Citations description and Google Places description

[Goku770]

Hey guys! After 4 months I have hit the first page of google in second place! I have a question though, I was looking on how to get higher rankings in google places and came across search engine journal, the author claims it is important that your google places description AND citation descriptions NEED to be the same for higher rankings. Is this true? I thought that all we needed to do was consistency of NAP and catorgies. I researched a lot on citations before I did them, especially looking at Philip Rozek's citation tips but no one ever said that google places description needs to match citation descriptions. Please comment on this somebody. If I have to I will go back and copy and paste of each citation description, Thank You

 

[Linda Buquet]

Admittedly I don't specialize in citations, but I believe it's sort of the opposite. Google does not really like duplicate content so I've seen industry leaders say you should change up some of your citation descriptions so they are not all the same.

 

[Goku770]

Thank you for the advice and reply

 

[Goku770]

Im guessing when someone uses yext the same description gets used over and over though?

 

[Linda Buquet]

Ya I don't know if you can break it up for variety there. I think I read someone say that if you use a solution like Whitespark, it's a good idea to use the same one on about 10 and then change it every 10.

I'm going to move this to the Citation forum. That way Darren from Whitespark will be more likely to see it.

 

[Dustybones]

@ Goku

I try to keep descriptions varied. Also, What each site allows for number of characters in a description varies. so its good to have a handful of descriptions on hand. Also, Some allow links and other don't. With YEXT, We go in once a month and tweak things.

 

[whitespark]

Hey everyone. This question came up on a MaxImpact Google+ Hangout I participated on with Mike Blumenthal. Mike had some really good points about it. Mike notes that Google completely ignores the business description in their own local ranking algorithm, so that should tell you something about how they feel about descriptions across the local search ecosystem.

He thinks it's a waste of time to have different descriptions on all your citations. I agree. The reverse would also be true. No need to keep them all the same. Basically, they don't carry much weight either way.

Mike wrote up a post about it after the Hangout:
Is There Any SEO Benefit in Varying Your Company Description Across Listings? - Local University

 

[Linda Buquet]

Thanks Darren, that's where I was hearing about it but think I jumped to wrong conclusion or only heard/read part of it. Thought someone recommended changing things up.

 

[whitespark]

It has been recommended many times by many people to change them up. Until Mike crushed that idea with his comments and that post, I was also suggesting it in a "not sure if it helps, but it can't hurt" kind of way.

 

[James Sunderland]

Hey everyone. This question came up on a MaxImpact Google+ Hangout I participated on with Mike Blumenthal. Mike had some really good points about it. Mike notes that Google completely ignores the business description in their own local ranking algorithm, so that should tell you something about how they feel about descriptions across the local search ecosystem.

He thinks it's a waste of time to have different descriptions on all your citations. I agree. The reverse would also be true. No need to keep them all the same. Basically, they don't carry much weight either way.

Mike wrote up a post about it after the Hangout:
Is There Any SEO Benefit in Varying Your Company Description Across Listings? - Local University

Here is the Max Impact Google hangout with Darren Shaw, Mike Blumenthal and Will Scott.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVpbzA5B0b4