Google has clarified that a business’s proximity to a searcher is no longer a key factor in ranking Local Services Ads 🚀. This update shows Google’s evolving approach to prioritizing what’s most relevant for users looking for local service providers 🔍.

Chris Barnard, a Local SEO Analyst at Sterling Sky, sparked the conversation by noting an update in a Google Help Center article. He shared a screenshot highlighting that Google had removed the section mentioning proximity as a ranking factor for local search ads. 

Ginny Marvin, Google’s Ads Liaison, confirmed this change and provided further clarification 🗣️.

In a statement, Marvin said:

“LSA ranking has evolved over time as we have learned what works best for consumers and advertisers. We’ve seen that proximity of a business’ location is often not a key indicator of relevancy.

For example, the physical location of a home cleaning business matters less to potential customers than whether their home is located within the business’ service area.”

Marvin clarified that this wasn’t a sudden change but an update designed to “more accurately reflect these ranking considerations” based on Google’s insights and learnings 📈.

The updated article now states that location relevance factors include:

“…the context of a customer’s search… the service or job a customer is searching for, time of the search, location, and other characteristics.”

Proximity Still A Factor For Service Areas

Google upholds policies that mandate service providers to restrict their ad targeting to areas within their serviceable range from their business locations 📍.

As Marvin cites, Google’s Local Services platform policies state:

“Local Services strives to connect consumers with local service providers. Targeting your ads to areas that are far from your business location and/or that you can’t reasonably serve creates a negative and potentially confusing experience for consumers.”

Why We Should Care

By reducing the importance of proximity, Google is granting its ad-serving algorithms the freedom to highlight the most relevant and proficient providers 🎯. This ensures that search results align more closely with user intent, facilitating connections between searchers and companies that can genuinely cater to their location 🌍.