The real-world impact of keyword stuffing in Google My Business
Many businesses are rebranding completely to skirt Google s guidelines. But when everyone does it, it becomes a branding nightmare.
Colan Nielsen on May 7, 2021 at 10:15 am
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Keyword stuffing has been a hot topic in the Google My Business world for a long time. Keyword stuffing or “adding descriptors” to your name on Google My Business is when someone adds words to their business name on GMB that aren’t part of that business’s actual legal name.
Here’s an example:
We know beyond a shadow of a doubt that keywords in the business name impact ranking directly and dramatically. Here’s an example of the ranking impact.
Case study: More content is not always better for ranking in Google
Content is king in SEO, but it s critical that it s the right type of content for your target audience and the SERP landscape for each client.
Joy Hawkins on April 30, 2021 at 10:51 am
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It’s common to hear “content is king” in the SEO industry. Although I agree with that statement, it should not be applied
cart blanche for every single site in every single situation. In fact, there are cases in which adding too much low-value content can have the opposite effect for SMBs and local businesses.
One-star ratings on Google are deemed not defamatory and why that’s a problem
It s crucial to have a solid review management strategy in place and for local SEOs to manage SMB expectations around review removal.
Joy Hawkins on April 16, 2021 at 11:57 am
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Eric Goldman, Associate Dean for Research and Professor of Law at Santa Clara University School of Law recently wrote about a case in Michigan where a law firm had a 1-star review left that had no text in it. [We also covered it in our daily brief a while back.] The identity of the user is unknown and the law firm claimed that the user posted the wordless one-star review to their Google My Business listing with the intent to cause damage to their reputation or profession and to dissuade potential clients from doing business with them.
How are local service ads impacting Google Ads accounts?
Make sure you are paying attention to the local service ads option with Google Ads, even if it is not yet available for your industry.
Joy Hawkins on January 26, 2021 at 8:30 am
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In September 2020, Google launched local services ads to lawyers. Since my agency works with a lot of lawyers, we were very curious to see how these ads impacted where people click in the search results.
At first, we assumed these ads were stealing clicks from the local pack results but were surprised to find that although it did lower the click-through-rate of the Google My Business listings, the average impact was only a loss of about 5 clicks a month. However, when we looked at several Google Ads accounts for several lawyers, it told a very different story.
SEO year in review 2020: COVID forces platforms to adapt their local and e-commerce offerings, and more
Even a pandemic couldn’t slow down developments in the search industry. Here’s our recap of the year’s most important stories and news.
George Nguyen on December 31, 2020 at 8:00 am
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Last year, we called 2019 a “roller coaster of ups and downs.” Hindsight is 20/20, and while many of us can’t wait to put 2020 in the rearview, the way the search industry’s biggest players responded to the new needs of businesses and consumers, brought on by the pandemic, will have lasting consequences for how marketers perform their duties.