From Snack Pack (3) to ONE PACK?

[bro]

Hello-

Thank you for whomever setup this forum, very help!

Question: I am familiar with google switching from 7-pack to 3-pack for local business. But have you ever seen 1-pack, that is, just one business being listed??? For a local business for the top keyword...only one business is showing. What causes that?

 

[Linda Buquet]

Thank you bro, I'm responsible for setting up the forum and am the owner, but I have a big and very talented team that helps keep this place hopping with the latest tips and news.

We call those One-Boxes and they've been around for a long time. WAY before it changed to a 3 pack.

They used to only come up if you were searching for a business by name.

But then about 1 1/2 years ago they went crazy and huge markets like San Diego Plumber and Los Angeles Dentist were getting locked up by one boxes. BAD ones. Total spam or many were parked abandoned domains with disconnected phone #s. Mike Blumenthal and I fought it for like 6 months with Google and then they finally updated the algo.

Now they still show sometimes but not nearly as often and it's usually a strong listing, not a bogus one.

 

[bro]

Thank you Linda for creating this forum and your informative reply!
Do One-Boxes ever revert back to multiple listings or should I close up
shop? I'm getting less than half of my usual business.

I can't stay in business if one large company is dominating the top local keyword, it's like wal-mart pushing the smaller businesses out of town. Is it worth complaining to google?

 

[mborgelt]

I would widen your keyword strategy. It's hard to be successful in any market if you only target one keyword. It's hard to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between business and rankings but you could nickel and dime (preferably quarter and half-dollar) your way to getting more traffic as opposed to just shooting for the top searched term. I would also make use of local organic rankings. If you don't make the pack, you want to at least take a stab at making your way up this part of the search as well.

 

[bro]

I would widen your keyword strategy. It's hard to be successful in any market if you only target one keyword. It's hard to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between business and rankings but you could nickel and dime (preferably quarter and half-dollar) your way to getting more traffic as opposed to just shooting for the top searched term. I would also make use of local organic rankings. If you don't make the pack, you want to at least take a stab at making your way up this part of the search as well.

Thank you for the good advice mborgelt!

I am ranked organically 2nd on the first page as well as ranking for other much lesser keywords. I was in the 3-pack as number two before this happened.

The problem is is that for the service there are two main keywords and the rest are just peanuts.

 

[Eric Rohrback]

You may only be watching the head terms then. You will get a lot of longer tailed traffic that you might be considering. Like already mentioned, widen your keyword strategy. Also if you're relying solely on Google for leads, then you're going to have a really tough time staying in business. You need to diversify your approach to earn traffic from a variety of sources. Google is huge for organic search, but organic is only a piece of the puzzle. Don't put all your focus on Google-Organic, make sure you're finding creative ways to get in front of your potential customers.