My SAB and its GBP are based in a really small village. Which nearby city should I target on the website’s homepage?

[taqi]

Hi everyone,

I’m working on local SEO for my first client, a landscaping contractor in northern France. He is a service-area business: he travels to customers rather than serving them at his business address. His Google Business Profile is based in Rubrouck (899 residents), a very small village. He actually have the address displayed.

His service area includes larger nearby towns such as Dunkerque (86,263 residents), Hazebrouck (21,912 residents), and Wormhout (5,584 residents). I’ll attach a map showing the area; the circles are sized according to each town’s population.

Here is the website structure I’m considering:

First, I would choose one main city as the website’s primary geographic focus. The homepage and all the main service pages would use that same city.

For example, if I choose Dunkerque (86,263 residents), the homepage title might be “Landscaping in Dunkerque and Flandre intérieure.” Flandre intérieure is the French name of the local region. I would then use Dunkerque as the location on each service page too, with titles such as “Hedge trimming in dunkerque,” “Brush clearing in dunkerque,” and “Fence installation in dunkerque.”

If I choose Hazebrouck (21,912 residents) instead, I would use it as the geographic focus on both the homepage and every service page.

After that, I would create separate service-area pages for the other towns he serves, using relevant local services and real project examples and photos.

Now that I’ve explained the situation, my main problem is choosing the city for this shared homepage and service-page focus. Should I choose Dunkerque (86,263 residents), Hazebrouck (21,912 residents), Wormhout (5,584 residents), or Rubrouck (899 residents)?

I’m also wondering whether Google could penalize the site or affect its visibility if the Google Business Profile is based in Rubrouck (899 residents), but the homepage focuses on a different city ?

For context, these are approximate driving distances and times from Rubrouck (899 residents):

• Dunkerque (86,263 residents): about 30 km and 29 minutes by car.
• Hazebrouck (21,912 residents): about 21.5 km and 22 minutes by car.
• Wormhout (5,584 residents): about 12 km and 15 minutes by car.

I also checked the keyword “paysagiste” with OpenSEO and Google Keyword Planner. These are the figures shown by the tools (Competition is the equivalent of key word difficulty):

• Dunkerque (86,263 residents)
  
  • OpenSEO: volume 170, CPC (cost per click) $1.02, Competition 0.46, commercial intent.
  • Google Keyword Planner: 100–1,000 average monthly searches; competition “Medium”; top-of-page bid range €0.48–€1.65; the displayed 3-month and year-over-year changes are both 0%.
• Hazebrouck (21,912 residents)
  
  • OpenSEO: volume 70, CPC (cost per click) $1.49, Competition 0.45, commercial intent.
  • Google Keyword Planner: 10–100 average monthly searches; competition “Medium”; top-of-page bid range €0.76–€2.68; the displayed 3-month and year-over-year changes are both 0%.
• Wormhout (5,584 residents)
  
  • OpenSEO: volume 20, CPC (cost per click) $1.63, Competition 0.42, commercial intent.
  • Google Keyword Planner: 10–100 average monthly searches; competition “Medium”; no top-of-page bid range is shown; the displayed 3-month and year-over-year changes are both 0%.
• Rubrouck (899 residents)
  
  • Neither OpenSEO nor Google Keyword Planner shows an average monthly search volume for “paysagiste Rubrouck.”

 

[ElizabethRule]

I think your location targeting on the website is solid. Google will not penalize the site or GBP for targeting the bigger city of Dunkerque. The GBP will not rank in that bigger city though, no matter how well the website may rank there in organic search. There is a limit for how far away from the address a GBP can rank, and though I have not checked rankings based on the map you provided, I do not see the GBP ever ranking in any of those cities. You might want to consider recommending to your client that they get an address (an office) so they can have a GBP in the area or city where they want to get more leads.

 

[taqi]

I think your location targeting on the website is solid. Google will not penalize the site or GBP for targeting the bigger city of Dunkerque. The GBP will not rank in that bigger city though, no matter how well the website may rank there in organic search. There is a limit for how far away from the address a GBP can rank, and though I have not checked rankings based on the map you provided, I do not see the GBP ever ranking in any of those cities. You might want to consider recommending to your client that they get an address (an office) so they can have a GBP in the area or city where they want to get more leads.

Thank you so much for taking the time to read my question and answering it that's really nice , glad to have a confirmation, !

Thanks for the reco i'll talk to him about this !

For this office stuff i see a lot of landscaper in dunkerque having an adress in dunkerque but they don't have any physical office in the city

My client also has 3 GBP with one with an address displayed but he has no office so i am a bit confused tbh about this topic haha