Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Different SERPs positions UK - Ireland
-
Hi there!
I've been checking rankings in UK and Ireland for the last months and I found something really interesting...
"Belfast + keyword" - UK = 2º position / Ireland = 1º position
"keyword + Belfast" - UK = 14º position / Ireland = 1º position
*(same keyword)
I don't understand how it is possible... Website is not geo-targeted so Google has no preference for any of these countries...
Any ideas about why does it happen?
-
Even though you don't have any geo-targeted sections, there are other indications on your site that let them know you are targeting Ireland and Google might be optimizing for that.
With that said, how are you checking these rankings? Do these keywords send you large amounts of traffic? Check Search Console. Are you having an issue getting UK traffic (North Ireland)? Are you worried about UK traffic due to North Ireland?
I am worried that what you are seeing is due to your own search history and settings and/or Google seeing the same search a few times and testing out different results. There might also be different competition in the Northern Ireland market. There is a ton that could explain this, but alas, as with most things SEO, it's hard to pinpoint.
-
Hi Matt,
Thanks for your response.
We are using a .com domain and we didn't set a specific location because website target Ireland & North Ireland (UK) so we try to rank in both "countries".
We are top 1 website in Google Ireland but Google UK doesn't love us sooo much.
-
Hi
Are you using an international domain such as .com or are you using a country specific domain as this is one obvious way Google can determine your location other than in Search Console. If you are using an international domain Google looks at several factors to determine your location including IP Address, any address listings on your site, Google My Business and even links to your site.
Have a look here - https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/62399?hl=en
Hope this helps!
Matt
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Massive unexplained organic traffic drop; disappeared from Google
Hi there,
Search Behavior | | katelynroberts
Our site has experienced a huge organic traffic drop, specifically from Google. The drop occurred on Feb 19 and I've got no clue why it happened. We have not made any significant changes to the website and it doesn't look like there was an algorithm update last week. We don't have any Google penalties or indexing issues noted, and the drop isn't specific to any particular segment/region/keyword. What am I missing? Any advice or insight is super duper appreciated. Our site is a Wordpress/WooCommerice e-commerce site with a blog and long-standing #1 ranks for keywords related to our main product offering. Screen Shot 2024-02-26 at 3.12.25 PM.png
Screen Shot 2024-02-26 at 3.07.52 PM.png0 -
Strange Traffic Movements
Hi there, I'm wondering if anyone can shed some light on this... I'm working with a client whose website is experiencing some odd organic traffic patterns. See screenshot attached. As you can see, there was a sudden cliff fall about a month ago, and then it recovered (almost) entirely. Then, a month to the day later, the same thing happened again. What is the likelihood that this is a data glitch vs an algorithm thing? Any light you can shed on this would be appreciated. Thanks,
Search Behavior | | mhenshall
Marc
Screenshot 2023-08-18 at 09.37.26.png image url)0 -
Ways to Identify Popular Search Terms
Certain searches seem intuitively like they would be popular, but don't appear so in my keyword research on Moz Pro. For example, I am a therapist and would have guessed that a lot of people would be searching for "online therapy California" during this pandemic, but actually those terms are not popular. I looked at Google Trends to see if I could understand this better, but It wasn't very helpful. Any other suggestions for where to get more information when search terms you would expect to be high volume don't appear to be so?
Search Behavior | | LPantell0 -
Target="_blank" and referral acquisition data
Hi, Any assistance would be greatly appreciated! I have been reading up on this topic but there is some contradictory articles out there and I was hoping someone could clarify the latest practise for me. Website A links out to four of its partner websites.
Search Behavior | | AMA-DataSet
These links are using a target="_blank". When i look at the acquisition data for any of the partner websites there is zero referral data from site A.
I tested this wasn't an analytics bug by using the real time feature while clicking the partner links to see what had happened, and to also find the source, but I found that they are all being returned as a source direct. Ideally id like it to show the referrals once more for reporting purposes. Do I need to add extra google analytics parameters/functions to track the outbound links? or should this referral data be appearing correctly and it is something unrelated to the links themselves? or should I throw in the towel and drop the target blanks? Thank you in advance for your time.
Best Regards.0 -
My e-commerce competes with my own wholesalers
Hi guys, I run a wholesale program, frequently my e-commerce competes with my own wholesalers on many websites like Etsy for example. Usually, the wholesaler displays the exact same picture of my website. May Google find that I have duplicate content? Is there any alternative solution for this instead of asking the wholesaler to make their own pictures? Thanks
Search Behavior | | Tiedemann_Anselm1 -
Page ranking in .com but not in .co.uk
Hi there, I tried to search the Q&A but couldn't find any answers to my issue. We have a page that is ranking #2 for the term "translation memory" in google.com, but it doesn't show in Google.co.uk. This has been like this for weeks now. We are not targeting any specific country in GWT. Does anyone know a possible explanation for this? Thank you.
Search Behavior | | SDLOnlineChannel0 -
More USA traffic than UK.
Hi there, I have a site www.nut-job.com and I am currently getting more traffic from the USA than uk. Is there anyway of not getting listed in the USA and telling google that the site is a UK site?
Search Behavior | | nutjobshell0 -
Trailing slash at end of URLs?
Hi, I'm just about to put up a new site and I need to decide between having no trailing slash at the end of the all the URLs, or putting one in there. I think Matt Cutts has a slight preference for them, as stated here: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/whiteboard-interview-googles-matt-cutts-on-redirects-trust-more "Matt says he would slightly advocate for using a trailing slash simply because it clearly indicates that a URL is a folder and not a document." However, I'm really wondering. I mean, if people link to my site, they'll tend not to insert a trailing slash, I'm thinking... Your thoughts would be welcome on this one! Cheers, Luke
Search Behavior | | McTaggart0