Different results & page layout in Google local for plurals?
-
I realize that the general results websites can rank differently for singular vs plural keywords, but today when checking local rankings for a client, I noticed that not only does the client rank differently for "church in San Diego" vs "churches in San Diego" but the layout and info of the local results pages are different.
"Church in San Diego" (screenshot) shows the phone number and has links for Website and Directions
"Churches in San Diego" (screenshot) doesn't show any of that instead has an image. If you click on the image, it brings up a card almost like a popup with info, reviews, and links for the organization.
Anyone ever noticed that before? Anyone know why the difference? And if there are different optimization strategies?
-
Hey Kurt,
I'm able to replicate exactly what you are seeing, Kurt. I'm in CA. so, this might potentially influence the results I'm seeing vs. what Ira is seeing.
I have seen both versions of the Local Finder view, but am not clear on what Google is doing with the test of both versions, and I'd never noticed before this difference of versions being triggered by plural vs. singular results. I'm actually doing some other searches now (shoe store vs. shoe stores, dentist vs. dentists with city modifiers) and I am NOT able to replicate the singular vs. plural difference you discovered with the church search.
What I do see is that, for that church search, the radius of the results appears to be the same, and that it's quite interesting that Google is only showing reviews for the singular search. Sorry not to have more insight on this, but it definitely looks like good old Google testing things out for the search you've been doing. Could change by the time you wake up tomorrow.
It makes me realize that I'd like to see a post on differences like this in the Local Finder view. I can't recall seeing one. Thanks for raising the question.
-
That's odd that you're seeing different results than I am. I did searches for church(es) in two other cities and saw the same thing - website and description links for church, image for churches. I also tried it with plumber(s) in 3 cities and both plumber and plumbers had website and description. Then I tried it for restaurant(s) in 3 cities and both restaurant and restaurants had the image/icon. Strange.
I'd be curious to hear what others are seeing in their local results.
-
Interesting, must be a new thing Google is doing, showing the thumbnail instead of the website and directions icons. When I try the same 2 searches, I get the thumbnail view for both. I also am seeing that style for all the other local searches I'm doing. Maybe you caught those 2 searches while the changes were being rolled out? I'm curious if you are still seeing the icons on any searches.
As for optimization issues, this makes it more important than ever to claim your Google Business listing and to optimize it with good photos.
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
-
Why would the review count be different between the Ad and the Organic result?
A client inquired about this after finding that their review count was different on their Google Ad that appeared in the map pack compared to their organic result right below it. I am stumped so any thoughts or reasoning as to why this is the case would be appreciated. See attached screenshot! Lptujep
Reviews and Ratings | | BrianAutoshopSEO0 -
Experience Getting Google Reviews Restored?
Does anyone have any experience or know anyone with experience getting google reviews restored? We have no technical issues with our Google business pages/locations, but for some reason, they deleted some of our recent reviews. These reviews were not at our location or review station or anything like that. A couple of the profiles were very new accounts, and a couple of the users posted reviews for a few locations, however, they were legitimate reviews that they did on their own. I was hoping someone had an idea of what to do to appeal to Google or if there was a form to fill out to get our reviews restored. Thanks, Ruben
Reviews and Ratings | | KempRugeLawGroup1 -
Google Removed All Anonymous Reviews from GMB Listings with No Warning
I just saw that Google is no longer accepting anonymous reviews for businesses, and in fact have REMOVED all current anonymous reviews. This just happened in late May, but I'm pretty surprised there hasn't been any talk about this, it's a pretty big deal. Before I knew this I called their "specialists" to ask why we lost so many reviews. I specifically asked if Google had changed their review requirements that would result in old reviews being removed. She said no. She's either not well informed or just lied. https://orthopreneur.com/anonymous-google-reviews-disappeared/ My company just lost 20+ positive reviews. Anyone else hurting from the change and finding solutions?
Reviews and Ratings | | HammerandHand1 -
Local pack ranking anomaly -- help?
At a bit of a loss on this one... If anyone has any ideas about what's going on or how to tackle this, I'm all ears. One of my clients, an orthodontist, is appearing in the top three organic positions and in the local pack for almost all keywords we're targeting. However, for the keyword "orthodontist" without any location modifiers attached to it, we're appearing in the top three organic results but our Google listing is not appearing in the local pack. The three listings appearing in the local pack are his next-door competitor, one practice that closed almost a year ago, and a practice in two towns over. He and his competitor are the only two orthodontists in this town, so they should theoretically be the two main listings that are being pulled in. The listing for the closed practice is marked as closed on Google and has been reported to Google several times in the last few months. The listing has no website or reviews on it, although it does have an address and a phone number. We have spent months doing aggressive, in-depth NAP/local listing cleanups. We have 24 Google reviews with an average rating of 4.6 stars, and we're organically gathering reviews every week. We went through a site redesign at the beginning of this year, so we now have a mobile responsive website. We are appearing in the local pack for almost every other keyword that we have high organic rankings for, so we know it isn't necessarily an issue with our Google My Business listing. Does anyone have any ideas of what's going on, or what we can do to get our listing to appear in the local pack for this keyword? The keyword "orthodontist" is the single most important keyword to this client and our strategy, so we're open to any and all suggestions or thoughts.
Reviews and Ratings | | mothner0 -
What types of businesses does Google display reviews in SERP for?
In just the last week, it seems like Google has removed reviews for businesses in our industry (staffing), which is unfortunate since we've been working hard for those reviews. The effect has been to be completely left off the local google business results. One week, we're at the top of the business reviews with our location prominently featured on the map and the next, we aren't even listed. It seems like there must be list of industries in which Google takes reviews into account (or if they do, then at least displays the reviews in the results). For us, up until last week, if you searched "temp agencies", these reviews were included in SERP. Now, nothing. Is this fairly normal behavior for Google?
Reviews and Ratings | | Parker8180 -
Rich snippet not enabled, on aggregated review pages
We have a website where you can book on restaurants, and afterwards you can review the restaurant you visited. So we have this page: https://www.r2n.dk/restauranter/restaurant-bonjour-vietnam (We have one for each restaurant). English version https://www.r2n.dk/en/restauranter/restaurant-bonjour-vietnam The page is marked up in microData, and when I test the site in google structured data it shows no errors https://search.google.com/structured-data/testing-tool#url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.r2n.dk%2Frestauranter%2Frestaurant-bonjour-vietnam . But the page does not show up on google with a rich snippet (The review stars). I am thinking it might be one of the following things. Either it is because there is multiple "Restaurants" on the page, where the others appear in recommended restaurants, where we also marked them up as much as possible. Or else it could be because the reviews are hidden behind the "Anmeldelser"(Reviews) button, where they are retrieved via a ajax request, but if this was the case I don't get why this other site where the reviews does not appear is working fine: https://www.just-eat.dk/restaurants-bonjourvietnam Also it is a week since we finaly correctly implemented the structured data on the page, so I don't know if I should wait a longer time(Though the page has been cached by google multiple times since we updated the code)
Reviews and Ratings | | Christian_T0 -
Ratings showing up in results
Hi.
Reviews and Ratings | | corn2015
What is required or how long doesi t take for local reviews to show up in search results for a local business? One of my clients is starting to get quite a few positive reviews but he wants to know how long before the star rating shows up in the results.ratings s0 -
Google Places
Hi Guys, Looking for some advice on improving the visibility of my Google Local Page for non-brand local keyword terms. I want my listing to rank for local keyword terms “sydney cars” “cars in sydney” and related terms. I know reviews play a key role and citations. We have created many citations in multiple different directories (yelp, truelocal, etc) but still have not yet seen much movement or results. In this case should I be building links to the actual website BMW Sydney with various/high diversified anchor text around “sydney cars” “cars in sydney” "luxury cars" and variations and continue building authority to this website. Image of the search results:
Reviews and Ratings | | MBASydney
--> http://s17.postimg.org/u33sgl87j/screenshot_1482.jpg Is there anything further I can do to it’s Google Plus Profile to improve its local visibility for these keywords? (Besides Reviews) Google Plus Profile Is Here:
https://plus.google.com/104004861293...ut?hl=en&gl=au Any advice would be highly appreciated. Thanks,
Matt0