• Search Engine Land
  • Sections
    • SEO
    • SEM
    • Local
    • Retail
    • Google
    • Bing
    • Social
    • Resources
    • More
    • Home
  • Search Engine Land
  • SEO
  • SEM
  • Local
  • Retail
  • Google
  • Bing
  • Social
  • Resources
  • Live
  • More
  • Events
  • SUBSCRIBE

Search Engine Land

Search Engine Land
  • SEO
  • SEM
  • Local
  • Retail
  • Google
  • Bing
  • Social
  • Resources
  • More
  • Newsletters
  • Home
Local

Do Google Posts impact ranking? A case study

Columnist Joy Hawkins shares the results of a case study to see whether Google Posts can move the needle for local search rankings.

Joy Hawkins on November 2, 2017 at 10:51 am
  • More

A few months ago, I teamed up with Ben Fisher from Steady Demand to test whether Google Posts have any influence on ranking in the local results (the “3-pack”).

The methodology

We picked two different businesses to test this on. One was a garage flooring company that had been struggling to rank for their main keywords in the 3-pack. The second was my church, which does not have any SEO or marketing efforts going on. The team at Steady Demand made two posts every seven days in Google My Business from August 11, 2017, to October 1, 2017.

Case 1: Garage flooring in Vancouver

For this business, we saw their ranking in the local results increase one position on “garage flooring Vancouver.”  It moved up from position four to position three, winning them a spot in the 3-pack, less than a week after they started posting.

For just “garage flooring” (implicit search), they increased from position seven to two about four days after the posts started. I double-checked to make sure they didn’t receive any new reviews a few days prior to the increase, since they did receive a few new reviews during the course of the test.

Case 2: Church in Keswick, Ontario

For my church, we were mainly tracking how they ranked for “church” keywords. They increased from position five to position three for “church keswick, on” but did so gradually after the posting started.

Unlike the garage flooring company, the posts on the church’s listing also drove a significant amount of traffic to the website. We used UTM codes to track the traffic in Google Analytics. Most of it came from mobile, and about half the traffic came from within the target area (the rest was out-of-state).

The post responsible for the largest amount of traffic was actually a bio/spotlight of one of the pastors. Google My Business showed zero engagement on the post despite its driving 74 new users to the website.

Conclusions:

  1. Based on what we’re seeing for this case and others we’re testing, I think Google Posts do have a mild impact on ranking. These tests were purposely done in non-competitive industries, so it might not be enough to produce movement in some scenarios.
  2. Google Posts are low-impact, low-effort tasks. They should be combined with other tasks to help improve Local SEO for a small business.
  3. The rankings maintained themselves weeks after we stopped posting on the listings. This is different from what has been observed about posting on social platforms such as Google Plus.
  4. Google My Business Insights are wrong. You need to use UTM codes on your URLs to get proper insights on these in Google Analytics.

Google Posts have been surprisingly underutilized by businesses and agencies, partly due to the past inability to schedule posts. With the recent feature addition to create and update posts via the Google My Business API, this is an opportunity for people to start using Google Posts more.


Opinions expressed in this article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land. Staff authors are listed here.



About The Author

Joy Hawkins
Joy is the owner of the Local Search Forum and Sterling Sky in Canada. She is also the author of The Expert’s Guide to Local SEO, which is an advanced training manual for people wanting a detailed look at what it takes to succeed in the Local SEO space. She has been working in the industry since 2006. She is a faculty member at LocalU and enjoys speaking regularly at marketing conferences such as SMX, LocalU, Pubcon and State of Search. You can find her on Twitter or volunteering as a Product Expert on the Google My Business Forum.

Related Topics

Channel: LocalGoogleGoogle: Google My BusinessGoogle: Google PostsGoogle: Maps & LocalLocal Search ColumnSEO - Search Engine Optimization

We're listening.

Have something to say about this article? Share it with us on Facebook, Twitter or our LinkedIn Group.

Get the daily newsletter search marketers rely on.

Processing...Please wait.

See terms.

ATTEND OUR EVENTS

Lorem ipsum doler this is promo text about SMX events.

June 15-16, 2021: SMX Advanced

June 21-22, 2021: SMX Advanced Europe

August 17, 2021: SMX Convert

November 9-10, 2021: SMX Next

December 14, 2021: SMX Code

Available On-Demand: SMX

Available On-Demand: SMX Report

Available On-Demand: SMX Create

×


Learn More About Our SMX Events

Discover actionable tactics that can help you overcome crucial marketing challenges. Our next conference will be held:

Next Event: Sept. 14-15, 2021

Available On-Demand: March 2021

Available On-Demand: October 2020

×

Attend MarTech - Click Here


Learn More About Our MarTech Events

White Papers

  • Gartner Magic Quadrant for Digital Experience Platforms
  • Selecting a Customer Data Platform For Your Organization: The 2020 Gartner Market Guide
  • The Complete Guide to Web Core Vitals
  • The New Era of Automation in SEO
  • Nielsen Annual Marketing Report: Era of Adaptation
See More Whitepapers

Webinars

  • Drive Customer Engagement with the Power of Personalization
  • 7 Use Cases That Prove Why You Should Implement DAM
  • Accelerate Your SEO & Content Marketing Program with 4 Key Milestones
See More Webinars

Research Reports

  • Local Marketing Solutions for Multi-Location Businesses
  • Enterprise Digital Asset Management Platforms
  • Identity Resolution Platforms
  • Customer Data Platforms
  • B2B Marketing Automation Platforms
  • Call Analytics Platforms
See More Research

Attend SMX For Only $199

h
Receive daily search news and analysis.

Channels

  • SEO
  • SEM
  • Local
  • Retail
  • Google
  • Bing
  • Social

Our Events

  • SMX
  • MarTech

Resources

  • White Papers
  • Research
  • Webinars

About

  • About Us
  • Contact
  • Privacy
  • Marketing Opportunities
  • Staff

Follow Us

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • Newsletters
  • RSS
  • Youtube

© 2021 Third Door Media, Inc. All rights reserved.

Your privacy means the world to us. We share your personal information only when you give us explicit permission to do so, and confirm we have your permission each time. Learn more by viewing our privacy policy.Ok