Large Scale Localised Landing Page SEO

1. The UK’s foremost pure play SEO Agency
LARGE SCALE
LOCALISED LANDING PAGE SEO

2. @bluearrayseo
INTRODUCING ‘MOATING’
Creating a moat around your
number one ranking castle
@bluearrayseo

3. @bluearrayseo
BUT FIRST…
LET’S GO BACK…

4. ...BACK TO APRIL 2016 &
‘THINK WITH GOOGLE’
@bluearrayseo

5. Mobile search in 2018 accounts for
almost 60% of all US online traffic.
*“Nearly 1/3 of all mobile searches
are related to location.”
LOCAL SEARCHES
*https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/consumer-insights/local-s
earch-mobile-search-micro-moments/
@bluearrayseo

6. *Zip code ‘qualifiers’ are e.g “Mexican restaurants 75215” via
https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/consumer-insights/local-search-mobile-search-micro-mome
nts/
Users are increasingly less
inclined to type location
*qualifiers.
“local relevance is expected,
but not always overtly
requested.”
Lisa Gevelber (Google's Global VP
Marketing), August 2017
INTENT IS ASSUMED
@bluearrayseo

7. ₁ Head terms would typically be one word high search volume queries related to your product or
service.
₂ Google likely use aggregated user behavior among other signals
When Google receives a query
related to your product or
service, how do we know local
intent is in play if it’s not
always explicitly typed by the
user?
If your ₁head or fat belly terms
trigger:
*Maps in search results
*Localised competitor pages
Location related modifiers in:
*₂Autocomplete
*₂Related searches
WHEN SHOULD YOU CARE?
@bluearrayseo

8. If you have a website tied to
localities, you need “what +
where pages” that;
Offer genuine utility & value
Are unique per locality
Have high quality content
Low cost to scale
Evergreen
It’s a tough ask...
LOCALISED
LANDING PAGES
●
●
●
●
●
@bluearrayseo

9. Localised landing pages can
take many forms:
● Yellowpages.com
● Booking.com
● Trulia
● AutoTrader
● Airbnb
● Yelp
● Golfadvisor.com
● Sixt.com
● Craigslist.org
EXAMPLES
@bluearrayseo

10. Localised landing pages can
be at risk of algorithmic and
manual penalisation.
On the manual side we need to
avoid being classed as any of
the below:
● A cookie-cutter site
● Having doorway pages
● Auto generated content
● Copied content
WARNINGS
@bluearrayseo

11. WHAT ARE THE TWO MAIN
ALGORITHMIC CONCERNS?
@bluearrayseo

12. Panda is a core ranking signal
and a part of the algorithm is
focused on thin pages:
● Auto generated content
● Thin affiliate pages
(e.g. just feeds)
● Content from other sources,
for example: Scraped
content or low-quality guest
blog posts
Thin content is not typically low
word count.
THIN CONTENT
@bluearrayseo

13. Not a penalty. Duplicate
content is not the same as
copied content.
Much of the main content on
landing pages should be
unique and offer significant
value difference against
internal pages and
competitors.
DUPLICATE CONTENT
@bluearrayseo

14. What does good look like?
ClickMechanic.com
Strong CTA above the fold
Unique value add below the
fold on <what> + <where>
pages via user reviews
No duplication because
centroid is the main factor,
layered with an algorithm
GOOD LOCAL LANDING PAGES
@bluearrayseo

15. What does good look like?
Zoopla.co.uk
(similar to Trulia in the US) -
IPO of $1.3bn
Value add on <what> +
<where> pages comes via
property details snippets (20
per page)
No duplication again because
of centroid and relevancy and
a different default sort order
to competitors (most recent)
GOOD LOCAL LANDING PAGES
(2)
@bluearrayseo

16. What does good look like?
Ihateironing.com
Strong CTA above the fold
Unique value add below the
fold on <what> + <where>
pages via bricks and mortar
(local listing) data
No duplication because
centroid is the main factor +
geo fenced. Pagination to
show depth
GOOD LOCAL LANDING PAGES
(3)
@bluearrayseo

17. Visits improved 204% YoY.
Mobile traffic (inc. tablet) grew
307% vs. 169% on desktop.
IMPACT (ihateironing.com)
@bluearrayseo

18. *There are 19,354 incorporated places in the United States. If you
had ten service types covering those places = 193,540 pages of
content.
What other ideas could we use
to offer unique value on
localised landing pages?
● RFQ data
● UGC (=<$)
● Data points & aggregates
Your creative ideas that
crucially, can *scale…
What about manually adding
text to pages?
LOCAL LANDING PAGES
@bluearrayseo

19. A surprising discovery was
that blocks of text related to
the locality on search results
pages (SRPs) appeared to
have no impact on ranking.
The longer term impact may
be second order though e.g
becomes more linkable.
Arguably could help with
longer tail keywords as well.
SRPs & TEXT BLOCKS
@bluearrayseo

20. PAUSE
@bluearrayseo

21. WHERE DO YOU GO
AFTER NUMBER 1?
Once you’ve achieved number one ranking for your
keywords, where can you go. What if #1 is impossible?
@bluearrayseo

22. We’ve all heard of Barnacle
SEO?
Like Barnacles attached to a
ships hull.
Third party assets that we can
attach to with relevant content,
keywords and/or media.
BARNACLE SEO?
@bluearrayseo

23. BACK TO
MOATING
@bluearrayseo

24. Practical example:
● Zoopla.co.uk
● Primelocation.com
● Homes24.co.uk
(pssstt... it’s all the same data)
Primelocation was a legitimate
acquisition and the other a
grey label.
It’s ‘Acquisition SEO’ but on
steroids.
MOATING (practical example)
@bluearrayseo

25. If you’re viewing these slides
online and missed the talk at
State of Search 2018,
I’m sorry.
THE SECRET
SAUCE!
@bluearrayseo

26. Clickshare being distributed
between positions 1-10.
Pos. 1 = ~*21% CTR
Pos. 5 = ~*4% CTR
Pos. 10 = ~*1% CTR
ISN’T THIS
CANNIBALISATION?
*CTR by industry ‘Real Estate’ across all devices.
advancedwebranking.com/ctrstudy/ @bluearrayseo

27. Rightmove 11m vs.
Zoopla 8m vs.
Primelocation 2m vs.
Homes24 200k
NUMBERS
@bluearrayseo

28. Far more M&A activity for SEO.
Publishers could help brands
with keywords they’re trying to
target with SEO advertorials
and grey labels.
This may even become a
serious revenue channel for
publishers.
WHERE COULD
THIS LEAD?
@bluearrayseo

29. IN SUMMARY
● ‘Think with Google’ gave us some incredible data we can
act upon
● Scaling localised landing pages is tough but with massive
upsides (big ROI)
● There is room for more traffic beyond number one rankings
● ‘Moating’ could leads to more M&A activity in SEO
and a beacon of hope for publishers
@bluearrayseo

30. THANK YOU
FOR LISTENING
@bluearrayseo