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I came across an issue where I used the USPS mailing industry standard address of a company to create a new G+ Local listing, where the listing was verified by postcard PIN. Then a couple of months later, it vanished from Google completely after the owners received a phone call from a Google rep verifying their address information. Read the rest of this entry »
Author Archive
How to Change a Business Address or Name in Online Directory Listings
September 20th, 2012If you would like help fixing your online business listings, please call Scott at 262-204-7265 or fill out this form: http://www.orionweb.net/client-nap-info-request/ and we will perform an audit of your online business listings across all the various Internet Yellow Page Directories (IYP) and the major data aggregators. We will help you determine what needs to be corrected. Remember, for search engine optimization purposes, it is important to maintain accurate Name, Address, & Phone information (NAP) online!
What do you do if your business moved locations or changed it’s name in order to have that information updated on the plethora online business directories?
You used to be able to call your local phone book company to have them change your listing info. But now, in the digital age, there are hundreds of locations where your company’s address can be listed online. It is safe to assume that not all of those multiple listings will accurately represent your company’s current business name, business address and/or business telephone number, etc.
To help to clean up your NAP (Name, Address, Phone Number) info in various online business directories, I would suggest to start from ‘the top’ and work your way down. Read the rest of this entry »
Ensure Your Business Has Uniform Address Info on Its Website & Throughout the Internet
August 24th, 2012It has become more important these days to have a company’s official NAP (name, address, phone number) info displayed on her website correctly. The major search engines are drawing NAP data from a large variety of sources these days, such as the major data aggregators, internet yellow pages (IYPs) or even a business’ own website ‘contact us’ page.
These online business directory listings that link to a business’ website are acting as ‘citations’, which are a ranking factor in SEO these days. Having uniform listings will ensure that these citations don’t feed search engines mixed signals. Read the rest of this entry »
How to Find the FID Version of a Google Map Maker POI URL from a G+ Local Page CID
August 22nd, 2012Here I present some tips on how to find the FID of a POI in Google Map Maker when you only know the Google+ Local or Google Maps CID. I also explain how to find the CID of a Map Maker POI if you only have a Google+ Local page URL.
It is important to have the FID of your Google Map Maker POI (GMM POI) for a few reasons. If something ever went wrong with your Google Plus Local page, or it disappears out of thin air, like has happened to me, you may need to reference the FID version of the GMM URL to recover it. Read the rest of this entry »
How To Manage Google Plus Local Pages vs Editing G+ Business Pages
July 11th, 2012There has been some confusion these days due to the transition of Google Maps Places Listings being converted into Google Plus Local Pages. For businesses who have already created a Google Plus Business Page using their Google Plus Profile, this can be especially confusing!
You might ask “How do I manage these various pages?” or “Where do I go to edit my local and/or business page?” First, you need to know with which page you are working. What is the difference between Google+ Local Pages and Google+ Business Pages?
Read the rest of this entry »
Authority Labs to Discontinue Free Accounts
July 9th, 2012I received an interesting reply from one of the founders of Authority Labs today to a support request I placed earlier. They are not going to offer their free 10-keyword accounts after they transition to their new partner API system.
The email said: Read the rest of this entry »
Using Google Map Maker to Fix Issues with Google+ Local Pages (Formerly Google Maps Place Listings)
July 3rd, 2012I found it very useful in Google Map Maker to know the CID of the G+ Local Page.
To find the listing’s CID you can simply visit the G+ Local Page and copy the URL for the ‘Edit business details’ link.
For example, the SEOMoz G+ Local Page is: plus.google.com/101479834534380514124/
If you actually click through to the URL from the ‘Edit business details’ link you would see a url such as: maps.google.com/maps/place?cid=18445035969036926487&mode=edit…
You can then translate that URL into a Google Maps URL by removing the “/place” from the URL (I also like to cut off anything after the CID # too) such as this:
maps.google.com/maps?cid=18445035969036926487
You can then find their Google Map Maker point of interest (GMM POI) by pasting that CID after this URL: google.com/mapmaker?gw=90&cid= such as: www.google.com/mapmaker?gw=90&cid=18445035969036926487
By clicking on ‘details’ you can view the change history and see that the GMM POI was added on Aug 16, 2011 6:32pm.
You can also see that they have moved locations and that when someone tried to add ‘Internet Marketing Service’ as an additional category, that change was denied once. A phone number was deleted and an additional category of “Marketing Consultant” was successfully added at one time as well as seen in the history.
The GMM POI URLs & change history can be very helpful information to know, especially when you are dealing with duplicate listings or in situations where you may have a main office listing with 5 or 10 practitioners at the same address each with their own practitioner name listing.
I have encountered a case where 1 law firm main office listing got merged with one of their attorney listings. Not only were 2 listings merged, but the reviews swapped to another listing as well.
In the Google Map Maker POI history you can also see where users had made edits and changed the POI names over the years. One of the attorney listings is marked as a duplicate, though it is not and several listings had changed attorney names back and forth over time.
What a mess! The progress to clean up the confusion can be slow at times, as you often will have to wait until a Google reviewer with some clout or experience passes by the POI to accept or deny the changes one makes… but it is worth the work in the end to have all the POIs in order and Google Maps / Google+ Local pages showing the proper data!
If you would like help fixing your online business listings, please call Scott at 262-204-7265 or fill out this form: http://www.orionweb.net/client-nap-info-request/ and we will perform an audit of your online business listings across all the various Internet Yellow Page Directories (IYP) and the major data aggregators. We will help you determine what needs to be corrected. Remember, for search engine optimization purposes, it is important to maintain accurate Name, Address, & Phone information (NAP) online!
How to Rate & Review Places in Google+ Local
June 27th, 2012Do I need to join Google+ in order to review a Google+ Local Places Page?
Yes, if you are already logged into a Google Account and you are not signed up for G+ yet, you are required to fill out some basic user info for your Google+ Profile.
If you click on the ‘Write a review’ icon on a Google Local Page, it pops up a window which states: “Before you can rate and review places in Google+ Local, you must join Google+.” Read the rest of this entry »
Newest Referral Spam from BuyFacebookShares found in Google Analytics
June 7th, 2012The latest in referral spam that I have seen in our client’s Google Analytics Refferrals Traffic Sources is from tinyurl.com /BuyFacebookShares.
In checking about 20 various client’s stats, we have seen at least 6 and at most 8 visits from this referrer between the dates of May 20 and June 3, 2012. The visits normally occured every 2nd day between those dates. The traffic ‘seems’ to originate from Brazil in every case that we have encountered, according to demographics data.
Read the rest of this entry »
A Milwaukee SEO Expert You Can Trust?
May 18th, 2012As a part of our SEO process, we here at Orion Group keep our eye on the competition, just as we track our client’s competitors websites and search engine rankings.
One competitor in specific started an SEO website to promote his new potential business, with no information on who he was, no name, no email address, just ‘Milwaukee SEO Consultant’. Back in April 2011, he boasted over and over on his brand new blog about how his Google rankings were climbing high so quickly. We all wanted to know, just like you may be wondering too, ‘how did he do this’?
In my opinion the tactics this Milwaukee SEO professional has used is shameful and makes the overall internet marketing consultant look bad. Well, below I have documented a few of his ‘tricks’. Read the rest of this entry »