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Domain Authority and Links

Local Search Ranking
Search Engine Marketers
Each year, Moz conducts a study of the top Local Search Ranking Factors by interviewing several experienced search engine marketers. The study is conducted in four different parts:

Ranking Factors

– General ranking factors
– Specific ranking factors
– Local pack ranking factors
– Negative ranking factors

What are the most important parts of each of these factor groups?

General Ranking Factors

– Signals that relate to your business (how close you are to the user, your categories)
– Signals that relate to your website content (keywords in titles, your name, address, and phone number)
– Signals that relate to links to your website (linking domain authority, anchor text)
– Citations that your website has gotten on external sites
– User behavior signals (clicks-to-call, clickthroughs, and so on)
– A factor whose importance is declining: social signals

Local Organic Ranking Factors

The following are the most important local organic ranking signals:

– Click-through rate from search results
– Having high-quality inbound links
– Having your city and state in your GMB Landing Page Title
– Having an authoritative web domain
– Having relevant keywords that pertain to your domain content

Note: Star ratings and rankings can be important to users, but they don’t really matter in terms of your search ranking.

Local Pack Ranking Factors

– Correct GMB category associations
– Having a physical address in the city a user is searching for
– Being in close proximity to the search user’s location
– Having high-quality, authoritative, and consistent structured citations

Note: Having local keywords in your domain name doesn’t really help all that much.

Negative Ranking Factors

You can majorly damage your ranking by:

– Having malware on your site
– Faking your business address
– Having GMB location violation reports
– Having the wrong category listed for your business
– Having different business names, addresses, and phone numbers listed on various websites

Bottom line: Incorrect business information, whether intentional falsehood or accidental mistake, will be very detrimental to your Google ranking.

These nuggets of information are only a portion of what Moz’s study reveals. If you’d like to read more, check out the full study here.

In the meantime, one thing is certain: if you cater to the user’s needs and make it easy to find your business and find out more about it, you will be setting yourself up for success.

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