Confused by rel=publisher for multi-location

[Margaret Ornsby]

Hi,

I get the difference between rel=publisher & rel=author. Publisher is the site-wide default and author is per article/blogpost.

My question is:
If rel=publisher goes ties back to a G+ business location page, and we're meant to have a separate G+ and website page for each business location, how do I set this up?
Publisher would be the whole website. Do I pick a "head office" and assign the whole website to that page? If so, then am I also supposed to tie the individual location pages on the website back to that "head office" or to their specific G+ page.

... and what's the impact on ranking for each G+ page?

head hurts trying to logic this one thru - would appreciate a different perspective...

Thank you!

 

[manny1020]

I asked this as well but have not received any answers.

I am thinking you would link each location webpage to their respective Google+ page, but I'm not sure about this.

 

[Linda Buquet]

Sorry guys this one makes my head hurt too AND my eyes glaze over.

Hopefully one of our really techy rel=pub guys will answer this one.

 

[manny1020]

No problem Linda!

 

[David Deering]

Well, without knowing more details, my initial thoughts are to use the rel=publisher tag on the homepage and link it to the business' main Google+ Business page. Because in the end, the business' main location/headquarters owns all of the branches, so you want to credit it as the publisher and owner of the entire website (I hope that statement makes sense). But with that said, there are other ways in which you can still link the various location pages of the website to their respective Google+ Local pages. I'd suggest doing that with schemas. And I could provide some suggestions on how to do that if anyone is interested.

 

[Linda Buquet]

YAY! David is here to save the day. Was hoping you would weigh in.

Thought about PMing you but didn't want to intrude but you are the expert at our forum in my book when it comes to rel= and schema!

 

[manny1020]

Well, without knowing more details, my initial thoughts are to use the rel=publisher tag on the homepage and link it to the business' main Google+ Business page. Because in the end, the business' main location/headquarters owns all of the branches, so you want to credit it as the publisher and owner of the entire website (I hope that statement makes sense). But with that said, there are other ways in which you can still link the various location pages of the website to their respective Google+ Local pages. I'd suggest doing that with schemas. And I could provide some suggestions on how to do that if anyone is interested.

So you recommend not linking the individual Google+ Local Business Pages to the individual landing pages at all?

With schema, are you saying to just markup the addresses? I would appreciate those suggestions if there is anything else to it.

 

[David Deering]

Hey Linda. lol Well, I don't know about all that, but I'll do my best to help. And you're more than welcome to PM me anytime; you'll never intrude or bother me. The same goes for everyone else here, too.

Ok, so please bear with me, as this post might get kinda lengthy in detailing what I would suggest doing. So let's say the scenario is that a company who we'll call The Big Company has a main location and several local branches/locations. The business just has one website but the website also has pages dedicated to each local branch, one page per location. The business has a Google+ Business page for their main location and a Google+ Local page for each local branch.

Since the rel=publisher tag was designed to be used to help Google understand which business or organization is behind the website, you should use the tag on the homepage and link it to the company's main Google+ Business page. And as you probably already know, you only have to add that markup once to a website, preferably on the homepage. So now Google understands that The Big Company owns this website. You can mark up The Big Company's info on your homepage and incorporate the rel=publisher tag like this:

<div itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/Organization">
<span itemprop="name">The Big Company</span>
<link href="https://plus.google.com/+TheBigCompany" rel="publisher" />
<link itemprop="logo" href="http://thebigcompany.com/logo.png">
<div itemprop="address" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/PostalAddress">
<span itemprop="streetAddress">123 Main St.</span>
<span itemprop="addressLocality">New York</span>, 
<span itemprop="addressRegion">NY</span> 
<span itemprop="postalCode">10016</span>
</div>

<span itemprop="telephone">555-123-4567</span>,
<span itemprop="email">info@thebigcompany.com</span>

<div itemprop="location" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/Place">
<div itemprop="geo" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/GeoCoordinates">
<meta itemprop="latitude" content="40.74506" />
<meta itemprop="longitude" content="-73.98301" />
</div>
</div>
</div>

Now let's say you have a local branch of the business--we'll call it Local Branch A--and the branch as I mentioned has its own page on the website. You can likewise mark up the branch's info and link it to the branch's Google+ Local page, and you can even make clear the connection between The Big Company and Local Branch A. So for that, you might do something like this:

<div itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/LocalBusiness">
<span itemprop="name">Local Branch A</span>
<link itemprop="sameAs" href="https://plus.google.com/+LocalBranchA" />

<div itemprop="address" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/PostalAddress">
<span itemprop="streetAddress">456 Local St.</span>
<span itemprop="addressLocality">Small Town</span>, 
<span itemprop="addressRegion">NY</span> 
<span itemprop="postalCode">10026</span>
</div>

<span itemprop="telephone">555-123-6789</span>,
<span itemprop="email">localbrancha@thebigcompany.com</span>

<div itemprop="geo" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/GeoCoordinates">
<meta itemprop="latitude" content="50.74506" />
<meta itemprop="longitude" content="-83.98301" />
</div>
<div itemprop="branchOf" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/Organization">
<span itemprop="name">The Big Company</span>
<link itemprop="sameAs" href="https://plus.google.com/+TheBigCompany" />
</div>
</div>

So by using the "sameAs" property, we're telling Google that this business is the same business found on this Google+ Local page. It makes things very clear and unambiguous to Google, since you've made the connection for them. And by using the "branchOf" property, we're telling Google that Local Branch A is a branch or satellite location of The Big Company. (Now that's not absolutely necessary to do, but it certainly won't hurt.) But especially by using the "sameAs" property, you're able to make the connection to the branch's Google+ Local page without misusing the rel=publisher tag.

I hope this all makes sense. Sorry for the long post. But if anyone has any questions about it, please feel free to ask.

---------- Post Merged at 12:16 AM ---------- Previous Post was at 12:07 AM ----------

<link itemprop="sameAs" href="https://plus.google.com/+LocalBranchA"><link itemprop="sameAs" href="https://plus.google.com/+TheBigCompany"><link itemprop="sameAs" href="https://plus.google.com/+LocalBranchA"><link itemprop="sameAs" href="https://plus.google.com/+TheBigCompany">