briefly. i went into Edge browser and incognito mode. (i never use Edge. my main browser is firefox) anyway for a brief session all the GMB results were totally fucked. like i was seeing myself and my main competitor all the way at the bottom of page 1 on maps. but i just checked again and it was back to normal (me being 4 and competitor at 3). wth?

 

[tony_d]

It's probably a location based parameter.

You're in incognito, so your previous 'location profile' wasn't applied to the search, which means you were probably served results for a different location.

Location is the number 1 ranking factor for maps, by a long shot. I literally drove around a city (admittedly, two years ago, but I assume it's still the same) with my cellphone and location services turned on, and repeated the same query eg "roofing services {city}", and the 3pack changed as I moved around

 

[tigger286]

It's probably a location based parameter.

You're in incognito, so your previous 'location profile' wasn't applied to the search, which means you were probably served results for a different location.

Location is the number 1 ranking factor for maps, by a long shot. I literally drove around a city (admittedly, two years ago, but I assume it's still the same) with my cellphone and location services turned on, and repeated the same query eg "roofing services {city}", and the 3pack changed as I moved around

How come it's never happened before? I mean what you say makes sense. I've done this many many times as I check it regularly.

 

[tony_d]

How come it's never happened before? I mean what you say makes sense. I've done this many many times as I check it regularly.

I have no idea

But I do know that with Google, you can do the same thing 10 times and get 10 different results each time, so... I would assume it's one of those situations.