Important Tips to Rank on the Map Pack with a Local Business
The Map Pack is the coveted spot among businesses. It’s the spot after the sponsored results where the top 3 businesses are listed. By being included in the Map Pack, businesses enjoy better visibility, increased traffic, and improved conversion. Still, it’s not easy to earn a spot in the 3 Pack area.
Being in the Map Pack requires a focused SEO campaign. Aside from aiming for this position, you also have to ensure that you are ranking organically and have met the following standards.
Getting mobile-friendly
Before you intend to get a spot on the Map Pack, you have to ensure that your website is mobile-friendly. Remember that Google rolled out its mobile-first indexing algorithm recently, so the mobile-friendliness of a website is a leading ranking factor on the web.
Besides, according to studies, customers will be 62% less likely to patronize a product or service if they had an unfavorable mobile experience with it.
So before we dive into the ranking, make sure that you have fixed this part.
Aim to rank organically
You have to boost your organic ranking if you want to be on the Map Pack. Google usually uses organic ranking signals to decide which businesses will be on the Map Pack result.
What if I have a local business, shouldn’t I rank locally? Of course, you have to be visible in your locality, but for this phase, you have to ensure that you are not limited to a specific geography. Below, we have discussed how you can boost your local rankings while enjoying topnotch organic rankings.
Don’t forget about proximity
For this part, you’re going to zoom in to your audience’s proximity. So how can you do it? If you have a local business servicing multiple cities within a state, you should create individual pages for each one.
On each page, optimize with local keywords indicating the location and services you’re providing. Through this, you can have local signals as well as organic signals to rank your website.
Always focus on the small details
As much as you want to exhaust all your time and energy on search rankings, you also have to ensure that you’re not missing the small details. Add landmarks, specify your services, update event calendars, and so on. This way, you’ll be on the radar of your target audience.
Make sure that you indicate as much information as possible for your business. This will be helpful in surviving the next point.
Stand out on the local filter
The reason why you have to rank organically is the local filter. Local filtering happens when two businesses offer similar services in the same locality. For example, you have a dental clinic on the sixth floor of a commercial building, then there’s another dental clinic on the ground floor. With this, Google perceives the redundancy, which means someone will be written off the Map Pack.
If you and the competitor are in equal footing in terms of listing information, organic rankings will be the determiner. The one with the higher organic ranking will be chosen for the Map Pack.