By MiriamEllis

Posted by MiriamEllis

Google must be one of the most experimental enterprises the world has ever known. When it comes to the company’s local search interfaces, rather than rolling them all out as a single, cohesive whole, they have emerged in piecemeal fashion over two decades with different but related feature sets, unique URLs, and separate branding. Small wonder that confusion arises in dialog about aspects of local search. You, your agency coworkers, and your clients may find yourselves talking at cross-purposes about local rankings simply because you’re all looking at them on different interfaces!

Such is certainly the case with Google Maps vs. the object we call the Google Local Finder. Even highly skilled organic SEOs at your agency may not understand that these are two different entities which can feature substantially different local business rankings.

Today we’re going to clear this up, with a side-by-side comparison of the two user experiences, expert quotes, and a small, original case study that demonstrates and quantifies just how different rankings are between these important interfaces.

Methodology

I manually gathered both Google Maps and Local Finder rankings across ten different types of geo-modified, local intent search phrases and ten different towns and cities across the state of California. I looked at differences both across search phrase and across locale, observing those brands which ranked in the top 10 positions for each query. My queries were remote (not performed within the city nearest me) to remove the influence of proximity and establish a remote baseline of ranking order for each entry. I tabulated all data in a spreadsheet to discover the percentage of difference in the ranked results.

Results of my study of Google Maps vs. the Local Finder

Before I roll out the results, I want to be sure I’ve offered a good definition of these two similar but unique Google platforms. Any user performing a local search (like “best tacos san jose”) can take two paths for deep local results:

1. Path one starts with a local pack, typically made up of three results near the top of the organic search results. If clicked on, the local pack takes the user to the Local Finder, which expands on the local pack to feature multiple listings, accompanied by a map. These types of results exist on google.com/search.
2. Path two may start on any Android device that features Google Maps by default, or it can begin on a desktop device by clicking the “Maps” tab above the organic SERPs. These types of results look quite similar to the Local Finder, with their list of ranked businesses and associated map, but they exist on google.com/maps.

Here’s a side-by-side comparison:

At first glance, these two user experiences look fairly similar with some minor formatting and content differences, but the URLs are distinct, and what you might also notice in this screenshot is that the rankings, themselves, are different. In this example, the results are, in fact, startlingly different.

I’d long wanted to quantify for myself just how different Maps and Local Finder results …read more

Source:: Moz Blog