If you rely on local customers to come to your store or service facility, then it is most important that these customers can find you on Google.
If they do their checking before they leave home using their desktop PC, then they may well use Google Local Search. It may be a problem for you to rank well in such a search as a recent Cre8asite Forums discussion points out. As the topic author pointed out, there are Completely And Utterly Farcical Google Local Verification Procedures. The problem is that Google does not support this local search facility with a customer service function. They rely on computer algorithms to identify the location of particular businesses. If that algorithm handles your website incorrectly, then it may be very difficult for you to get that corrected.
You may not be aware, but if such a customer does a Google search for your business on their mobile device that may give them a very different result. Since your more interesting prospects may be using a Blackberry or an iPhone, this can be an important challenge.
To check out whether you appear in Google Mobile Search for appropriate keywords, the following is a way for you to check this. This is a simulation of how Google mobile search appears on an iPhone using landscape display.
In all likelihood you may be surprised at the results. As usual Google does not reveal details of its Mobile Search algorithm. However it is likely that if your website does not give a good user experience on a mobile device, then it may be downgraded in the listings. Notice also that there is a link to Google Local Search. That of course in this case must be Google Local Mobile search. The results will be different from the regular desktop Local Search.
It is also of interest to note that it is only on mobile devices that you have this direct link to local search. In the regular Google desk top research there is no such link. In that case Google relies on an analysis of the search terms to decide whether to give you local search results. You can try your desktop search using Google Maps but this does not give you an easy route to find local suppliers.
If you wish to make sure that potential customers find you, it is important that you cover all all these different ways customers may try to find you. Contact us if you need help in handling these challenges.
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Can having a mobile version of my website or a mobile friendly version help in this regard. Also to appear in local searches you need to completely fill up all the details of the form while registering in Google local search. This helps to appear in the top results.
Thanks
Barry, it’s a very useful feature. However, it seems something is missing here. It would be even better, if it can show up the total number of search results!
That’s true, wilhb81, however I can understand the Google logic here. If you are on the go, all you have time for is the relevant search result you are looking for. You won’t be going on to extra pages (even though there is a link to do that at the bottom).
Whilst i would have thought that it used the same algorytham, i can see the logic to it being specific to a mobile user’s experience and if your site is poorly designed for mobile users then i suppose it makes sense that you shouldn’t rank as well.
Thanks for this valuable information. I like your post
once again a new twist in website development. We finally have customers convinced to buy on our sites and we have to consider what happens if they are viewing on mobile.
Google maps mobile can fetch you your approximate location in a certain range. What API does it use to do this? It has to be something that the mobile exposes. How to get hold of the API?
Good article! Yes people are using 3G tech more and more widely through mobile, even in some good develping countires like China, so it’s high time for companies to pay more attention to this trend through google search.
Thanks for the nice tips. I can probably utilize it for my websites.