How you rank your GMBs?

Scadush said:

I think this is a good suggestion, however, Google ranks by GPS for local, not organic canonical rankings. Finding the top competitor is great, but instead, define the business trade area and use a GEO Grid mapping tool to see who is getting the most maps for the exact trade area. Typically, the main keywords for a GMB are 10 to 1 over including a geo modifier so ranking for something city is ok, but not as good as ranking for most maps under the main keyword alone in your actual trade area. Another important fact is that citations are only about 7% to 10% of the equation in regards to actually ranking locally. So make them count and do reverse engineering based on GPS rankings, not conical rankings.

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Scadush said:

A trade area is a geographic area around your business where up to 80% of your customers come from. A dentist say is 3 miles whereas a local coffee shop might be 1 mile. Its all dependent on where the most likely geographic area a customer will come from. It also establishes where who your real competitors are.

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Scadush said:

Ok. Its way easier usually for keyword + city because it's got a lot less search and is nowhere near as valuable. The only reason SEO's got attached to these geo modifiers is that before local, its the only way you could rank locally, organically. You should go after main keywords as that is what locals use on their smartphones knowing that google will give them proximity and only those living outside the area use the modifier (about 20%). You need to focus on the GPS and not the single-digit rankings or services that use them with techniques that create local domination over competitors in their actual trade area, not a "city" modifier.

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Scadush said:

GEO Grids are mapped by GPS point, and they are only a sample. Every time you move a few feet, there is a new set of maps so to speak. The maps are great because if you see your ranking every 1/4 mile lets say, then you can assume the rankings between are pretty similar or gradually worse depending on averaging the two. Service businesses have no address so you pick a service area and run a grid. Since there is no proximity to attach an address to, your rankings are not usually very good if someone else has a brick-and-mortar location for the same search. We attack that with our program, but I recommend not fighting city hall and putting in the darn address already. There are so many ways to do it, so why make it so hard? If you absolutely must have no address, then anonymous CTR by 4G proxies and/or user engagement from local guide accounts in the service area will do the trick.

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hreyhrey said:

I would love to add the address of course, but it's not really feasible with Rank & Rent. In R&R you're forced to find random people online that are willing to accept a GMB postcard under the impression their data will be hidden.
Imagine if someone decided to visit the random craigslist person you're using for an address! I've read stories of the police being involved in that situation.

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pio69 said:

What are you looking for keyword difficulty?

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hreyhrey said:

I build full sites with lots of content, however I use NLP’s for the content so that’s not an issue for me.

wordpress + digital ocean for hosting

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pio69 said:

Thanks, ever tried with a 1 page or few pages site?

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hreyhrey said:

No, I don’t see the point of that. I want to build full entities that are powerful and can’t be touched by google or anyone.
Recently I had a GBP get suspended and when I appealed, even without any supporting documents, they reinstated it right away.

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Scadush said:

Hi Alexander,
The reason many have failed at CTR manipulation is like anything else, it has to be done the right way. It's like when I hear people say, "yeah, I tried SEO, but it doesn't work". For CTR manipulation to work locally, it has to be first and foremost, done from mobile proxies. Secondly, it must be done reasonably close to the location. Many CTR bots are sending through residential proxies from one location sometimes thousands of miles from where the actual location is. It's easily spotted on Google Analytics and if you can see it, so can Google. There have been a lot of backyard programs sold to SEO people that try to do everything. CTR to websites, CTR to Youtube, CTR to the GMB, you name it. But in order for GMB CTR to work, it needs to follow the natural progression of an actual local customer. That means expensive proxies, from mobile devices, sent out locally. And the biggest reason for an agency or SEO to use proper CTR locally is the clients they serve. Being able to show progress on Insights and Analytics in the first few months, and happily reporting on it will allow all the other parts of your local SEO to work too. The service we use is affordable and never disappoints. Even during Covid, we never lost a local client because we increase traffic month after month. Once Google sees NATURAL-looking local search, and in accordance with their own patent, they reward the GMB with more maps and search as well. This is a fact proven on over 140+ accounts for us in the past 2 years. Anyway, just wanted to clarify this point and let local SEO guys know that CTR, after the obvious optimization, directories and regular posting, etc, is the way to help and retain clients.

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