Google Maps Point of Origin

[Steve Wiideman]

Hey Legends! I have a client working on their internal site search and they'd like to mimic Google Maps as closely as possible. The question came up today about how Google sorts listings for branded queries.

For example: "dunkin donuts orlando" (not the client) when searching from anywhere except Orlando will display 3 listings for Dunkin. How do they choose the order of the Dunkin's?

I remember back in the day Google would use the centroid of the city and list properties inside out. Today it feels like there are algorithm influencers.

Your help is appreciated. Hope you're all doing well!

 

[Colan Nielsen]

Hey Steve, you could run some searches to confirm this, but I would bet that it's based on who is closest to the city center. We see that with non-branded/discovery searches when searching from outside that city or state so I imagine the same applies to a branded search.

 

[Steve Wiideman]

Hey Steve, you could run some searches to confirm this, but I would bet that it's based on who is closest to the city center. We see that with non-branded/discovery searches when searching from outside that city or state so I imagine the same applies to a branded search.

Thanks Colan, we'll continue to research. Appreciate the support.