The Complexities of Local SEO During COVID-19: Summary of Episode #7
The one and only Niki Mosier joins the podcast to rant about the world of local SEO during a pandemic and beyond:
Struggling with Google's GMB support
The complexities of local SEO and COVID-19
On being both a local and technical SEO
Resources:
The World of Local SEO and Its Complexities both Pre and During a Pandemic: A Conversation with Niki Mosier
Niki Mosier is a fabulous person as well as a bit of an SEO anomaly as she is both a fantastic local and technical SEO!
While she likes technical SEO, Niki loves local SEO as it gives her the chance to make a direct impact on the client's business life. Certainly that "business life" has gotten more complex during COVID-19. To that, Niki was a tad surprised at how quickly Google pivoted to help businesses better align with the new "environment."
Still, working with Google on the local side can be frustrating. There's certainly a lot of chatter on SEO Twitter about the hardships of dealing with Google on the local side. Niki says, and I've experienced the same, that Google's paid search support is far beyond the GMB support available. It can be downright difficult to get a quick response from the GMB support time. However, since we're talking about money, the paid team is far more responsive. One "trick" Niki has tried is to reach out to the paid search support team first about a local issue (in "ignorance") and try to get an "in" that way.
More helpful than anything though is the local SEO community (who rock in case you haven't seen it in action on Twitter, etc.)
Niki also addressed the complexities of working with SMBs on their SEO during COVID-19. One challenge is just keeping up with all the changes to a business's operating hours as the world deals with curfews and lockdowns. This all gets even more complex when you have multiple locations in places that have different limitations on a business's operations.
Nothing is worse than having someone show up to a business only to find out that the information in the GMB profile was inaccurate in the midst of a pandemic. This is especially true now that your GMB profile is basically your new business card.