Mike Belasco's presentation on Analytics For Local Search as delivered at SMX Advanced London in May 2010.

1. Analytics For Local Search How and What To Track For Local Search presented by Mike Belasco @belasco

2. Who Is seOverflow? seOverflow is a search engine optimization and pay per click marketing company in Denver, CO. We specialize in offering solutions that enable web design companies, marketing consultants, and other SEO companies to offer high end SEO services to their clients. The only company with 2 Local Search Ranking Factors participants. We know Local!

3. Today’s Topics Status Of Tracking Local Search Track Traffic From The 7 Pack Other Local Search Tracking Techniques The Future Of Tracking Local

4. Anatomy of a SERP Pay Per Click Local 7 Pack Universal Results

5. State Of Analytics For Local Search What Sucks And What Doesn’t Suck …. Ok it mostly sucks

6. Difficult to identify traffic from local ‘packs’ Search Engines telling you not to use tracking numbers Most true local conversions happen offline or on the phone Data in LBC Dashboard is incomplete (keywords are pre-washed) and not exportable Most local analytics solutions are hacks No great rank checkers for 7 pack Current Road Blocks

7. Track Local ‘Pack’ Traffic

8. 1. Use a 'local vanity' URL as your URL in your Google Local Business Center listing 2. Create a 'tracking' URL 3. Set up a redirect to 301 redirect your vanity URL to a real 'tracking' URL 4. Update your GA Snippet to allow # instead of ? to denote URL parameters (or use the canonical element) 5. Configure Advanced Segmentation in GA to view results Track Local ‘Pack’ Traffic

9. Create Campaign URL

10. redirect 301 /vanityurl http://www.yourdomain.com/#utm_source=google&utm_medium=localpack&utm_campaign=google-universal-local Redirect Vanity URL To Campaign URL

11. <script type=”text/javascript”>varpageTracker = _gat._getTracker(”UA-XXXXXXXX-X”);pageTracker._initData();pageTracker._setAllowAnchor(true); pageTracker._trackPageview();</script> OR <link rel="canonical" href="http://www.yourdomain.com"/> Eliminate Duplicate Content

12. GA: Create Advanced Segments 1. From the Dashboard, click on the Advanced Segments link in the left column 2. Choose Create a new customized segment at the upper right of the next page. 3. Using the Dimensions drop down menu on the left, click onTraffic Sourcesand you'll get a list of things by which you can filter the segment, includingSource, Medium and Campaign.

13. GA: Create Advanced Segments 5. Set up three ‘AND’ rules in this advanced segment. Rule #1 Source=google Rule#2 Medium=localpack Rule #3 Campaign=google-universal-search

14. Create An Advanced Segment

15. Other Ways To Track Local Search

16. Google LBC Reports What Google LBC reports: Impressions. Visits to website. Requests for more info on Local Listing page Requests for driving directions and where those requests originated (US only?) Keyword terms used by searchers who saw your listing (pre-washed).

17. Google LBC Tracking Data Local Search Conversions Are Not All About the Website

18. Google LBC Tracking Data Show clients they are being found by their potential customers for terms they could never hope to rank for in Universal Search.

19. Google LBC Tracking Data Keep an eye on changes in what and how Google is reporting in the Maps Dashboard. These are clues to what is important to Google and what it thinks is important to Local searchers.

20. Phone call tracking If you are selling a product add a ‘Buy In Store’ option. (use discount code) Add a ‘In Store Pick-up’ option Coupons In-store survey (simple as asking) Simple assumptions based on sales volume/local website traffic volume Ideas For Tracking Offline Conversions

21. The Future Of Tracking Local Search

22. Call tracking enabled for at least Google via Google Voice (they’ve done it before) A more seamless tie in of LBC report data in Google Analytics A good local ‘pack’ rank checking tool Agency LBC analytics tools to dig deep into a large amount of listings My Wish List