Google have recently announced changes to the Google search that will change the way in which a lot of companies rank in the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages). The reason for this is to improve the results for searchers when they are looking for a product or service; such as a local restaurant or company. Google local has been in use for a long time, but only normally appears when you add a geographic location or place name to the search string. The image above shows the results for the keyphrase Manchester SEO, which brings up the first 10 SEO companies that are listed in the Google business directory. Ranking within these listings is independent of standard search results, so even if you are ranked number #1 for this term, you won’t appear in the local listings unless you have worked on it specifically.
Google has now rolled out a worldwide plan to present the user with these results regardless of whether a location is entered as part of the keyphrase string or not. It determines your location from your IP address (which captures a reasonably broad location) but you also have the option to specify more specifically using some manual options. This is now making it very important to rank well within Google Local search, as these listings appear before the organic search results.
To find out more information, you can view the original post on the Google blog: Google local blog post
