Optimizing a regional page

[compar]

I know that several of the SEs and Directories have regional sections. I have never paid much attention to this regional stuff before because I was always trying to optimize for the "world".

But I have a site that we want to optimized for a specific geographical region of Canada. Can someone be so kind as to tell me everything there is to know about regional optimization please?

[Smyrl]

Bob, I am sure people have had more experience than I but I have found for my purposes it takes little more than putting location in title tag and description. I of course put location on contact page and usually on homepage but have not worried about putting location on all pages.

Frequently I try for good placement for the following type keyword phrases:

widgets city state
widgets city
widgets

As you would suspect top phrase ranks best, followed by widgets city, and lastly widgets. If keyword is not highly competitive it is possible to rank well for all three.

I will be interested in reading ideas of other posters.

Shannon

[schlottke]

I tend to use an opposite aproach smyrl.

Minneapolis Web Design : Minnesota Flash Design : Twin Cities

--- target the base directory of the region, use keepitlocal.com, and have websites that are both hosted in that area and are from that area link to it.

That by itself should net you top 5, even for the most competitve area terms. (with the exception of "cancun vacations" "Las Vegas Motels" etc.

[Smyrl]

[QUOTE=schlottke]Minneapolis Web Design : Minnesota Flash Design : Twin CitiesQUOTE]

I see you are going for some fairly competitive keywords. Are you able to be reasonably ranked for Web Design, Flash Design, etc.? I will try your approach on next page I put up.

Shannon

[compar]

But what about Geo-targeting and regional sections in directories etc? It seem to me I have seen a lot of talk about this but I've never paid attention.

I've just had a very bad experience with a local real estate site. It is #1 allinachor for the regional search term -- kitchener waterloo real estate -- and as of this morning has 1920 backlinks reported and PR6, but it is still only #231 in the SERPs.

I'm wondering if there is something else I can do to give it even more regional relevance.

Now I have a local jewelry store who specializes in fine diamonds. I don't want to have the same problem with it as I have had with the real estate site. So besides the obvious things like using the regional terms in the keyword phrases, is there anything else?

[Smyrl]

But what about Geo-targeting and regional sections in directories etc? It seem to me I seen a lot of talk about this but I've never paid attention.


Bob, I have not targeted regional directories. They can't hurt. I usually go after DMOZ, Yahoo Directory , Google. And any themed links that are a good fit. Example: My Texas Music concets site targets backlinks from artist's sites that we have preforming.

I once keept a list of Search engines that had a free submit. I would run off a copy for each web and record date I submitted and date I found site listed. The search engine world kept changing so rapidly and Google became so big I just started concentrating on Google, Yahoo, and DMOZ.

I do not do search engine optimization for anyone but the sites for which I do the web design.

I expect you will find the regional jewelry world a much easier world to work in than real estate world. That has to be one of the worst.

Shannon

[SEbasic]

Here are a few to get you started.

http://www.sterlins.com/
http://www.ace-directory.com/
http://www.blakkat.com/
http://www.buzzle.com/
http://www.designdirectory.org/
http://www.directoryarchives.com/
http://dwoz.com/
http://www.dwoz.com/
http://www.earthstation9.com/
http://www.favouritelink.com/
http://www.searchenginecolossus.com/
http://www.geniusfind.com/
http://www.gimpsy.com/
http://www.josh.nu/
http://www.dmoz.org/
http://www.re-quest.net/
http://www.sedsearch.com/
http://www.seekon.com/
http://www.turnpike.net/directory.phtml
http://www.website-design-101.co.uk/website-design-directory.html
http://www.webworldindex.com/
http://www.web-service-companies.com/
http://www.webmasterschannel.com/
http://www.webmaster-toolkit.com/directory.shtml
http://www.websavvy.cc/
http://www.worldwidewub.org/
http://www.wowdirectory.com/
http://dir.yahoo.com/
http://www.yeandi.com/

In terms of geotargetting...

I would go with schlottke's method. I would have thought this was the best way to do it. That's how I have normally gone about it.

RE your real estate site, that could just be the sandbox effect don't you think?

[disgust]

a quick note about dmoz:

normally it's really really hard to get listed twice in dmoz, but it's perfectly acceptable to be listed in your regional directory and a more broad one.

the same thing's also true of the kids & teens section.

[nohaber]

If you are optimizing for Google Canada or any other "Google Country", links from domains ending with .ca + links from sites hosted in certain Canadian IP ranges should help.
Other than that, selecting geo keywords will help.
Also, putting a certain physical address on a page may help depending on the search engine (if the search engine tries to parse and learn addresses from web pages).

[iconv]

Also, putting a certain physical address on a page may help depending on the search engine (if the search engine tries to parse and learn addresses from web pages).
I have never noticed this having any effect, which search engines use this approach?

[Old Welsh Guy]

I have had loads of crap with this, as I am in Wales, and we have New south Wales in Australia interfringwith our SERP's . I have found that getting links from country only specific directories helps, but what does it best for me is having all the usual methods of optimising, but making sure that the full address is on every page at the foot. i.e

business, town, region, Wales, Uk. I also have a small set of links around the text o the main pges on the site. Call it superstition, but I just had this thought that maybe the search engines were taking not of it as it was surrounding links? Hell who knows, I do it and it works lol I normally get a rankining for town , region, country and main island (UK)

[compar]

RE your real estate site, that could just be the sandbox effect don't you think?
God I hope so. Unfortunately the client despaired a month ago or more and refused to pay me the last installment in our 4 month contract because of lack of results.

I'm still working on the site and a couple others in the same category, because I hate to have unsatisfied customers, and as a matter of professional pride I guess.

[l234244]

Compar, what sort of results was your client expecting after 4 months?

[compar]

Compar, what sort of results was your client expecting after 4 months?
As much as you explain to them that things take time they don't believe it. The Guy was prepared to pay for 4 months, but he really expected results in 2 weeks. When he had no visible results -- read top ten in the SERP -- after 3 months he quit.

I showed him all the links and all the additional pages indexed and all the other parameters that had improved for his site, and which I expect will eventually put him top ten, but that isn't enough for these impatient people. They want top ten today.

[l234244]

I think this is a problem that all SEO companies will face in the future, best thing is to point them to some of these forums and let them read for themselves what it takes to be in the top 10 results in search engines.

[DarrenC]

It also doesn't help with shady SEO companies out there - trust in itself is a hurdle for most SEO companies to get over. I have to admit that when I first started out, I too would of expected instant results when you've employed a expert in the field.

It's only when you read forum and articles that you don't realise how difficult it can be and how much work is put into getting your website to No.1

[DarrenC]

Just out of interest I checked out KW's 'kitchener waterloo real estate'

Looking at a few examples it appears that more focus is given to Real Estate, and less on Kitchener Waterloo.

agentsonline.net/kitchener

Then there are some websites which have hardly any KW's included in the content

greaterkwchamber.com

There's only 56,000 results, some of the sites in the top 10 have low PR, few links, few content. Strange why your not ranking higher. From the examples though they seems to be going for a something similar to Schlotte, in that:

kitchener waterloo real estate canada real estate specialists