Geotargeting: How to Use it to Out-Compete Your Pay Per Click Competitors

The idea behind geo targeting is that the unique IP address assigned to your computer by your local internet service provider can be used to identify what geographic region you are in.

Websites such as Google and Yahoo use this information to provide content specific to your geographic area. In the case of pay per click search engines they only display your ad to individuals searching in the local area you specify.

What this means to the average business owner.

Scenario #1

Joe the plumber is sitting home on a Saturday morning when he notices that his roof is leaking. He goes to his favorite search engine and types in “roof repair”.  The results include some of the larger roofing companies that have an office 100 miles away and some articles about roofing repair.

Meanwhile Bill the roofer who has the best local roofing business and a brand new website is wondering why his new website has no traffic.  Bill the roofer's website returns at result #1652 never to be seen. 

Scenario #2

Joe the plumber is sitting home on a Saturday morning when he notices that his roof is leaking. He goes to his favorite search engine and types in “roof repair”.  At the top of the page Joe the plumber sees "Affordable Local Roofer. Call Bill the Roofer Now."  Below that are listed some of the larger roofing companies that have an office 100 miles away and some articles about roofing repair. 

Scenario #2 is clearly more helpful to both the customer and the business owner.  It is made possible through geotargeting.  All three of the major pay per click search engines (Google, yahoo, msn) allow for geotargeting. 

How Geo targeting can help you out compete your pay per click competitors.

With the original pay per click search engines the formula was very simple. Whoever paid the most for a specific keyword got the #1 position and everyone else’s site appeared in descending order from highest to lowest price.

Google has made this formula much more complicated than it used to be.  They do not divulge the exact formula, but what is known is that among other things the formula takes the following pieces of information into account

What this means to local business owners who are doing geo-targeted pay per click with Google Adwords is that their ad is likely to be ranked higher than there national competitors even though they are paying a lower price per click.

For example. If I am a local realtor in New York City and someone in New York City searches for “real estate broker”. Is this person more likely to click on my advertisement that specifies that I do real estate in New York City or a generic Century 21 Advertisement?

So your Google relevancy score has increased for two reasons: