Guest: Darren Shaw – @EdmontonSEO. For more info on our guest check out: http://t.co/WD3M4MqD .

With the launch of Search Your World, how do you think this will/has affected Local SEO

Not seeing much local G+ integration, but it’s coming. Current theory is that Google Place Pages become G+ Pages. Timeline: If I had to guess, 6 months to a year. I’m really not a fan of “Search Plus Your World” though. Makes search results worse in every case I have seen. I don’t have much more to say about SPYW other than it’s crap, and it’s not going away, and we’ll need to accept it.

@bryantdunivan: It seems to have limited the amount of local space on a serp, but that will be shortlived – maybe pages replace local ads.

How do you find great keywords for local SEO?

Great question. I start with standard KW research. Adwords tool, google suggest, & google related. Build out a huge list. Then I take that list, sort it by Local Monthly Search Volume. Then I manually go through the list and pull out the main terms, the locational terms, and the descriptors.

Ok, hmm, there is too much to it, and I don’t want to burn up the time. Check this doc – How To Build a Localized Keyword List: http://t.co/HEs44cEh .

@markalves: Sources for local SEO terms? Local blogs, forums for neighborhood synonyms.

@aknecht: I dig into geographical segmentation of existing analytics data. Lots of wonderful stuff there and search on them to verify. Another tip, read local newspapers. They tend to use the terms local people use or will influence the terms they use.

@kmullett: What they said + don’t forget WMT. Don’t forget brain power…talk to some people.

Do you have any pro tips for Local SEO Link Building?

Yes! Well, *I* don’t, but the rad folks at SEER do. Have you seen this? – 35 Local Link Opportunities You Missed (from SEER): http://t.co/rpkaV7Yz .

In local, since the biz is often not very link worthy (think small town electrician), I usually to go a little grey-hat and get hooked up on some private blog networks. Then I build links to the posts to keep them indexed. I don’t want to say much more about it. Keywords: “private blog networks”. You need to talk to the right people.

@aknecht: Local chamber of commerce have directories unfortunately many don’t are not public. Need to join & get made public.

@bryantdunivan: Use BBB, local rotary clubs, local orgs to build your links through, guest blog and provide comments to your news provider.

@shuey03: If you can get a creative piece of link bait and get it pushed, it will get links for local businesses.

@lyena: I also recommend getting on customer blogs and vendor blogs.

@kmullett: Local PR releases are good. If your town has a newspaper/radio/tv, create event/news to be on their sites.

What is the most valuable thing you can do in a local SEO campaign for local rankings?

NAP Consistency is #1. If you have incorrect NameAddressPhone data all over the web, you’re not going to rank.

So, here’s what I do to find all the inconsistent NAP data.

1. Step 1. Go to factual.com, and search the business name. Click on the business name in the results, and choose explain. Poke around.
2. Step 2. Assuming you find variations of the phone number out there, plug them into the local citation finder & find all occurrences. If you find variations of the address, search Google for them. Put everything into a spreadsheet.
3. Step 3. Go through the spreadsheet, and do whatever you can to try and get the sites to update the listings.

Hat tip to @daveminchala for showing me factual.com. He’s a local seo pro. Follow him.

Hundreds of sites?! Painfully go through them one at a time, OR @nyagoslav tried Yext for a client and was pretty happy.

NAP cleanup is one thing I can’t outsource. Needs serious attention to detail and client collaboration. When you’ve got everything cleaned up, next step is hyper-local citations! But blogs, business associations, local newspapers, gov sites, etc are all great citation sources.

I do this detailed local competitive analysis report for every new SEO client. See section 1 on this page: http://t.co/B1TX62bK . Almost every time I aggregate and sort all that data, the top rank businesses seem to align with the ones with the most citations. This of course is more important for “pure” 7-pack style rankings, as opposed to blended. With blended, it’s more about links. We recently did some hyper-local citation work for a client, and he skyrocketed in rankings for hundreds of terms.

Here’s how to find hyper-local citations.

1. Step 1. Run a LOT of KW queries on the local citation finder in the city/niche and associate them all with a project. My system for competitive citation analysis: http://t.co/C9BHqK3b . So, for a lawyer in chicago: chicago lawyer, lawyers, attorneys, dui lawyer, robbery lawyer, criminal lawyer, etc.
2. Step 2. Go under “Your Projects” and ALL the citation sources from all the queries will be listed under “view sources”.
3. Step 3. Ctrl-f in your browser for “law”, “legal”, “chicago”, “illinois”, etc. Any niche or location related terms. Copy all the domains that match the Ctrl-f searches into a spreadsheet. These are your hyper local citations.

We did this recently for an hvac client in NYC and found 60+ hyper-local sources. After getting those citations, rankings took off.

@bryantdunivan: How do you get incorrect addresses changed when there is no way to get them updated?
@EdmontonSEO: If there is absolutely no way, and they don’t respond to emails, they’re probably not an important site to Google.

@bryantdunivan: Its imperitive to link to a contact page, so they go to contact you – they know what they are looking for.

@kmullett: Another one we send non-seo clients to is getlisted.org. A simple free route to get started.

Skitzzo Do you consider a link w/ a local modifier in the anchor a citation as well?
@EdmontonSEO: Nah, I consider that a link.

How can you get more reviews to boost your Local SEO?

Best post on the topic: bit.ly/ogt1pq

Get one of these handouts made: bit.ly/wOfpIO

Also want to mention the Link Prospector we built with @GarrettFrench. Awesome for guest blog prospecting: http://t.co/rjyqS8Qs . Coming soon! A couple weeks from launch.

Guest blogging works SUPER well for link building in local.

 Darren Shaw is the founder of Whitespark, the SEO firm that built the popular Local Citation Finder. Darren has been developing websites since 1996, optimizing them for the search engines since 2001, and has been focused on Local SEO since 2008. He’s currently helping to organize the first international GetListed University workshops in Edmonton, Canada.

Guest: @BrettASnyder

@BrettASnyder: is a converted PPC dude who works for @SEERInteractive as an SEO Consultant. you can read more about him here: http://bit.ly/xO3o1a .

What exactly is a lazy SEO?

Lazy SEO isnt actually being lazy (sry!) but using tools/processes to automate your SEO and let linking opps come to you. This way you can prioritize strategy development in those super competitive spaces & leverage tools to do the leg work for you. It’s all about problem solving. Find what works and find how to make it scale.

Ex. – Many people use G-Alerts for brand monitoring but its also a strong research tool once you’ve found a profitable query. Idea is that you want your manual process (ID the query) to pave the way and your automated process to carry that momentum forward.

@kmullett: Would that include 1-n posting tools/services, where one post actually replicates to many?
@BrettASnyder: Not really IMO, it’s more taking a manual process that you know works and taking the human element out of it.

@shuey03: Google alerts work great… I like to use @trackur as well.
@aknecht: Love @trackur as well.
@aknecht: Using Google alters is also a good lead generator. It’s amazing what people post that can relate to your business.
@BrettASnyder: For sure, the hard part is sifting through all the crap to find the real strong opportunities.
@ethanlyon: G-alerts to Twitter search queries can also be a great way to monitor brands / linking opps.
@BrettASnyder: Twitter is a great call, I’m big fan of lists/hashtags.
@ethanlyon: I love the idea of G-alerts for arch issues that you might not have realized. e.g. site:[insert site] viagra OR cialis.

What kind of systems and tools do you use to assist in the automated discovery process? & how do you use them

1st step has always got to be identify your problem and what you want to accomplish…then work backwards from the solution. Let’s pick competitive research, I love using Track Engine to monitor changes on a website…say a competitors News section. Once you know what they’re doing for press you can replicate/improve on that and push for linking opps before they get any traction.

You can use Excel to generate content blocks or Canned Responses in Gmail to auto-generate outreach msgs. Use Concatenate function to mash up content blocks and Substitute function to sub in variables. Excel content mashups for eComm product descriptions let you take attributes from your database and use them as the variables. Its all about finding tasks (ie content creation) that client says “thats great idea we just cant do it” & refusing to accept it.

For blogger outreach specifically, always find a way to leverage referral networks when possible. Especially when outreach strategy has been successful w/ particular person/group…take advantage of THEIR network for add’l links. PitchMe is a great blogger referral network too, especially for eComm clients that can offer reviews/giveaways.

@ethanlyon: For really solid queries, use ifttt.com to push to your mobile. Might blow up in your face though for high-vol RSS feeds. Warning about ifttt. Push it to your mobile all important alerts, but make sure it doesn’t blow up in your face. Happened to me Twitter links > delicious tags. Automatically tags the things the people you follow into delicous.
@BrettASnyder: Ifttt is awesome…think of it like creating an RSS feed of linking opps that constantly updates when new sites fit your criteria. I use it a lot for collecting competitor/client mentions on Twitter.
@kmullett: Example ifttt, slightly off topic, send all your tweets to gmail, then filter from inbox. Easy for clients backups.
@BrettASnyder: Or send all competitor Twitter mentions and filter the negative 1s RT.
@dohertyjf: Or push tweets with a certain hashtag to Google Reader. Boom, content ideas.
@kmullett: Working on an ifttt that ties into diigo’s publish to wordpress, drupal, etc. Bookmark to diigo, bam it’s a post.

@bryantdunivan: First step – Always check out the analytics, then do comparisons/KW research to determine the best attack for the content.

@kmullett: Don’t forget tools like samepoint, socialmention, topsy, twilert, tweetbeep, et al. Great for discovery.

@StephStMartin: People will do stuff for the smallest prizes. have contests,post a blog post & best comment wins a giftcard.
@BrettASnyder: And beyond that, export your commenters and run a smaller giveaway for just them!

@djchrisle: @seerinteractive also uses google docs / excel + import XML and custom functions to pull data ow.ly/8rOnn .

@kmullett: Amazed at how many SEOs I talk to that don’t use Google operators in KW research too. allintitle, allintext, etc
@BrettASnyder: G-queries should be used from everything from arch audits to KW research to Linkbuilding and beyond.
@StephStMartin: Don’t forget inurl, allinurl, and my fave, site:

@djchrisle: @ethanlyon and @brettasnyder – dudes are serious with exports in excel. XLS download: ow.ly/8rOvu .
@ethanlyon: ImportFeed() in Google Docs is extremely effective.

@RachaelGerson: Recently saw @BrettASnyder use Excel to automate content creation in insanely awesome ways. ow.ly/8rPgy .

@ethanlyon: Side note: @Ubersuggest is awesome for content ideas… query: how to [topic] .

@ashbuckles: It takes time but here’s some videos — bit.ly/x1snYu
@djchrisle: Go to Lynda.com spend the hours and MASTER (not learn) Excel. You can save DAYS of work. I’m not lying.
@RachaelGerson: Make sure you follow @lavoritano, @bigalittlea & @bonnieschwartz too. Ridiculous Excel skills.

@StephStMartin: Blogroll. They write a comment, you include them in your blogroll & have them share posts socially.

2012 Predictions

@bryanphelps: Goog continues updates to promote big brands.

@ashbuckles: Anchor text links become considerable less important in 2012.

@Matt_Siltala: @ashbuckles I don’t think they become less important, but I think people need to think of it more in terms of natural anchor text. Local and Google+ will be integrated more and more … just watch.

@jasonmun: I reckon branding and social will be key.

@ashbuckles: I think as G+ matures, we see more author authority factors in ranking. The G+ noise ratio is so low compared to Twitter & Facebook that traffic can be incredible in some industries.

@lyena: I think G+ adoption will go slower than anticipated. Businesses are struggling to keep up with Facebook & Twitter

@kmullett: This is a link to the G+ SEO article: http://t.co/HyGAO5Dp. BTW, The Google+ team have already gone on record in many instances about the upcoming tie-ins. Just takes time.

@ashbuckles: I think Google will continue to deliver crazy results for mobile users in 2012. Great mobile results won’t happen this year. Google will try to anticipate location, etc. and miss the mark when delivering results. They’re way behind.

@lookadoo:: More focus on quality content in multiple formats – txt, video, PDF, social.

@OptimizePrime: I bet 2012 will be the year of natural language. Good SEO = organized mess (especially anchor text & synonyms in content)

@kmullett: I think schema will become very important, especially for CTR (better snippets) but will be measured signal at first. I speculate that because Google has to serve quality and there just are not enough CMS’s/sites with it yet.
@ashbuckles: I think schema requires integrated changes that Google can’t force throughout the web in a short period of time.

@bryanphelps: 2012 SEO Prediction: @aaronwall goes to DC as expert witness to bring Google down.

@dan_patterson: I think more and more people are just going to overlook the fundamentals for something ‘shiny’

@kmullett: Based on requests for webinars/seminars and speaking, SM is still the shiniest rock on the block.

@Matt_Siltala: What do you think the biggest changes you are going to be, when it comes to your marketing efforts in 2012?

@garyjmag: It looks like Video is going to become a bigger part of our marketing efforts this year.

@kmullett: We are going to continue to push clients towards action, ROI, tangible value scoring instead of positions.

@lyena: I completely agree with you. Esp. because ranking is already inconsistent with localization & personalization.

@kmullett: Yeah, like a client who’s closing a lot off SEO, and yet is beefed because 2 of the 10 terms they want fluctuate.

@lyena: There will be more focus on optimization & conversion, not just traffic. Usability too and simpler code. I also think that Google will continue taking data from us and PPC will become more important for SEO testing.

@shuey03: I think in 2012 you are going to see a lot more people investing in seo tools to help streamline their efforts.

@ashbuckles: Strategy in 2012 includes more diversification of traffic generators. Relying on 1 primary source of traffic is risky.

@Matt_Siltala: all great answers….agree especially on the tools and focusing on doing something with all that social traffic.

@SmartBoyDesigns: @lookadoo do you find that focusing that time spent on multiple formats would be better spent on more content in one format?

@lookadoo: No, believe universal results are huge & you can enter competitive SERP spaces with various formats. Approach is to have subject matter experts. Train & enable clients to help produce content & think SEO.

@ashbuckles: So what predictions do you disagree with?

@OptimizePrime: I HOPE to disagree with the prediction that (not provided) will rise to 25%

@ashbuckles: I think (not provided) is clearly moving above 25% this year.

@jasonmun: These guys reported 33% bit.ly/rZzMIu

@OptimizePrime: Agreed, picked @randfish’s figure of 25%+ from 1/2/12.

@ashbuckles: I agree Pinterest will take over the world in 2012 (@randfish) — mz.cm/u99AIf For some industries, Pinterest is the perfect traffic source right now.

@shuey03: I predict that SEOs will ruin pinterest by the end of 2012.

Pinterest:

@OptimizePrime: I agree about pinterest, it has great UI. I just hope they don’t switch to no follows once it gets big.

@RachaelGerson: Recently analyzed quality of Pinterest traffic. Higher bounce & lower conversion rates lower.

@ashbuckles: Not surprised. But it can be great for brand development, deep links, and referrals.

@RachaelGerson: The stats are logical. On plus side, seeing some great blog posts written w/ Pinterest images & links. In terms of Pinterest traffic, I think biggest thing is to watch for 404 landing pages. Why waste the traffic?

@ashbuckles: Images are great for some SERPs pages (universal results) and popular images get top placement. Pinterest can help get you visible for certain SERPs pages in certain industries.

@dan_patterson: On the pinterest topic, I think seos will flood it, nofollow will come, but seos won’t ruin it completely. I like pinterest.

@garyjmag: I’m really interested in seeing what happens in local search in 2012….i can see G+ & Places having some tight integration.

@lyena: That would be a challenge for local biz. G+ page is a definite advantage to Places. But who has time for that?

@scotttdodge: I just hope that they figure out how the heck they’re going to support Places. Soon.

@garyjmag: Places already has that shout box for biz status updates. I wonder what the usage is on that already.

@lyena: I call it “we are still alive” status. All my local customers use it. Not sure if it helps.

@@garyjmag: Have you ever worked with G-feet? altho slow, its the only time i felt like they’re providing support.Google Feet is their on-the-ground support team. Visit local biz, helps w/ Places. G+ profile for MN team: http://ow.ly/8jUK3 . They’re currently the middleman btwn my client & Places engineers trying to solve a phone number swap w/ competitor. I think their role is to help biz owners sign up and get set up on Places.

@jasonmun: What are your thoughts on the Paid vs Organic serp? Paid landscape seems be growing by the minute!

@RachaelGerson: I think Google’s blurring the lines to the point that non-industry ppl don’t always know what’s paid vs organic.

@scotttdodge: Not a fan of the insurgence of PPC in the SERP. I’ve never clicked an ad – manage alot, though. Could be my generation.

@ashbuckles: I rarely click paid ads but Google is growing paid revenues like crazy. New placements don’t surprise me.

@scotttdodge: True. I just think ads are so obvious. I’m the type to look at the url of an ad and type it in, just to save them $$

@jasonmun: Soon there will be no Organic listings above the fold!

@davidmalmborg: What about the evolution of SEO? No, it’s not dying, but surely our job will be different by the end of 2012.

@jimboot: With 2 changes a day to the alg, the only thing constant in SEO is change

@lyena: I think, we will be policing content and try to kill syndication.

My favorite tweet of the chat

@Matt_Siltala: If you are good at what you do, don’t worry the basics have not changed and you will be just fine.

Shameless G+ Plugs

• Dream Systems Media
• SEO.com
• Cirrus ABS
• Internet Exposure

PubCon: For a full list of all PubCon session recaps, this is the best resource: http://bit.ly/vwRQM8 (via @scottcowley)

@RavenAlison: If you want to see tweets from every PubCon session, there’s twetchup.com!

@aknecht: For those interested here’s a good recap of my #pubcon session on Social Media Analtyics alank.ca/swnTTC

Any major Google or Bing announcements to be aware of?

@thompsonpaul: Google’s using integration of G+ w/ search using the badges functionality it released yesterday. Also ties in heavily to Adwords.

@scottcowley: As most know, Google took away a lot of keyword data right before PubCon. Matt Cutts also hinted at removing PPC data next. Bing is still trying to get traction, but they’re getting more looks because of great data delivered through webmaster tools. Matt Cutts said the marketing focus of webmasters should be on social, local, and mobile. The consensus is that webmasters should stop trying to get keyword data back and use the data they have. However, @mattcutts opened up the possibility of releasing some historical keyword data.

@ashbuckles: @scottcowley Interesting that Google isn’t talking about search any longer. Not surprising, however.

@aknecht: From @mattcutts at #pubcon G is going to devalue ad heavy sites especially if all at the top of the page. @mattcutts said the roll out of the SSL for logged in users will only affect google.com, no immediate plans for other locals.

@alexvolk: Bing also just realized details on Webmaster Tools Fall Updates ow.ly/7x39c

What were your greatest AHA moments at #Pubcon?

@aknecht: Greatest Ahh moment, when I impressed @steveplunkett over breakfast w/ analytics technique.

@KeriMorgret: The loopholes Google hasn’t closed yet that @aimclear talked about at #pubcon

@scottcowley: Biggest “Aha” for me: stop trying to game the system – social signals are changing the nature of SEO forever. It take smore work to fake social signals than to create good content that gets natural social signals. I think many SEOs are frustrated realizing how important Google Plus will become for SEO. It’s blackmail, in some respects.

What link building changes did you learn about this year at #Pubcon?

@scottcowley: Some SEOs are going to be making changes after some things that @GregBoser said about link building. Boser flat out said that “brute force” link building is dead – and that includes tactics that have worked for years. Big things: no page should be getting more than 10% of its backlinks from 1 keyword phrase. New sites should focus on building links only w/ branded keywords for the first few months of the campaign to gain reputability. Exact match anchor text links are dying in importance. Sites are seeing more success with partial match branded backlinks. And Google is putting more weight on sitewide metrics as a whole instead of a few number of very strong, SEO’d pages.

@ashbuckles: @scottcowley Branded links have always been important but marketers often emphasize non-branded traffic… leading to exact match.

@dhdoxey: In the BlackHat session: contact your competitors top links and say they need to link to your competitors new site – Yours.
@aknecht: Best if you can find competitor links that go 404, much easier to get them to repoint them to you.

@scottcowley: One thing that has me thinking a lot lately is the principle of getting links from sites that are getting their own social signals.

What interesting things did you hear about competitive analysis at #Pubcon?

@scottcowley: The best thing SEOs can do (if they haven’t already) is build real relationships using real content to get real links.

@alexvolk: “real relationships” and “authenticity” were recurring themes at #pubcon that I heard from people I trust.

@shuey03: I hear @garrettfrench is building a wicked 404 link building tool

@scottcowley: I thought it was interesting that @kennyhyder says he doesn’t go after the same links that his competitors have. You should learn about your competitors’ backlink profiles to gauge the level of quality, but get your links in other ways.

@Matt_Siltala: Agree with Kenny, you can use as a blueprint, but can always find much better links based on info.

@KrisRoadruck: Relationship building is not a scalable tactic & if you are building relationships for the purpose of a link you are doing it wrong.

Anything you’d like to share about SEO Trends, Schema & Panda from #Pubcon?

@scottcowley: There are still a ton of sites that haven’t delved into Schema.org markup yet. We’re definitely in an adoption phase for a while. Rel=author was mentioned repeatedly as being crucial to the social signal/SEO trend. An interesting note about Panda: some sites are finding their rankings increase as they manually remove low quality links.

Which parties were your favorite at #Pubcon?

@scottcowley: I think @RavenTools did a phenomenal job with the Poker Tourney. I loved the Poker Tourney because players and non-players felt comfortable being there. Can’t say that about them all. Expect it to become an annual tradition. The best parties at PubCon are those that mix fun and/or food with comfortable conversation. I would be remiss if I didn’t give a huge shoutout to @AlanBleiweiss and his yeoman’s work on #EpicDinnerVegas. Amazing gathering. And #EpicKaraoke was where all of the best-kept SEO secrets were shared. So come next year. http://www.twitvid.com/VBYGS

@scottcowley: I should mention that I was disappointed by the lack of quality social/SEO data this year. Nobody can say what’s working/not yet.

@aknecht: #epicdinner hands down, but Raven Poker party was also in a class by itself for pure fun!

@alexvolk: @scottcowley +1 on @raventools tourney and gathering. First rate. and good networking.

@JadedTLC: #epicdinners are always the best party at any conference. Always

What lessons in conversion do you care to share with us?

@KeriMorgret: Naming products what your customers call them help conversion from.

@scottcowley: CROs all approach testing in very different ways. Some say you should test colors, some say to stop testing colors. Heard it all. Helpful things: try testing out completely different appeals – emotional vs logical, for example. If you want to A/B test pages that get minimal traffic, test VERY contrasting variations. If you’ve never looked at your forms for testing purposes, long forms, pre-fill forms, etc. cause major hangups with visitors. If your site isn’t getting a lot of submissions/buys, reduce testing to “microconversions” like click-throughs, video views, etc. One thing you should check out – a Google Quality Rater Handbook was recently leaked. http://bit.ly/s6V3Ev There’s gold here.

@dhdoxey: Engage your audience and help them get what they want by telling them with social.

@Nallawalla: Captchas stop conversions Make a hidden captcha. If there’s no data its valid, a bot will fill it out & you know its spam. Forums are 7-8 times bigger than the blogosphere and yet we do not talk about them.

@Matt_Siltala: … allt he hubs … ie (links, press, content, social etc…)

@KeriMorgret: Miss the old twitter mentions tab? Go to twitter.com/#!/mentions

Summary: SEO for Small Businesses (SMB) on #SEOchat with @mikehalvorsen

Guest: @mikehalvorsen of @manta. @mikehalvorsen is an expert mustache consultant and big supporter of #movember Check out this awesome stache: bit.ly/vcd9Al . He has been building websites for 13 years and been in the SEO game for 7. You can read more about our friend @mikehalvorsen here: http://bit.ly/sn2HbU .

SMBs usually have small budgets, how do you manage the expectations of one who spends $100 a month on SEO compared to $2,000+?

For small businesses that have low budgets, I usually push them toward SEO training. Personally, I don’t have the time to SEO for clients with low budgets. That’s why training is usually the best for them. I usually start off by having them read @SEOmoz’s SEO Guide – http://t.co/SnvYwdWD .

There is a ton of information out there that is available for free. @AlanBleiweiss also wrote another amazing guide on SEO for content – http://t.co/pI3rNJel . People always ask SEO questions on our @Manta connect forum – http://connect.manta.com/.

It has been my experience businesses that don’t have the budgets to be serious with SEO would rather learn it themselves. For $100 a month, you won’t get much SEO; however, you can get a little time and I’ll put together resources for training. In a lot of ways, SEO is one of the best things they can do to help grow their business cheaply. ESPECIALLY if it’s DIY SEO.

@shuey03: It seems like most small business owners don’t have the time to do seo on their own, no?
@mikehalvorsen: Personally, I think most small businesses DO have the time. They handle all their own marketing and don’t have the money. But to be honest, that is what most SMB’s are like.

SMBs used to be able to focus only on maps optimization, how has “blended” place search changed the way you approach strategy?

I have never focused on just maps, so nothing has really changed for me. With SEO, there is a lot you can do to improve results. Focusing on one thing and one thing only isn’t a good idea. Maps are definitely a great place to start, especially if they don’t have a website yet.

@shuey03: But isn’t it nigh impossible to compete if blended place search is displayed and an SMB has no website?
@mikehalvorsen: It’s not impossible to show up in there. There are other places you can get high visibility outside of G Places. There are directories you can claim profiles on. Cough, cough.
@shuey03: cough, cough, cough, manta
@shuey03: Don’t know if you have the data or can even tell us, but what does a typical listing on @manta get in terms of views.
@mikehalvorsen: I’m not sure what the average views are for claimed profiles on @Manta, but we do have analytics available for free.

@kikolani: Usually I can eyeball a site and tell them some specifics like try to get links here or optimize this page on your site. I find if you give people information, they still might not be able to do it and might ease into your pricing.

@shuey03: getlisted.org is a great resource and with @davidmihm behind it, it will only get better over time.

What are the top five things that SMBs do wrong when approaching their SEO?

SMB’s think they can get by with whatever presence they have on the web. They almost never want to redo a site. I have been pushing my clients away from focusing on rankings, but with Google’s latest privacy changes, it’s hard. I think I may have to push back towards giving ranking reports without being able to see the referring phrases.

Businesses need to make sure they continue to follow best practices after they’re done paying for SEO. Many SMB’s get cheated by snake oil SEO’s who tell them that it’s okay to do blackhat SEO. I can’t stress SEO training enough. SEO is NOT rocket science. It is something most businesses can handle themselves.

If you take shortcuts with SEO, it usually catches up. Because you’re OK now & have great rankings doesn’t mean it will last. If an SEO promises or guarantees rankings — run for the hills. I usually find myself going out of the way to point people in the right direction if I’m not what they need. If an SEO touts their TOPSEO’s membership or bull crap awards, stay away from them. It’s paid inclusion.

What are the the most common Place Page optimization recommendations you give to your clients?

There aren’t awards in SEO. There are rankings, sales, and outreach. ALWAYS use your actual business name! Remember NAP: Name, Address, Phone Number. ALWAYS stay consistent with your business information. Keep NAP the same everywhere.

It has been my experience that clients who go from no reviews to having reviews get more calls and emails. I like to have clients push their customers to write reviews on Google Places and Google Places only. I like my clients to get at least 10 reviews. I like my clients to get at least 10 reviews. 10 seems to be an easy number to attain. And it gives them something to push for. 10 works well. All positive reviews CAN look fishy, but that is why 10 is a good number. All positive reviews CAN look fishy, but that is why 10 is a good number.

@kmullett: There was a study done, I think with hotels, that showed all positive reviews were less trusted.
@mikehalvorsen: Hotels are a little different. Especially the chains. I’m thinking about SMBs.

@shuey03: I think bad reviews are just an opportunity to publicly solve a problem and show you awesome customer service.

What tools are available and recommended to help scale SEO for SMBs?

Another important part of Places is pictures. Make sure to have high-quality photographs that show what your business does. Spending $200 to hire professional photographer will go a long way. Pictures will help build your brand as an authority.

There are a lot of SEO tools. I have tried them all. @SEOmoz makes one of the best available, especially at the price point. A lot of the tools are too advanced to be of use for most SMB’s. They won’t be able to make sense of the data. I am a fan of the @SEOmoz tools because it’s really a great bunch of tools accessible in once place.

As we all know, there are a lot of good SEO’s out there. But I think there are more SEO’s who can do more to harm than help. Some of the blog posts about SEO are way off base. Even when I do SEO testing, I always have trouble believing the results. Just because something worked for one person does not mean it will work for you.

Hands down, one of the best SEO tools available is Twitter & a good SEO sparring partner. If you’re confused about SEO, ask. Most of us SEO’s will go out of our way to help people for free. Find an SEO and ask them questions on Twitter. That is the biggest problem with the SEO blogs and articles. The competition is always different.

@shuey03: What do you think about @raventools?
@mikehalvorsen: I think @raventools is awesome.