Has someone told you that all you need to do is have a website and use social tools like Twitter and Facebook and the money will just roll in?

Local search is huge and getting bigger by the day.  Google’s estimates 40% of traffic is for local products and services. This is huge!

But how can you tap into this?

The “go to guy” for local marketing is the guy ranked #1 for the term – Scott Gallagher has created a video that spins heart felt humor into the confusion that many business owners face with their online marketing.

Post from: Denver SEO - Local Search Enthusiast

Local Marketing Games

As a small business owner competing in your local  market you should be aware that Google now determines the searchers location and provides the local search results regardless of their search query. This action has pushed business listing in Google prominently front and center.

But is this a good thing or a bad thing?

The Pros and Cons of Google’s New Local SERP

With Google’s new local SERP, sites that already perform well in both organic and local search results perform even better. The new consolidated SERP helps push a page’s ranking up a notch or two. A business’s Places page should then be …

Expert Interview on Local Search with Chris Silver Smith

With all of the changes recently rolled by Google in November 2010, It is now more important than ever to pay attention to local search marketing and to have a plan for your local business. I was also thrilled to have the opportunity to …

3 Misconceptions About Google Places & SEO

But, in smaller cities and/or less competitive industries, it was always possible to show up in the 7-pack or 3-pack of local results. That has not changed in the new Google Places. If you do enough searches outside the major cities, …

Post from: Denver SEO - Local Search Enthusiast

Misconceptions, Consolidated SERP’s Shake Up

Google Places Search – 8, 9 or More Local Results to a Page

It appears that Google is willing to fill the results page with local Places Search results if they are in fact the most relevant results on a given.

Mobile search makes your Google Places listing more important

You’ve seen the commercials, or perhaps even done it yourself. You’re out and about, suddenly remember you need to pickup flowers for your Mother’s birthday.

Google Places Cracking Down on Spam

Many local businesses, and those involved in local search marketing, have criticized Google for the amount of spam in Google Places (formerly Local Business Listings). Google has addressed these concerns by introducing new Google Places …

Now available with Google Apps: Google Places – Google Small Business

Google Places offers business owners a free and easy way to make sure that potential customers can find their business when searching online at Google.com and in Google Maps, both from desktops and mobile devices…

Google Places Now Verifying “Edits” With Owners

Google is now verifying, when they can, edits made to the Google Maps Places database.

Make sure that your listing is playing by the rules. Learn more about Goolge Places Quality Guidelines for more details on managing your listing.

Post from: Denver SEO - Local Search Enthusiast

Google Places, Spam, Edits and More

Feeding off the momentum of improvements we’ve made over the past year in AdWords, we recently released beta versions of the updated Keyword and Placement Tools.

We’ve maintained the core functionality of these tools, but have added some new features that we hope will make them more useful for you. If you use English as your AdWords interface language you may have noticed that you already have access to these tools, and availability to all English advertisers as well as other languages will be rolling out over the next few weeks

source: Updated Keyword and Placement Tools

Post from: Denver SEO - Local Search Enthusiast

Search Based Keyword Tool Discontinued Soon

The icing on your SEO cake

When a site is online for a while (about a year usually) and becomes the number one result for certain keyword or phrases that a user types in, search engines will assign sitelinks to display under your organic search engine results.

How are sitelinks generated?

When you search for something, lets say “LinkedIn,” you will notice there are some quick links on the search result such as “Jobs, About, Advanced” etc, how does that work?

Assuming my website is #1 on the search results, how can I do that?

Post from: Denver SEO - Local Search Enthusiast

Sitelinks in Google

And of course wouldn’t you know it – the users Google profile is a junk junction.

An here’s a kicker…the users Google profile ask: Something I still can’t find on Google
Answer- friendship

Well with a profile like this and jumping buzz post it really smells like spam to me…and to tell you the truth I don’t make friends with “spammers”

I’m going to have to learn a ton about Google Buzz, but I’m to so sure how to contrl buzz jumpers like this.

Any thoughts?

Post from: Denver SEO - Local Search Enthusiast

Google Buzz Jumping

There has been a lot of speculation going on over Google’s announcement late in 2009 that load times of a page will become a relevant factor in ranking web pages.

If you haven’t heard all the scuttle-butt the articles below should get you up to speed.

Page Speed May Become a Ranking Factor in 2010
I would say that based on Matt’s comments it is probably fair to assume that Google will indeed begin taking page speed into consideration as a ranking factor, although he doesn’t come right out and say that they definitely will. …

Will Google Make Page Speed a Ranking Factor
Google is obsessed with speed. A tremendous amount of corporate energy is being put into initiatives to speed up the web. Googles Lets make the web…

What do you think? Is speed really a factor when it comes to rankings?

I personally don’t think so. With unique content and link building factors being the bread and butter of “true’ results I find it hard to believe that the load time of a page will have any real effect on the serp’s.

Worried about your load time?

GTmetrix – A New Tool For Google’s Speed Factor
GTmetrix is a free tool that provides in depth information on the speed of pages on your site and what you can do to improve load time.

Sure, page speed plays a role and is important when it comes to the user’s experience but when it comes to displaying relevant search results speed is not a factor.

Post from: Denver SEO - Local Search Enthusiast

Google’s Speed Ranking Factor

I hadn’t noticed this at first so not sure how long it’s been active, but can’t be more than a few days ago.

Thanks to Chris Lang, via my social circle, I was quickly able to find a video outlining how it works.

I also follow Jack Humphrey and as usual he had something to say on the subject. His train of thought about a seo value appears to have some logic. At first glance of my social circle and content Google profile seo might well be influencing my displayed results.

Google Knows Your Social Circle

On today’s Friday Traffic Report podcast we talk about a new discovery in Google search results – and it’s pretty darned cool! You can now take a look at your entire social circle according….

I did a little leg work and found several additional reads on G’s social circle.

Google Puts Social Results in the Mix!

If you are one of those people still skeptical about the business uses of social media, you may be interested to know that Google’s Social Search is no longer just an experiment. Though it does have the beta tag on it, …

Google Social Search Goes Live, Adds New Features

Google has begun the rollout of its Social Search product, a way of seeing customized search results based upon the people in your social network. Social.

Wow, Google Is Awfully Clueless About My Social Life

What’s happening is that Google is being very cautious about clueing me in as to what it knows. The ways Google builds social circles is via your Google chat buddy list and by looking at accounts you’ve entered on your Google Profile. …

Google Social Search goes live — without Facebook results

In the battle to conquer real-time search, Gooogle has drawn a line in the sand. The search giant today went live with its Social Search feature, which adds relevant results from users’ social graph. But one thing is noticeably absent …

To use the social features of Google you must have a Gmail account and be logged in.

Oh, and if you don’t have a Google profile…make one!

Post from: Denver SEO - Local Search Enthusiast

Google Social Search Results

But it’s not gone completely. On the same day I also discovered that the real time stream is being displayed inside the search options.

If you’re not aware of Google’s search options you can look at the image below to find the options selector on Google’s search page.

After clicking the show options on the serp’s page select Latest from the sidebar menu

You don’t have a chance to review history like you do with People Browser or the like app but then again it’s all about real-time results in the moment.

Real Time search is going to play a larger role in the search results the engines will be giving us. There are many differing opinions floating around the web on the subject.

How real time search could affect SEO

Google have now started to roll out real time search. Posts from social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook will now appear in the SERPs for certain brand.

Why Real-Time Search Won’t Last

Real-time search is a hot topic right now and many claim that this is proof that social media is for real and here to stay. I agree with it adding additional validation that social media is going mainstream, but I have my doubts that …

Real Time Search Speeds up the News

Early in December Google announced that they will be including real-time news and updates in their web search pages. And soon after Yahoo followed suit. How does this affect the news cycle and PR? As you can see in this short video news …

What do you think…would real time search be of any value to you?

Post from: Denver SEO - Local Search Enthusiast

Real Time Dance

The results are displayed mid page in a scrolling box.

What does this means?

If you’re looking for information on events as they are happening, you can view content posted in the past few minutes rather than outdated news articles from the past.

“Whether it’s an eyewitness tweet, a breaking news story or a fresh blog post, you can find it on Google right after it’s published on the web,” said Google fellow Amit Singhal in a announced blog post.

Very cool!

Post from: Denver SEO - Local Search Enthusiast

Google Displaying Real Time Results