Why is it important to be in Google’s Local 10-Box? Nothing is exploding faster in the area of online search than geo-targeted search. This means that more and more of us are turning to the Internet for searches like:

dental practice albany ny

Check out the Local 10-Box for this search:

Let’s dissect that first result:

First, the keyword is King. Remember that our query that was originally used was: dental practice albany ny

The first dentist that is listed is Albany Group Dental Practice

Notice that they have three of the four keywords in their Local Business Listing name. You do not have to use your business name as the Local Business Listing, you can choose to use any keyword string you like as long as it is relevant to your business.

Best practice when conducting dental marketing online - When you register your business with Google Maps, Yahoo! Local, etc be sure to include keywords that people are searching for when looking for your services.

Second, let’s go deeper into this Local Business Listing:

Albany Group Dental Practice has 22 Citations that verify the location and phone number of this dental practice. These citations are found on other people’s websites and build trust with Google. By trust I mean that Google feels very comfortable with the accuracy of the address and phone number that they are displaying because they see that 22 other websites are verifying this information. This is huge!

Best Practice online dental marketing - Find out where your competitors have “Citations” and be sure that you are cited as well. Verify the accuracy of the information that is listed already for your practice. You can use Google Alerts to do this. Look for a future post about Google Alerts.

Remember that the search engines are in the business of returning RELEVANT and ACCURATE information. The relevance is the keyword part. Albany Group Dental Practice contains three of the four keywords that were searched. The accuracy is taken into account by the number of Citations for that the Local Business Listing.

Let me know if you have questions or comments by posting in the Comments section. I will be happy to help.

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