There are two simple ways of telling Google and the other search engines where your business is located via your website. One is to create a KML file and an attendant geo-sitemap. The other is to provide your full business contact information in rich snippet format on the site. Now there is a way to easily do both with one simple creation tool from Michael Borgelt of 51Blocks.
From a single input of your basic NAP + web information, the tool creates a kml file, a geo-sitemap file pointing Google to the KML file and an HTML code snippet in the new schema.org format for your business contact info.
You then paste the code snippet onto your contact us page or into the footer of your website, place the kml & geo-sitemap files in your public html file of your site and then reference the geo-sitemap file from the Google webmaster tools. The KML file can also be uploaded to Google MyMaps to create an embeddable direction and location map for your website.
I doubt that Google needs both signals to trust your site but by doing both you have future proofed your site for any eventuality.
Mike, thanks a lot for great info! We’ve been looking into adding KML files and Schema markup to client’s websites and this tool is definitely a huge help.
Comment by Liliya (2 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 8:04 am
Thanks to both Michaels. We’ve been heads down in schemas, and this is very helpful.
Comment by Nina Hale (1 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 9:40 am
@liliya and Nina
you are welcome.
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 9:48 am
Thanks to Google+! I have been looking for a tool like this. I paid a guy $600 to do a KML for me a while back. Amazing how technology and a nice person can change all that. Thanks again Mike.
Comment by panzermike (225 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 10:05 am
It also bears mentioning that Arjan Snaterse has offered a free geositemap tool at http://geositemapgenerator.com for several years…I’m a major user there.
Comment by David Mihm (168 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 10:21 am
Mike,
Thanks so much for the mention and glad people like the tool!
David – The only think I dont like about geositemapgenerator.com is that they put a link to their website inside of your location file. This was one of the reasons I built this tool.
Let me know if anyone has any feedback!
Michael
Comment by Michael Borgelt (6 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 10:45 am
Hi Mike,
Is the schema code snippet along the lines of hcard format for contact info, or is it an instead of/preferred format? Thanks!
Comment by Dr. Keith McGahey (4 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 11:14 am
Thanks for sharing!
Seems easy enough to implement too, even for someone that’s all thumbs like me.
Forgive the noob stupid question…this would be needed in addition to any xml/html sitemap submitted thru google webmaster tools?
Think I just answered my own question when I read the post a 2nd time..but thank you again for sharing.
Comment by Chris (111 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 11:34 am
@Keith
It is used instead of hCard.
Schema.org is the newest “rich snippet” format (along with microformats (which is hCard), microdata and RDFa).
The long term benefit of schema.org format is that Yahoo, Bing and Google have all agreed on it as a standard (but not Facebook).
That all being said, I DO NOT THINK it worth the time to rush out and change it.
@Chris
Yes a geo sitemap (that references a KML file) is a supplemental sitemap that is submitted to thru webmaster tools.
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 12:05 pm
@Mike
Thanks for making me aware of this great tool.
@Michael
Instant add to my processflow
Thanks for building it
Comment by Simon Salomonsson (4 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 2:03 pm
@Mike
Setting up some new clients these days.
Do you recommend marking them up with Schema instead of hCard?
Comment by Simon Salomonsson (4 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 2:05 pm
@Simon
Absolutely. I don’t recommend going back and retrofitting with schema as I think hCard does the job just fine.
But going forward having agreement between Bing, Yahoo & Google means this is the favored format for now and the most obsolete proof.
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 2:10 pm
So Mike I’m curious, if you could only do one of the following, which would it be? (With the focus on boosting rankings/relevance)
KML
Geo Sitemap
Schema
hCard
Geo Meta
Or if you have time could you rate in order of importance?
I’ve heard various opinions and am testing a couple and curious to hear your thoughts.
Comment by Linda Buquet (293 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 4:11 pm
@Linda
I do not believe that any of the geo communication techniques help rank. They help with trust (ie Google knows that this business really is located here because they added a file to their website) and it helps with solidifying the location of a cluster (which would limit merging etc).
If I could only do one (and you only really need to do one) it would be whichever was cheapest easiest of the above.
Sometimes as an SEO you might not have access to the root of the public html so the KML/Geositemap (they go together) is out. Or you might not have access to webmaster tools which would nix it as well.
And then as a result I had to choose between Geo Meta, Schema and hCard I would choose Schema as it is no more work than either of the other two but more future proof.
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 4:16 pm
Perfect thanks Mike. Confirms what I suspected but have seen conflicting opinions so wanted to get yours.
Comment by Linda Buquet (293 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 4:51 pm
@Linda
You know what they say about opinions….
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — October 7, 2011 @ 4:57 pm
Thanks Mike. I’ve been looking for something like this sense Local University in Burley where I first heard about Schema.org and KML.
Comment by Jason (43 comments) — October 10, 2011 @ 2:41 pm
Hi Mike, Do you know if there’s a version for the UK. I’ve been trying to build my own kml sitemap for a while buy webmaster tools doesn’t seem to recognise it. Unfortunately the 51 blocks tool seems to be US only due to the state option.
Comment by Patrick Blair (2 comments) — October 11, 2011 @ 9:53 am
@Patrick
The http://geositemapgenerator.com is an excellent geo sitemap/KML creator tool that will work in the UK. It doesn’t provide schema.org address formatting though.
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — October 11, 2011 @ 10:08 am
@david, @mike: thanks for mentioning my tool (geositemapgenerator.com).
@Michael: thank you too.. “competition” keeps you sharp
I knew about the URL in the KML, but this was an unintentional one (hard to believe, but true 
). It was there for the example in the description field, but I figured out a lot of people doesn’t used it and therefore it places a backlink in the KML.
However: it’s removed now and it should be gone. If someone still finds one, please mention it
@Mike: it does now provide HTML for Schema.org and even for Microformats (if one prefer those), also when multiple locations are entered.
Comment by Arjan Snaterse (9 comments) — October 16, 2011 @ 5:47 pm
Thanks for the suggestion on tools Mike!
Quick question, does it help to mark up multiple addresses on a single contact page if we have more than one location for the business? Will this erode the authority/create confusion for Google when it determines where the business actually is? We have one central headquarter, and we plan to add that to the footer of our site. We have 2 more addresses we want to add to the contact page.
Look forward to your thoughts on this!
Comment by Jackson Lo (8 comments) — October 24, 2011 @ 4:34 pm
Subsequent to this post I wrote about Geo Sitemap generator, which does support multiple locations.
One role of the markup is to allow you add multiple contact details to a single page and clearly communicate to Google & Bing what is where. I also like to add a local landing page for each location that provides location specific details. Then I can link all three from the footer as well. And use those location pages as the url in the Places Dashboard.
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — October 24, 2011 @ 7:29 pm
Excellent! Thanks Mike! I tried the CSV option both in FF and Chrome but none moved me to the next page after uploaded and clicked Next. Instead, I punched them in individually and that did the trick.
Comment by Jackson Lo (8 comments) — October 24, 2011 @ 9:57 pm
@Jackson: thanks for mentioning this bug.. it will be fixed soon.
Comment by Arjan Snaterse (9 comments) — October 25, 2011 @ 3:18 am
This is fantastic, thank you very much for sharing these links/tools. It made getting my geositemaps a no brainer as well as being compliant with the schema.org stuff..
Comment by Brent (10 comments) — November 30, 2011 @ 12:57 am
“Google no longer supports the Geo extension to the Sitemap protocol. We recommmend that you tell Google about geographically-based URLs by including them in a regular Web Sitemap.”
from: http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=94555
Comment by John Coffey (1 comments) — June 18, 2012 @ 12:46 pm
Thanks again Mike for sharing all of this. It is hard to run a business and keep abreast of all the changes.
Comment by daniel (38 comments) — January 17, 2013 @ 6:14 pm
I submitted my site to Google maps local and they said they would send a post card to verify my address. Never happened. Are they abandoning the paper verification?
Comment by Blake (4 comments) — January 22, 2013 @ 12:14 pm
Just implemented Schemas for a client, saw results in 48 hours, they had pretty strong domain authority which helped.
Comment by David Fitzgerald (1 comments) — January 25, 2013 @ 1:49 am