Special thanks go to Mr Joanna, Michael Cottam and Lindsay Wassell help collect data. (Also, thanks to Danny Dover for tell me how all my initial ideas were wrong;)
Back in October added change the location from where search Google can easily. It is located only in the vertical search – click on "Change Location" and see something like the screen below (bottom left):
Of course, this is to do but Google's uneven support for the opt out personalization provided, of enormous value for each local SEO I had regarding the position function was really accurate. If I had my position in another city, I really see what saw my customers and prospects?
What I'm describing is not the most scientific experiment; It is only a first exploration whether Google's "Change Location" feature in various cities for different users, matched up. Your results may vary. If your experiences are different, we'd like to hear your comments.
I grabbed 3 of the best minds in SEO (or at least that's what I told you so that you would voluntarily) 3 U.S. cities except me (we held by avoiding this inland to any complications of CcTLDs). I am in Chicago, Joanna is moz headquarters in Seattle, Michael is in Portland and is in Tampa.
We picked up for each city an a word query that (suggested by the respective localite) had a different local taste. We kept it in the field of food and drink, because like not to eat and drink? The final queries were:
Chicago - "Pizza" Seattle - "coffee" Portland - "Pubs" Tampa - "Seafood"Each of us started our own city, ran the query, and took two things: (1) where the local search results, and (2) the URLs for local search results. There were 3 organic results before the first local began position 4, for example. The new, integrated results are a bit difficult but we counted no results with a letter (A)-(G) as a local result whether it a "places" was especially result or not. We repeated the process for each of the 4 cities/queries.
Prior to perform searches, each of us unsubscribed from our accounts. We tested add & PWS = 0 parameter to remove, personalization, but it was not a case where this had no impact on our results. City order was shot on the 4 participants.
I was all set, develop some really determine how 2 sets of queries match each other, complicated mathematical but ended up that the actual results so black and white, that I have a grid like created 4 participants results up matched. If I had site X position (D) and someone else did, is a match, simply:
The table shows how results (represented by the name of the city) match each person, the results of the local user. The diagonal (dimmed) is always a 100% match, because this person is the local user. For these searches (be pretty popular) all local results were 7 packs. Chicago, Portland and Tampa began local results after 3 organic listings (position # 4). Seattle local listings began the # 1 position (more on that below).
The short takeaway - Florida's effort. Our results matched completely, with the exception of Tampa, where everyone our results were totally different from Lindsay's (although our 3 sets of non-local Tampa results all compliant). Deeper, it turns out that Lindsay out in the burbs a bit, and their results tend to be more locally in your field. The rest of us are closer to the city centres.
If you a city dweller, the results were quite promising. It seems, that Google add the location to the nominal value and not much personalization into the mix. Although we had logged anecdotal evidence suggested, logged as results were similar. The good news is that the "Change Location" feature should be a useful tool for SEOs to do a lot of local work with clients in other cities. Of course, it never hurts sanity-check your results in a given situation.
The latest Google SERPs seem to organic and integrate local results in some cases, and I suspect that a domain's total will have authority the placement of your local score could. In our mini-experiment, Seattle / "Coffee" results unusual behavior, as shown in the following screenshot issued:
The "local" Starbucks list appears in the # 1 spot, displayed, although the second local offer # 4 is not. This a factor of the Starbucks seems his authority as a whole. If I change my site back to Chicago, Starbucks is still # 1, but I see a local Starbucks address.
It is clear that a lot changed in local search, and I think we can expect to see more integration of the total organic and local algorithms, (while some unique factors, such as quotes and reviews keeps local). Whatever happens, though, the new tool "Change Location" seems to be a genuine window in the local algorithm and should be a welcome addition for local SEOs.
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