Facebook Locations - Good or Bad for Local SEO?

[Absolute Exhibits]

Our company has three (3) offices and each has its own Facebook Business Page. Other than the primary company page, which is for our headquarters, the other two locations have only been claimed and do not have posts, reviews, check-ins, etc.

Now, Facebook recently granted us access to Facebook Locations, which, if I understand correctly, would remove 2-out-of-3 office pages and add a "Locations" tab to our primary company page where people can see the other offices neatly laid out on a map.

See Starbucks Example: https://www.facebook.com/pg/Starbucks/locations/?ref=page_internal

I've read mixed reviews regarding using the Locations feature, but nothing definitively answers whether or not using Facebook Locations would negatively affect local rankings.

Does anyone have firsthand experience going from individual business pages to a single parent business page with Facebook Locations? Is there any trustworthy documentation out there about this?

I've reached out to Moz and Facebook directly and no one can seem to answer this question. Still uncharted waters I suppose.

 

[Json]

Ok... So ive thought about this one for a day.

There really is no definitely answers with SEO. Never trust someone elses data, until you see it 1st hand. Plus google really isnt even sure these days. Good old machine learning.

I honestly dont see how it could affect local rankings. Outside of pushing the website down 1 spot, because the FB page will out rank it. ( Are you worried about the no follow links dropping?)



I would assume you can redirect the link of the old facebook pages, to the new ones.
Then you wont lose any of the no follow links. I know they have the option to "merge" similar pages. That should do it.

Any traffic that hits the old fb pages, then can get redirected to the new one.
That should prevent any google issues.

 

[JoshuaMackens]

We just did an order like this.

Unfortunately, no conclusive results yet.

I just saw no one responded to this and didn't want you to feel abandoned haha.

Just not enough evidence on our side yet.

Maybe someone else will come in with some more experience.

Sorry buddy!

 

[Absolute Exhibits]

Thanks for replying Joshua! Once you have some more data, I'd love to hear more about it!

 

[Absolute Exhibits]

Hi Json, thanks for looking into this. I'm more concerned with how Google would interpret the change of going from 3 individual Facebook location-specific pages to just having a single Facebook page using their "Locations" feature.

Does Google acknowledge Facebook Locations? How does it weigh it as compared to having individual URLs? The worst case scenario is that Google no longer see the individual location pages, doesn't see the locations still exist, and rankings drops.

As for redirecting, you say I'd need to merge pages but from what I understand going to Facebook Locations doesn't create any new pages - it simply removes them. So if that's the case, I have nothing to merge.

 

[JonClassyBrain]

In my experience it is better to have a Facebook page for each location. Multi locational businesses typically have a Facebook, Yelp, and GMB page for each location. The reason I know this is because my company does SEO for 4 different multi locational businesses.

These businesses include a Chiropractic franchise, Tire seller, Hardware store/Plumbing Supply Store, and a transmission shop.

When doing a branded search for your business on Google it's important to own the entire first page of digital Realestate. Not having a Facebook for each location leaves room for competitors to rank for your branded search.

In addition, these profiles give each location an opportunity to interact with each community they are located in. If you were my client I would recommend you keep these Facebook pages and task someone at each location with getting the community involved with reviews and posting on a regular basis.

 

[PioneerMedia John]

Good questions and great sharing. Thank you!

We'll likely be doing something similar for one of our clients who hates having individual FB pages for their locations and we'll report the results back here.

 

[jmcdonnell]

Hi,

Just wanted to clarify that Locations does not consolidate all of your pages into one page. It just knits them all together. So you'll still have local Facebook pages (which is becoming increasingly important).

I've implemented Locations for a bunch of clients. Here's a blog I wrote about it:
https://www.reshiftmedia.com/facebook-locations-updated-with-name-reviews-changes/

 

[Andre]

Does anyone have any updated data or thoughts on this matter, especially around the topic of how (if it does) using Facebook locations impacts upon local search and local rankings in G (and local pack)?

 

[JoshuaMackens]

I expect the impact on rankings is non existent. The pages are virtually the same. You're allowed the same features. All location pages can be indexed.

It seems like the only difference is that the name of the page includes the address and takes posts from the main page.

I guess you could argue that Google may find a quality issue with the location pages all having the same content but:

1) You could get reviews for each location to get unique content
2) What other alternative is there? Individual posting for each page? That's super time consuming.

I think locations is probably the best bet.

 

[Andre]

Joshua, thank you for taking the time to share your insights. Much Appreciated.

 

[JoshuaMackens]

Joshua, thank you for taking the time to share your insights. Much Appreciated.

You bet!