How to use Google Places to your local seo advantage or bypass the problem strategically.
It is not all doom and gloom with the presence of Google Places in SERPs, because Places has opened up new doors for local SEO in the local business market. There are a few ways you can use things to your advantage.
a) If you have a local address, you can register as a local business and use that for a Google Places place page. Many businesses are run from home and it is perfectly legal in many countries to do so. If you are able to register as a local business on Google Places for optimizing for your target keyword, you stand a great chance to rank within the places pack for your target keywords. In fact this might get you a local seo advantage too if you organize your strategy properly.
b) There are usually some spots available immediately above the Google Places pack where Organic results are displayed in the SERPs. If you are doing Organic SEO and if competition analysis tells you that you can rank above the places pack results, this is a big plus. In a lot of cases, this can be achieved through keyword domain match. If a keyword domain match is hard to achieve, a series of aggressive seo campaigns can achieve this result as well.
c) Double Whammy: If you setup your campaigns properly, you can achieve both of the above for target keywords – in this case you have seriously achieved a massive outcome.
d) If your competition and keyword analysis tells you that none of the above can be applied, it is best to move on to the next target keyword without wasting time, effort and money. Planning is 80% of your local seo work and if planning tells you to stop no matter how good the keyword is, that is very good advice.
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