What Pizza Can Teach Us About Local SEO
Last week we had one of the craziest calls with a marketing agency we've ever had, so we have to share it. They help restaurants in NYC with marketing and didn't understand why restaurants in competitive markets, such as NYC, need to optimize their Google Business Profile's SEO. "There can only be 3 pizza shops ranking on Google Maps in NYC so why even bother; it's impossible!" they said (in a classic New York accent).
Nothing is impossible...
But to be clear, ranking a pizza shop in NYC is just about as hard as it gets. Order yourself your favorite slice of pizza while we explain how there can be more than three top-ranking pizza shops in NYC. This logic applies to any business in any city, so don't click the delete button on this email so soon!
If a hungry New Yorker is looking for pizza, they might type one of the following four phrases into Google Maps:
- Pizza NYC
- Pizza in NYC
- Best Pizza NYC
- Plzza Slices NYC
Below are the names of each pizza shop that showed up in the top 3 search results for at least one of those four search phrases, and how many times each did:
- Joe's Pizza Broadway x 2
- Keste Pizza e Vino x 3
- Bleecker Street Pizza x 2
- NY Pizza Suprema x 1
- Scarr's Pizza x 1
- Corner Slice x 1
- Slice Pizza x 1
- Dollar Slice Pizza x 1
Would you look at that?! If someone is trying to get a pizza in NYC, there are 8 different restaurants ranking in the top 3 for just four different keywords.
Here are the actual top 20 ways people typically search for pizza in NYC:
pizza near me, best pizza NYC, pizza delivery NYC, pizza takeout NYC, pizza restaurants NYC, slice pizza NYC, authentic NY pizza, Neapolitan pizza NYC, wood-fired pizza NYC, vegan pizza NYC, gluten-free pizza NYC, late-night pizza NYC, pizza by the slice NYC, pizza delivery Brooklyn, pizza delivery Queens, pizza delivery Manhattan, pizza delivery the Bronx, pizza delivery Staten Island, Di Fara pizza, Joe's Pizza
If four search terms resulted in 8 different restaurants in the top 3, the top 20 search terms will easily show us at least 40 different restaurants!
What this tells us is that, sure, you might not rank in the top 3 for "pizza slice NYC" because that's incredibly competitive, but you can still rank in the top 3 for different variations of that keyword by simply using more of them (called long tail keywords) in your Google Business Posts, on your website, and on your social media accounts. All 2,000 places that sell pizza in NYC (thanks for these stats, Bard!) are fighting for the keyword "pizza in NYC." Let them tire themselves out while you win on the easier long tail versions that people are still looking for, like "best pizza pies in Soho" or "slices of za NYC". If you have questions about how to do this, just email hello@merchynt.com with a link to your Google Business Profile on Google Maps and we'll give you some pointers for free.
RoboReply now has analytics to let you know how many reviews each profile is getting. Managing Google reviews on more than one profile has never been so easy!
ProfilePro tip of the week:
Write a Google Business update that uses a longtail keyword (meaning one that it not the most commonly searched keyword, but something that people looking for what you do might still type into Google)
Update: we're getting ready to release a brand new version of ProfilePro that makes it more useful than ever. Stay tuned for more details!
Go to Your Google Business Profile
We love Google Maps marketing as much as we love pizza (an unhealthy amount). We offer:
- Google Business Profile management services
- Listings/citation management software
- Reviews management software
- Reputation management software
- Google Business Profile SEO AI tool
- Bulk Google review responding AI
The best part? Everything can be 100% white-labeled for agencies
Check out our guide on every possible ranking strategy for Google Business Profiles!
Google Updates You Should Know About
Google updates their algos regularly, and we check and then digest them for you. Here are the latest ones local marketers should know about:
- March 2023 - Core Algo Update
- December 2022 - Spam Link Update
- September 2022 - Product Reviews Update
You can find details on all algo updates here.
