Local SEO Field Notes
What the search data actually says for local service businesses, told straight, including the parts that did not work.
You have a website and a Google Business Profile, and you cannot tell which of them is quietly doing the work. The notes include the parts that did not flatter us: the sitemap post admits it took three deploys to fix our own site properly. It is less about tactics in general and more about what a specific page, profile or listing is doing for you right now.
The posts are field notes. One shows why a longer service page does not rank better and gives a simple test any owner can run. Another walks through a Business Profile checklist written for your trade, sorted into items that move calls and items that are housekeeping. Others cover what an urgent searcher checks before phoning an emergency locksmith at night, from true night hours to a number that matches the listing, why a sitemap can show the same lastmod date on every page, and our theory that missed calls may cost you map rankings. That last one is a theory, and it is written as one.
Most of the posts include a check you can run on your own site the same day. We show the test, you run it, and you decide what the result means for your business. The Business Profile checklist, for example, is built to be worked through in one sitting, and the sitemap post shows how to check your own site in a minute.
You should leave knowing which pages earn their place, which profile items are worth an afternoon, and which technical details to raise with your web person. Would you rather hand the checking and the fixing to someone else? That is our local search work.
Start here
Why a longer service page does not rank better
A word count target is a poor way to judge a service page. Here is a simpler test: does it answer the question completely and quickly?
How to work through a Business Profile checklist written for your trade
A generic profile checklist skips the categories, services and photos that matter in your trade. Here is how to work through a trade-specific one in order, and how often to run it again.
Every post in Local SEO Field Notes
How to work through a Business Profile checklist written for your trade
A generic profile checklist skips the categories, services and photos that matter in your trade. Here is how to work through a trade-specific one in order, and how often to run it again.
Google cannot hear your phone ring, but it can see who gets the next call
Google never hears your phone ring. It can see what a caller does next, and a caller who comes straight back to dial a competitor tells it plenty. Our theory, and our fix.
Why your sitemap lastmod is the same date on every page
A sitemap where every page shows the same last-changed date often means the build cannot read git history at deploy time, not that nothing changed. Here is the fix that held.
Why a longer service page does not rank better
A word count target is a poor way to judge a service page. Here is a simpler test: does it answer the question completely and quickly?
How emergency locksmiths win the call that comes at night
Your listing can hold the map by day and still lose the night call. Here is the order an urgent searcher checks things, and what to fix at each stop.
Want to talk through your marketing?
Tell us where things stand and we'll tell you plainly what we'd do next.