If you’re a business where people search your city for what you do (Chicago personal injury lawyer, Austin massage therapists), Google has just rocked your world. Your web site optimization is now more important than ever, and you cannot neglect your Google Places listing (the map listing).

As of last Wednesday, Google is now showing the map itself over in the right-hand column, and the listings on the page MIX RESULTS FROM ORGANIC AND MAP LISTINGS. This is huge. Clients who weren’t very high on the map, but have great optimization, can suddenly find themselves #1 again. Happy days are here again for the SEO guys!

Previously, a Google search engine results page might show 2-3 ads at the top, then a map with 7 listings, and finally, the top organic listings. Historically, there were 10 organic listings on the page. Now, you see the ads, and then you march right in to the listings. Map listings will have a red circle with a letter, as well as a link to the “more info” on the map listing, and strong organic listings will have both…the title and description from the page, along with the address and phone number.

Caveat: Generally, these Google algorithm shifts throw everything into chaos for about six weeks, and then things settle back to normal. Hopefully, this is the new normal.

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 6th, 2010 at 10:52 am and is filed under seo. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.