How to pitch a local business with its own heatmap
A prospect’s own map opens the conversation. What it costs and what to say.
Read the guide: How to pitch a local business with its own heatmapGuide
Proximity, relevance and prominence: what a geo-grid shows about each.
Google says local results come down to relevance, distance and prominence. A geo-grid is the one tool that lets you see distance. Here is what it shows about the other two, and what it cannot.
Last updated · Written by the Local Pinmeter team in Phoenix, Arizona
The three factors
What Google says
Google’s own help page says local results are mainly based on relevance, distance and prominence: Tips to improve your local ranking on Google (opens in a new tab). Relevance is how well a Business Profile matches the search. Distance is how far the business is from the searcher. Prominence is how well known it is, which Google ties to things like reviews and links to the business. Google keeps the details confidential, so we know no more than that: everything below is what a scan shows, not how Google works inside.
Proximity
Distance is the one a grid shows best
Each pin is a search from a different spot, so a grid is distance made visible. In our 16th Street scan for “nail salon near me”, the nine pins in the middle average rank 1.0 and are all in the top 3. The 32 pins on the outer edge average 6.9, with 9 in the top 3. The business is first close to home and ranks lower farther out, which is what distance would predict. How to read the whole map.
Relevance
Relevance shows up when you change the keyword
Scan the same grid for two keywords and the difference is mostly relevance. For 99th Avenue on one day: 20% of pins in the top 3 for “nail salon near me”, 38% for “pedicure near me”. Same business, same grid, same time. That is why the keyword you choose matters: how to choose them.
Prominence
Prominence is the hardest to see
Reviews, ratings and links build prominence, and a grid cannot isolate them. What you can do is compare: Review Race™ lines up your client’s rating and reviews with the top 3 nearby, so a gap has numbers behind it. Treat that as a clue, not a verdict.
Questions
Questions
Can a geo-grid tell me which of the three factors is holding a business back?
Not by itself. A grid shows the combined result at each spot. It can show a pattern, such as strong near the business and weaker with distance, and it can show a difference between keywords. The reason behind a result is for you to work out.
Does Google publish how it ranks local results?
Google says local results are mainly based on relevance, distance and prominence, and that the algorithm’s details are confidential. Google’s help page (opens in a new tab) has its wording.
Where does Review Race™ fit?
Review Race™ puts your client’s rating, review count and reviews gained a month beside the top 3 businesses nearby. It looks at one input to prominence, not at Google’s ranking itself.
