1.
”AWESOMENESS
NEAR ME“
How To Win At Local SEO

2.
@izzionfire #SEOkomm

3.
I know, you‘ve heard a lot
about Local SEO.
But not like this!

4.
For the smarter SME, Local Management
is a simple enough process.
1. CLAIM 2. ENRICH 3. MAINTAIN
Claim your business on
GMB / local platform
and verify your
location.
Keep listing refreshed
with posts,
descriptions, images,
cool content.
Gain reviews from
happy customers.
Respond to your
customers.
See if nasty spam is
dragging you down.
Ensure irrelevant ugc is
dealt with when you
can.
Case-by-case issues.

5.
But how do you
maintain that
attention, quality and
performance across
an enterprise-level
business?

6.
2,200 branches worldwide
Mixture of branch types (DSS,
Fast-Lane telematics)
All SEO efforts in-house in
Munich.

7.
Awesomeness doesn‘t happen alone
The
Politician
The GMB
Expert
The Review
Whisperer
Marta Lazcoz
Senior SEO Spain
Thorsten Becker
Director SEO
Maila Giuggiloni
SEO Italy
The Platform
Handler
Heiner Tappe
Senior Lead SEO

8.
Local SEO is an
even more
important focus
than organic
for the brick-and-mortar business.

9.
SERPs be feature & content heavy af.

10.
Voice assistants are primarily used for
Local-intent based searches
1. Hunting quick facts (68%)
2. Looking for directions (65%)
3. Searching for a business (47%)
https://www.brightlocal.com/research/voice-search-for-local-business-study/
Grüß
Sie!

11.
Aggregators can dominate organic

12.
Brands vs. Aggregators in Car Rental
43%
44%
13%
Brand names vs. OTAs
Brand
OTA
Other
Source: Searchmetrics, September 2019

13.
No NAP data for
you
But they can‘t dominate Local!

14.
The social proof trust value is undeniable
e.g. filtered results based
on query modifiers

15.
Mobile search is by default local!

16.
Local is way more
about „Ranking
Factors“ than
organic.
It‘s arguably easier to influence and optimize for

17.
Algorithmic differences between Organic
and Local
Main factors to bear in mind and how they differ

18.
1. Local entities are fed directly into the Local
Knowledge Graph. Requires no URL or technical
SEO*
*(but on-site values can impact local rankings)

19.
2. Spam is algorithmically filtered well in Organic,
whereas it appears way more often in Local
Fake ListingsIllegal Services Spammy Names KW Stuffing

20.
3. Proximity to searcher can be a personalization
factor in Organic, but a ranking factor in Local
Local Organic
Results are
tailored to my
city + country
(despite no
mention)
Results are
impacted by
distance to my
house

21.
4. There are more explicit ways of personalization
and refinement for Maps results
Hey, Google
– only show
me alcohol-
free, vegan
results

22.
5. Local rankings can be directly influenced by
offline business behavior
e.g. Low quality customer visits, negative user feedback

23.
A shift towards
quality weightings
in Local.
Offline impacting online performance

24.
New Google patent: „Quality Visit Scores“
https://gofishdigital.com/quality-visit-scores/
What values make
most sense for this
type of business?
Return visits for the
same person

25.
A LOOK INTO
LOCAL PACK
RANKING
FACTORS
Get into that sweet, sweet map pack.

26.
URL TRAFFIC
URL REVENUE
01.03.2019 – 26.03.2019 YoY GA Org.
+83%
+119%
1 Local Pack
Ranking =

27.
RELEVANCEPOPULARITY PROXIMITY
• Amount of reviews
• Average ratings
• Local citations
• Store visits
• Quality visits
• Local links (?)
• Distance to
searcher location
• Distance to
specified location
entity
• NAP aligned
• Categories
• Unique business
photos
• Business
description
• Onsite factors
https://moz.com/blog/how-does-the-local-algorithm-work

28.
LET‘S HACK
THE LOCAL
PACK
How to get into, and perform well within the map pack

29.
First of all, the nescessary stuff.
o Verified GMB listing
o (NAP) Name, Address, Phone number aligned.
o Image content (inside, outside, of genuine use to browsers)
o Unique business description with detailed points.
o Relevant Primary & Secondary categories most specific to your entity.
o UTM parametered links to track tasty local visits in GA/GSC.

30.
Be careful
Can be scraped from
partner feeds without you
knowing

31.
Guess what: it depends!
Where to send
your Local Entity
traffic

32.
Where to send your local entity traffic:
More than one
location?
Homepage
Conversion
Possibilities?
Location unique
data?
Yes
No No
Via a partner
booking site?
Yes
Booking Partner Link
Yes
No
No
Parametered
Page URL
Yes
Own
Indexable URL

33.
No thin, or duplicated page risk
Much easier to maintain on a larger
scale
Can still link to 3rd party booking
platforms additionally
Parametered
Generic URL

34.
Unique location data and content
for organic performance too
Conversion uplift elements such
as pre-filled booking engines
localBusiness structured data to
connect your entity to a unique
identifier
Valuable user engagement
insights specific to destinations
GA performance tracking with
UTM
Own
Indexable URL

35.
Now you‘ve gotta get people to click

36.
Fill it with key information, drive those conversions
Make your Local
Knowledge Panel
your business
card on the web

37.
Conversion elements like Products
• Drive direct, focused traffic via enriched elements in your Local Knowledge
Panel (looks a bit like ads)

38.
Posts, Offers & Announcements

39.
Why it gotta be for Local only?
Enrich your pages
with hyper-local,
valuable content

40.
Embed 360 views for
sweet onsite engagement

41.
Enrich your landing pages with location-unique content

42.
/div[@class="mq1Pic dFINPc aTWSi"]
Chrome Scraper Plugin ->

43.
Use the Q&A
Feature to your
full advantage
Even if it‘s a terrible & misunderstood feature.

44.
I hate Google Q&As.

45.
But Q&As are in heavy use!
& somewhat improving
Make the most of it, yo

46.
Take over the Q&A space yourself
1. Source real frequently asked Q&As
from branch staff and customer
care.
2. Push to high priority locations, e.g.
high SV, strange location, high
interactivity.
3. Get up-votes!
4. Send confused complainers
elsewhere.

47.
Pay attention to 3x voted
questions!

48.
Get your answers up-voted too.
How about no

49.
Act local,
to know local
behavior
Don‘t fall victim to organizational blindness.

50.
On-the-ground research
Found it yay
#proud

51.
Track quality visits and pipeline to operations
• Over busy during times, speak with operations to help adjust peak staff working
times.
• Long wait times? Coffee and water goes a long way.
• Provide useful business descriptions with need-to-know information.

52.
Dealing with
contributers &
local guides
The more self-provided content, the better.

53.
How about no

54.
LOCAL GUIDES:
• Can create changes to my location data.
• Can change the appearance of my listing with their photo uploads.
• Know how many people search and interact with my listings.
• Have higher authority reviews, with arguably greater weighting.

55.
The community-
driven system is it‘s
biggest plus and
biggest flaw
The harsh reality of map spam

56.
Images and Videos earn Local Guides
more points, naturally this causes issues.

57.
WTF Google?

58.
Seriously, WTF.
lol

59.
Hey Google Vision AI, where u at?

60.
Entity extraction from Images is fantastisch

61.
How to fix? Flag it and get in touch.
Lame.

62.
Event placements can be easily manipulated

63.
https://ohgm.co.uk/event-spam-seo/

64.
Event Structured Data + High Authority Location

65.
How to fix? You guessed!
Lame.

66.
https://www.sterlingsky.ca/ultimate-guide-fighting-spam-
google-maps/

67.
Driving and
handling reviews
& ratings
IKR. Since when did SEO become customer support?

68.
Reviews make everyone excitedBut do they recieve enough attention?

69.
[Obligatory Review Statistics]
• 86% of consumers read reviews for local businesses
• Consumers read an average of 10 online reviews before feeling able to trust
a local business
• Up from 18% (in 2017) 57% of consumers will only use a business if it has 4
or more stars
• 91% of 18-34 year old consumers trust online reviews as much as personal
recommendations
https://www.brightlocal.com/research/local-consumer-review-survey/

70.
Why is review management the SEOs job?
Because like most crucial website improvement
tasks –
if we don‘t, NO ONE WILL ;)
Sassiness aside, reviews and reputation management helps with:
ü CRO & UX Uplift
ü Semantic enrichment & query targeting
ü On-page improvement inspiration

71.
Respond to those reviews, show you care.
• 89% of consumers read businesses' responses to reviews!
https://www.brightlocal.com/research/local-consumer-review-survey/

72.
Provide those Entity
Connections in the
Local Knowledge
Graph
Feed data or fall prey.

73.
LocalBusiness Schema Mark-up
<script type="application/ld+json">
{
"@context": "http://schema.org",
"@type": "Bakery",
"address": {
"@type": "PostalAddress",
"addressLocality": "Sunnyvale",
"addressRegion": "CA",
"postalCode": "94086",
"streetAddress": "42 Izzi Ave"
},
"aggregateRating": {
"@type": "AggregateRating",
"ratingValue": "5",
"reviewCount": "250"
},
"name": "Izzi’s Bakery",
"openingHours": [
"Fr-Sa 17:00-22:00"
],
"priceRange": "$$",
"servesCuisine": [
"British" ],
"telephone": "(408) 714-1489",
"url": "https://www.izzis.com"
}
</script>
Make it hyper-Specific to
category. E.g. Casino >
localBusiness
Affirm your Local Listing
entities (GMB & directories)
Implement with JSON-LD
(most up-to-date syntax)
Provide that explicit
connection between your
listing and website URI

74.
Related entities in Local

75.
Knowledge Graph Ready SD!

76.
“But Structured
Data is evil :(“

77.
I want these kinds of Zero-Click SERPs
Satisfied on SERP > Quick Site Visit
Factual Representation > Excluded
If Google‘s gonna steal my data, make sure they steal the right data

78.
OK SO BASICALLY,
Good Local SEO is just:
- Enriching entities with unique data
- Pushing (and responding to) reviews
- Taking data-control over Local Guides & Google
Can I grab a coffee now?
NO.

79.
How does this
scale across a
large business?

80.
How many SIXT branches in
Deutschland?
Ger-many
Sorry.It‘s404.

81.
2,200

82.
The Main Benefits of Enterprise-Level
PROXIMITY IS RARELY AN ISSUE
Larger scale networks means this ranking factor is easily covered.
INTERNATIONAL SEO IS HEIGHTENED
Being in the destination-view mindset is awesome, no silo’d view.
THE LOCAL SEO‘S PLAYGROUND
One industry + 1000s locations = huge local algo testing possibilities.
MORE MONEY, MORE RESOURCES
Although it’s usually not enough to cover the scale!

83.
The Main Cons of Enterprise-Level
LANGUAGE TARGETTING HASSLE
Google Map listings have no hreflang.
BIG COMPANY POLITICS
The command chain and time-to-implement is increased massively.
INTERNAL FEEDBACK PLATFORMS
Existing features in place for staff performance compete with public reviews.
MORE LISTINGS, MORE BULLSH*T
Keeping data consisted and content enriched at scale is impossible.

84.
Solving those issues (no easy feat!)
LANGUAGE TARGETTING HASSLE
Google Map listings have no hreflang.
BIG COMPANY POLITICS
The command chain and time-to-implement is increased massively.
INTERNAL FEEDBACK PLATFORMS
Existing features in place for staff performance compete with public reviews.
MORE LISTINGS, MORE BULLSH*T
Keeping data consisted and content enriched at scale is impossible.
OPTIONAL REDIRECTION
Unforced so Gbot can crawl non-US domains
INTERNAL EDUCATION
AUTOMATION & TOOLS
As well as proper processes.
BEING AWESOME
Preach the good word of SEO. Prove the ROI.

85.
Internal Education is
the key to enterprise-
level Local success
Taking all of our knowledge, and using it for good

86.
The Problem
Google my
Business
Internal
Score
Quality Managers
CRM Operational
Staff
Customer
Service
SEO

87.
The Vision
Google my
Business
Internal
Score
Quality Managers
CRM Operational
Staff
Customer
Service
SEO

88.
Highlighting these issues can be sensitive matters
Who the hell
are SEO
anyway?
We already have
a good rating
system in place
There‘s no budget
for that
No one pays
attention to
Google Maps
anyway
That negative
review is FAKE, I
am the BEST at
what I do

89.
Preach the good word of Local SEO
We make heck tons
of revenue
$$$$$$$

90.
Preach the good word of Local SEO
No channel revenue bragging but
making people cash horny
We exist only to benefit the
company’s goals – it’s in our best
interest
Highlighting the fact that Local
Entity reviews are publicly visible
Compromises: incorporating GMB
reviews with the operational staff
goals.

91.
This is geniunely tricky.
You need patience, positivity, and a politician
(Thorsten – Director SEO)

92.
Gather a local
army to fight
your battles!
Your best assets are on the ground.

93.
Unique content!
Your best assets are on the ground
Local links!
Photo flagging! Correct data!

94.
Working with Operational Staff
• Education workshops for operational staff and
region managers, in HQ and country.
• Created specific how-to guides based on the
most common listing problems, e.g. how to flag
reviews, who to contact for issue x
• Branch opening questionaire to source important
information and content from the get go.
• Mindset of „Help us, help you“

95.
„This SEO stuff is awesome“
But: be careful.
The more education, the more people start
to believe
a) You have a direct line to Google
b) They can do it themselves.

96.
Use Knowledge
Management Platforms
for consistent
local entities
Collecting and optimizing our entities in one space

97.
Local Management Platforms

98.
Be pushed to all major directories

99.
Automated data updates and suppression
is a dream

100.
One central way to review respond

101.
Pushing the need
and importance of
reviews
SEO team led initiatives across the countries.

102.
Set-up of review notifications
Send information directly to operational managers.

103.
Preaching the good word of Local SEO
Reviews make you
get rich quick
$$$$$$$

104.
Some Winning Review Push Strategies
Communication (nicely): A quick mention to happy customers that their feedback is
valued. No review gating though!
Incentives: Refreshments for waiting customers, adorn with review shortlinks.
Make it easy for them, e.g. with tablets in-store, Free WIFI
Competitions: in-branch for most mentioned in reviews staff member, in regions and
countries for highest rated location.
Helping negative reviewers and asking them to reconsider.
Actually delivering a good service ;)

105.
SOLVED!
LANGUAGE TARGETTING HASSLE
Google Map listings have no hreflang.
BIG COMPANY POLITICS
The command chain and time-to-implement is increased massively.
INTERNAL FEEDBACK PLATFORMS
Existing features in place for staff performance compete with public reviews.
MORE LISTINGS, MORE BULLSH*T
Keeping data consisted and content enriched at scale is impossible.
üUnforced, browser lang. Based
redirects
üCompromises & better
education of company benefits
üMaking operations our local
rockstars, and Yext
üA long time of internal
education, scary meetings.
Being pro-company KPI SEOs.

106.
How did all
this work for

107.
Google my
Business
Internal
Score
CRM Operational
Staff
Quality
Managers
SEO
Customer
Service

108.
Reviews &
ratings impact

109.
Current review and rep management process
üLearnings from review push initiatives being spread worldwide by
SEO country managers
üNegative reviews (in some cases) get changed to better scores after
issues are properly dealt with
üP.S. – review responding had an awesome impact on local pack
rankings. 10/10 would recommend.
üCreated Google Data Studio dashboards for top stakeholders per
country.

110.
Reviews are BOOMING (all over, but this is UK)

111.
Local Pack
Rankings &
Visibility

112.
Local Pack Ranking Share (Sept. 2019)
ENTERPRISE branches UK: 420 SIXT branches UK: 51
ENTERPRISE local pack share: 40% SIXT local pack share: 34%

113.
Local Revenue
Performance

114.
Reviews impact on Revenue 2018-19 (UK)
Amount of reviews (Yext + GMB) vs. Local Organic revenue (GA + UTM) May – Aug 2019

115.
US, UK, DE, FR, ES
Amount of reviews (Yext + GMB) vs. Local Organic revenue (GA + UTM) May – Aug 2019

116.
Local performance increase YoY
US UK DE ES FR
Unique
Visitors
Revenue
+68%
+77%
+65%
+95%
-50%
-18%
+119%
+131%
+77%
+67%
GA data Jan – Sept 2019 YoY

117.
Local is the dream traffic source
CvR BR ToS
+111% -42% +32%
UK Local GA data Jan – Sept 2019 YoY

118.
Offline impacts on
online performance:
-Operationalperformance(reviews)hinders
yourawesomeonsiteSEO&CRO
-Valuablebusinessvisitscanimprovelocal
rankings
-Inversely,youcanuseyourdigitalknowledge
toimproveofflineperformance
Wie geil ist das?

119.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
üLocal entity rankings and prominence are way more important than organic
(beat aggregators and zero-click SERPs, etc.)
üEnrich the hell out of your listings with unique, relevant, and aligned data to
ensure you have the final say above Google and Local Guides.
üFeed services like Q&A & photos with your own data and take control,
inversely use these to enhance on-site content.
üEducate and motivate your business and operational staff to be your Local
SEO superheroes.
üIncorporate Local SEO performance within your businesses core KPIs.

120.
SET THEIR LOCAL
PERFORMANCE
ON 🔥 🔥 🔥

121.
Join the fabulous SIXT SEO crew –> sixt.jobs

122.
THANK YOU
🔥 😘
I‘m Izzi Smith,
Soon-to-be: Technical SEO
Analyst at Ryte
@izzionfire
me@izzismith.com