One of the local search ranking factors that comes into play is how close the business is to the city centroid (the exact middle of the city). If you’re business serves a greater city area, but happens to be physically located on the city outskirts on or in a suburb, you’re already losing points toward ranking well in the local search algorithm. The Centroid Factor use to be weighed really heavy. However today, the Centroid Factor in local search including Google Maps / Google Places plays more of a minor role, except for very competitive terms. For example, terms like Detroit DUI Lawyer or Detroit DUI Attorney. We have found that when all things are equal, the Centroid Factor is highly weighted. The search engines realize it’s more important to determine where you are at than where the center of a city is. Therefore, this city centroid factor will continue to decline.

For other local search, visit our Google Maps Algorithm page, Google Maps Optimization (Google Maps SEO) page, Live Search Map and Yahoo Local page.