{"id":12096,"date":"2012-01-24T10:05:08","date_gmt":"2012-01-24T14:05:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blumenthals.com\/blog\/?p=12096"},"modified":"2012-01-24T10:18:53","modified_gmt":"2012-01-24T14:18:53","slug":"google-places-myth-linking-to-your-places-page","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blumenthals.com\/blog\/2012\/01\/24\/google-places-myth-linking-to-your-places-page\/","title":{"rendered":"Google Places Myth: Linking to Your Places Page"},"content":{"rendered":"

I wondered if either of you had ever written an article (or seen a good one) on the merits of link building to a Place Pages. This is widely mentioned<\/a>, of course, but I don’t believe I’ve ever seen anything attesting the merits of the practice. – Miriam Ellis\u00a0<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

I see this piece of [mis]information being repeated and passed around local circles. Here is the response that I gave to Miriam as to my thoughts about the practice of linking to your Places Page:<\/p>\n

This is a myth that has been spread around for years and is total poppycock.<\/p>\n

Place Pages are search results. They are perhaps more static than some search results but there is no more substance to them than any Google search result.<\/p>\n

Places Page have no authority status nor any status as a document and they are not indexed. Thus sending a link to them is like linking to a web page on Venus. It essentially passes link juice into the ether.<\/p>\n

I can see no merit in passing a link to it.<\/p>\n

\"Cerberus
\nThe one argument I have seen is that Google would increase the authority and thus rank of your business if the Place Page associated with that business has more authority. The reality is that Google has numerous tactics for correctly associating your Place Page with the most authoritative page (your website) for your business, not the least of which is the Places verification process. But even if you haven’t verified Google has numerous techniques (and patents) for associating the two successfully.<\/p>\n

In fact not only do I see no merit in the practice, I see some harm in it. I have seen several SMB websites where the website links to their Places page directly from the main content area of their home page. The net affect is to dissipate page authority that should be passed along to interior pages of your site.<\/p>\n

Like Cerberus, this myth has many heads, and like most myths seems to live on despite reason.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I wondered if either of you had ever written an article (or seen a good one) on the merits of link building to a Place Pages. This is widely mentioned, of course, but I don’t believe I’ve ever seen anything attesting the merits of the practice. – Miriam Ellis\u00a0 I see this piece of [mis]information …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":262,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12096","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-google-maps-google-local"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t