Google Places - What Would You Do?

[mjtaylor]

I have a new client with an office at home, where the company is "registered" and a service location about a mile away. Neither are listed in Google Places and I have to add it. So, which address to use?

The service location would be the obvious, perhaps, though that is not what is listed on the website because you have to send money first and then rendezvous, as it were, at the service location.

Should both addresses be listed? Or should I just have them add the service location to the website and just add that? Is it going to confuse G to see two addys?

I am thinking it is better to wait to add the listing after Google has cached the addition of the new address to the site. Would you agree?

[SteveGerencser]

List the service location.. Google "prefers" that the listed address be one that customers can actually go to..

For the address, as much as I hate to say it, a microformat hcard solution might, I stress "MIGHT" help by using the adr tag and specifying what each address is for..

http://microformats.org/wiki/hcard

for example:

  <div class="adr">
    <span class="type">Service Center</span>:
    <div class="street-address">169 University Avenue</div>
    <span class="locality">Palo Alto</span>,  
    <abbr class="region" title="California">CA</abbr>&nbsp;&nbsp;
    <span class="postal-code">94301</span>
    <div class="country-name">USA</div>
  </div>

  <div class="adr">
    <span class="type">Mailing</span>:
    <div class="street-address">999 College Drive</div>
    <span class="locality">Palo Alto</span>,  
    <abbr class="region" title="California">CA</abbr>&nbsp;&nbsp;
    <span class="postal-code">94301</span>
    <div class="country-name">USA</div>
  </div>

This will give you both addresses and they are flagged appropriately and then let Google worry about it..

[mjtaylor]

Oh! Of course, brilliant! That should help, thank you! Why do you hate to say it??

Do these need to go on every page? This site is ridiculously huge as he posts photos from every trip - deep sea fishing captain.

And wait until it's been cached to add the listing?

[SteveGerencser]

I am not a fan of microformats at all.. They do nothing for the user and are designed purely to make life easier for machines.. Hence, not a fan..

I would add the boat/marina to every page and the mailing address to just the contact page..

[Tiggerito]

I have a colleague here who added both his home and office address on top of an automatic and different office address from Truelocal. He subsequently got a phone call from Google where he had to explain why.

I've also seen his listings marked for removal. Can't remember the exact text but was something about being able to object or confirm the listing was still valid.

He now has 4 listings, two for the same location, with the same content!

At the moment all listings are showing if you search on his very unique business name but only one has much clout in real results.

I'm still showing above him

Conclusion: I don't think you will gain much by having multiple listings close to each other, and there is a risk you may get slapped on the wrist. I'd go with the office address which will look better with Google and the customers.

[Tiggerito]

I am not a fan of microformats at all.. They do nothing for the user and are designed purely to make life easier for machines.. Hence, not a fan..

I'm still waiting on my semantic markup being shown as rich snippets, and then being helpful for users. Fingers crossed.

[mjtaylor]

So, I have one vote for using the home office address and one for the service address as the listing ... anyone else care to weigh in?

[crankydave]

I am not a fan of microformats at all.. They do nothing for the user and are designed purely to make life easier for machines.. Hence, not a fan..

I would add the boat/marina to every page and the mailing address to just the contact page..

This would be the direction I would lean. Other than sending deposits, or any other need for snail mail, there's really no reason to use the "office" address.

Contact page info... yes. Across the site... service location. My opinion.

[dburdon]

I would tackle it from the local search results angle. What is the most important location keyword? Where is that location's address centroid?

[mjtaylor]

Thanks, DB. It's all Key West. Everything is within a 2 X 4 mile island. CD, I have to agree with you. It does make most sense to use the marina address. Thank you all. I feel as though I know where I am going now.