In recent years, I’ve been thinking more about the concept of “national rankings.” Ever since I’ve been in the community, I’ve generally thought about rankings on two different geographical levels.
- National: How are we ranking for the majority of users in this country?
- Local: How are we ranking for users in a particular city/state?
When referring to how we’re ranking, we generally default to national rankings as they encompass the majority of searches. We only became concerned with local rankings when thinking about our presence in a particular area. Thus, local rankings have generally been treated as a secondary metric.
However, as the SERP evolves, how much do national rankings even mean for certain queries? For instance, what would “national” rankings look like for the term “apartments”?
Here are the Google search results for that query from a neighborhood near me:
Sure, Apartments.com is in the first position in what could be considered a partial brand search. However, Google is even localizing the sitelinks it shows underneath. Beneath that, we see the map pack and localized results from other sites such as Zillow, Trulia, and Apartment Finder. In all practicality, there’s not a single result here that could be considered “national.”
This is likely true for the majority of geographies at this point, as this term is one where users want to see apartments in their area. So the apartment example is pretty obvious, as it’s likely that users are looking for something in their area. However, let’s use a less obvious example.
In my geography, there are no local pack results on a search for “businesses for sale.” But there’s only a single “national” result in the top five.
Once again, if you’re a broker competing in this space, it might not make sense to track keywords on a national level. The results will likely be different for queries depending on your location. Google has identified that users want to invest in businesses in their state, city, or county. We even see that one result ranks twice in the top five with their county and state pages respectively.
Let’s look at one final example. The eCommerce space is one where localization doesn’t immediately come to mind. In eCommerce SEO, we’re often more concerned with crawl budget and ensuring Google can crawl through large amounts of JavaScript. However, the localization of the SERPs still applies here.
Tessa Nadik, the SEO Manager at Dick’s Sporting Goods, brought the example of “running shoes” to my attention. Generally, this would be a pretty clear-cut eCommerce SERP that emphasizes category pages on retailer sites. However, looking at the SERPs, we can see that the first thing Google shows is the local map pack:
Yes, even traditional eCommerce queries are getting more localized by Google. Because this SERP will differ depending on a user’s location, it begs the question: What is a national ranking for “running shoes”?
Is it Possible to Track National Rankings?
Something else that’s made me rethink national rankings is the idea of tracking. How exactly do you track what a “national” ranking even is? If the result changes depending on where a user is located, then a standard rank tracking solution can’t give you the most accurate data. The ranking that is returned will obviously be triggered from some location.
As an example, here’s what a “national” local pack looks like for the term “divorce attorney.” We can see that a rank tracking solution shows local results from Oklahoma and Arkansas, which are centrally located in the U.S.:
In this example, if you report on national rankings, the data you’d be reporting would be more reflective of what users in the South Central region of the U.S. could see. However, it’s far more realistic that even users in these geographies are seeing much more hyper-local results.
This is no fault of the rank tracking solutions, as this is probably one of the more accurate representations of what a “national” ranking would look like. However, the shift that needs to occur isn’t how these solutions track rankings but how we utilize those solutions.
How to Get Insights on ‘National’ Visibility
It’s easy to be overwhelmed by the task of understanding national performance. How are we supposed to collect data on every search from every geography? However, there are ways that we can use rank tracking technologies to better understand this.
Track Your Core Keywords in Multiple Geographies
If your rank tracking solution allows you to track keywords by geography, this can be a powerful way of understanding national performance. Nowadays, this is standard in most rank tracking solutions.
Start by selecting a core group of keywords that you want to analyze national performance for. This will likely be a small set of 5-10 keywords that you know are the most valuable to your business and also are likely to vary by geography. Next, choose the most important markets for your company. This could be anywhere from 20-100 different geographic regions that are the most important for your site to perform well in.
Ensure that all your core keywords are tracked across all of your high-priority geographies. For example, if I identified that I want to track national visibility for “running shoes” and “running sneakers” across 50 different markets, you’d want to track at least 100 keywords in total.
My colleague, Matt Parker, has created this setup for one of our clients using STAT. A separate “Data View” was created that segments out all of the keywords that have an attached geography.
Roll Up the Report
Now that you’re tracking all of your core keywords across multiple geographies, you’ll want to combine the report to see what visibility looks like “nationally.” Here we can see all of our rankings across a large variety of geographies rolled up into a single visualization.
This allows us to quickly see how the client is trending across a large variety of markets. This Data View also allows us to see how competitors are trending in these combined markets, providing market share reports that reflect national performance.
Final Thoughts
There are still industries and SERPs where national rank tracking is extremely relevant. Many eCommerce store owners may disagree with moving away from national rankings. However, the truth is, for a large number of industries, the SERP is becoming inherently more localized. The more Google shows local results to users, the less valid the idea of “national rankings” becomes. By improving how you utilize your existing rank tracking software, you can gain more insights into your site’s performance in the markets that matter most.
More Resources:
- How to Show the Value of Local SEO
- How You Can See Google Search Results for Different Locations
- Local Intent Marketing: What Businesses Need to Know
Image Credits
All screenshots taken by author, August 2020
