Guys, i have one question. What kind of links or other stuff i need to rank a website in the local search results (the 7 pack or whatever) ? Do i need tons of citations or is it something else?
You need a local backlinks. For example, if you want to rank your site in UK. You need a UK backlinks, UK Facebook likes, UK twitter followers etc. in this way, you will get rank in UK search engine easily.
If it's a real business with a local address the first thing you need to do is optimize it's google+ local listing. You should do the same for all of the local listing sites. The more citations the better. Look in the downloads section there's usually a guide or two for things you need to do for ranking in google places results. Now for organic ranking you're going to need some quality links to the site. Keep in mind that Google is getting very aggressive with penalties lately. I would focus on creating some high quality web 2.0 buffer sites that you can build links to. Use those sites to push your link juice through. You should also look into setting up a rep management system where you can funnel reviews to the local directories. The more positive reviews you can get on those sites the better. I typically focus on Google+, yahoo, and yelp.
yea, i'm doing seo for a real business with a local address in the US. so far i managed to rank it in the actual search results but not in the map results.
Citations, its location within the center of other businesses, any reviews?, is the google places verified? Local maps listing is a totally different algo than organic.
This is very true. Citations and reviews are key to the pack 7, and other factors you have no control over and therefore shouldn't worry about.
