Darren Shaw's Mozcon 2019 talk where he walks through a case study in local seo taking a business from zero online presence to ranking well in the local search results. From zero web presence to ranking hyper-locally, Darren will take us along on the 8-month-long journey of a business growing its digital footprint and analyzing what worked (and didn’t) along the way. How well will they rank from a GMB listing alone? What about when citations were added, and later indexed? Did having a keyword in the business name help or harm, and what changes when they earn a few good links? Buckle up for this wild ride as we discover exactly what impact different strategies have on local rankings.

1. GET YOUR
SLIDES HERE
sprk.it/mozcon2019

2. The Case
Study

3. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Nov 9, 2018

4. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Nov 9, 2018

5. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
NONE of the 113 submissions
were a clean slate
Dec 9, 2018

6. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
FC Developments!
Dec 15, 2018

7. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Did some information gathering
Dec 20, 2018

8. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Did some keyword “research”
Dec 20, 2018

9. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Base terms plus modifiers
Dec 20, 2018

10. GMB
Setup

11. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Created the GMB listing
Dec 20, 2018

12. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
“Optimized” the GMB listing
The categories are really the only thing to optimize
Dec 20, 2018

13. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
But also, fill out every
field and regularly use all
features for engagement
signals and conversions

14. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Is a GMB website good enough to rank?
Dec 20, 2018

15. Things I like about the GMB site:
It looks decent enough
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

16. Things I like about the GMB site:
Simple and easy for a business to use
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

17. Things I like about the GMB site:
Feed content directly into the Knowledge Graph?
Disclaimer:
This is pure
speculation
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

18. Things I like about the GMB site:
Posts and reviews are automatically added to the page
Fresh content!
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

19. HOT TIP!(maybe?)
Even if you have a website, you
might still want to create and add
content to the website in GMB
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

20. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
I didn’t like the URL
https://fc-developments-custom-home-builder.business.site
Jan 10, 2019

21. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
So I bought a domain right in GMB
Jan 10, 2019

22. Rank
Tracking

23. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Welp, that was easy. Ranking #1!
Jan 11, 2019

24. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Welp, that was easy. Ranking #1!
Jan 11, 2019
But,
long tail
keyword
And I live
only a
few
blocks
away

25. To get a better sense of rankings, track from
different locations around the city
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

27. Citation
Building

28. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
I had our citation team build 100 citations
Jan 15, 2019

29. HOT TIP!
Use a different phone number for
citation building to avoid all the
annoying sales calls from crap
directories
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

30. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Um… what about NAP consistency?

31. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Just add it as an additional # in GMB

32. 18 calls

33. All from sales people

34. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
One month later, did the citations impact rankings?
Feb 11, 2019

35. More
Content

36. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Added a bit more content to the site
Mar 6, 2019

37. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
The next day, the first ORGANIC rankings appeared
Feb 11, 2019
Added extra content

38. Citation
Indexing

39. Are the citations providing
any benefit if the pages
aren’t indexed in Google?
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

40. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Added links to
all the citation
URLs to the
GMB website
Mar 8, 2019

41. Greenlane Script
https://www.greenlanemarketing.com/tools/google-indexation-tester/

42. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
March 12th - No real change to indexation
And results differ at different run times. Hmm.

43. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
March 12th - No real change to indexation
And results differ at different run times. Hmm.

44. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Hmm…
This GMB site
has zero
authority to
pass to the
citations…

45. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_

46. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
So I tried this on March 12th

47. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
This also did nothing
but Matthew Woodward got some sweet affiliate $bux

48. Ok, let’s try to index from a higher authority domain

49. Submitted the page for indexing through Search Console
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

50. BOOM! Indexation rate DOUBLED the next day
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

51. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Rankings seemed to respond the next day too!

52. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
And rankings have been on the rise since
(though, reviews and links are now also contributing)
Added the whitespark.ca
indexation page

53. Service Area
Test

54. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Added service areas for each postcode I’m tracking
Feb 19, 2019

55. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Maybe some impact? Could be other factors
Added the
service areas

56. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
To be sure, I took them out on April 5
Apr 5, 2019

57. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Rankings were not impacted by removal
Removed the
service areas

58. Google
Posts

59. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Started pumping out Google Posts daily
Feb 24, 2019

60. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Rankings maybe responded a bit?
Started adding posts daily

61. Reviews

62. Mar 14, 2019
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

63. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Got our first review!
Mar 14, 2019

64. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Two more the next day!
Mar 15, 2019

65. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
How did the reviews impact rankings?
Got 3 reviews Nice

66. Links

67. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Have you seen this?
https://twitter.com/GrindstoneSEO/status/1087836159969914880

68. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
(H)igh (A)uthority (D)omain (R)elavant

69. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Branded or URL anchors only

70. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
LINKS!

71. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
LINKS!
Mar 29, 2019

72. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
LINKS!
Apr 1, 2019

73. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
LINKS!
Apr 1, 2019

74. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
LINKS!
Apr 1, 2019

75. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
How did the links impact rankings?
First link 3 more
WOW!

76. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_

77. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
No impact?
1 11 1 1 1 1 1 3 1
12 new links from industry and city specific sites

78. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
SAD TROMBONE
Still nothing as of July 5th

79. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Theory: the law of diminishing returns
Links
Rankings
Reached parity with competition?

80. We don’t need more links.
To progress further, we need
to improve in other areas.
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

81. New Website

82. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_

84. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Re-indexed via Search Console

85. #mozcon @DarrenShaw_
Google:
Launched new site

86. Takeaways

87. Don't just track local rankings
from the city centre. Track
from multiple zip codes
around the city.
01
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

88. 02To get the full value from
your citations, ensure
they're indexed.
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

89. The service area section in
GMB will not help you rank in
those areas.03
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

90. 04Invest in a Google review
strategy. They have an
impact.
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

91. Whoa. Those first few
links, hey?
05
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

92. 06Any individual strategy will
eventually hit a point of
diminishing returns.
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

93. A full website is better
than a GMB single-pager.
OBVS.07
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_

94. 08It’s not one specific activity, it’s
the aggregate of all activities
that will move the needle.
#mozcon @DarrenShaw_