{"id":654,"date":"2008-05-12T15:15:18","date_gmt":"2008-05-12T19:15:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blumenthals.com\/blog\/?p=654"},"modified":"2008-05-13T11:29:12","modified_gmt":"2008-05-13T15:29:12","slug":"the-longtail-of-local-search-mapspam","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blumenthals.com\/blog\/2008\/05\/12\/the-longtail-of-local-search-mapspam\/","title":{"rendered":"The Longtail of Local Search Mapspam"},"content":{"rendered":"

Update 05\/13\/08<\/strong> Google has removed some but apparently not all of the examples below.<\/p>\n

In the conversation about Lawyers’ mapspam<\/a> EarlPearl and Stephan Espinosa both wondered<\/a> what type of spam panzermike and other lawyers were placing into Maps. I decided to delve into the moshpit that is the proxy for on-line legal marketing in LA and see what was up. It certainly has all the making for a new lawyer joke. \u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

I started my search looking at the links that panzemike had posted:<\/p>\n

dog bite lawyers<\/a><\/strong>\u00c2\u00a0near\u00c2\u00a0<\/a>Los Angeles, CA<\/a><\/strong>
\ncar accident lawyers<\/a><\/strong>\u00c2\u00a0near\u00c2\u00a0<\/a>Los Angeles, CA<\/a><\/strong>
\nwrongful death lawyers<\/a><\/strong>\u00c2\u00a0near\u00c2\u00a0<\/a>Los Angeles, CA<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

It was not at first clear from the above links whether there was abuse or just some creative title optimization and lots of remote offices:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

This firm, apparently has 24 offices throughout the greater LA area, San Jose and San Diego. It was conceivable to me that they had optimized each title like the above for each office. I decided to focus my research in the city of Pasadena to check for multiple listings per location but got a little nervous when Google indicated that it had 54,208 lawyer listings in Pasadena. Here is what I found just in Pasadena:<\/p>\n


\n<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Each listing found in Maps below contains:\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u00a2 Main Search One Box (if available)
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u00a2 Local Listing Graphic from Maps
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u00a2 Search Phrase
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u00a2 URL of mirror site
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u00a2 site:URL in Maps to approximate number of listings per domain in maps<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
\"\"\u00c2\u00a0\"\"\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0
\nSearch phrase:\u00c2\u00a0pasadena ca dog bite lawyer\u00c2\u00a0<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mirror Site: \u00c2\u00a0www.dogbiteattorneys.biz<\/a><\/span><\/span>\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Google Maps Site Search (11 results):\u00c2\u00a0Site:dogbiteattorneys.biz<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

\"Wrongful\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"wrongful<\/p>\n

Search phrase:\u00c2\u00a0wrongful death attorney pasadena ca<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mirror Site:\u00c2\u00a0Wrongfuldeathexperts.net<\/a><\/p>\n

Google Maps Site Search (12 results):\u00c2\u00a0Site:Wrongfuldeathexperts.net<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

No One Box results \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\"\"\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Maps Search phrase:\u00c2\u00a0pasadena car accident lawyer<\/a><\/p>\n

Mirror Site:Caraccidentexpert.net<\/a><\/p>\n

Google Maps Site Search (12 results):site:Caraccidentexpert.net<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

\"\"\"\"\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0
\nSearch Phrase:\u00c2\u00a0Michael H Silvers Pasadena Ca<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0 \u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mirror Site:\u00c2\u00a0michaelhsilvers.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Google Maps Site Search (12 results): site:michaelhsilvers.com<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

\u00c2\u00a0\"\"\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Search Phrase: pasadena personal injury attorney pasadena<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

These six Map’s listings are obviously all for one physical office location. I gave up looking after I found this many. Given that he has 24 offices, one could safely assume that most offices have been listed multiple times and there may even be more in Pasadena.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Many of the above Map’s record referenced different domains that offered slight variations on the same site. The\u00c2\u00a0whois record indicated<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0that they owned 42 domains. The domains found point to mirror sites that are optimized for each key phrase\/domain combo and other than titles and headlines, the sites have otherwise identical content. Many of the sites also each provide additional authority to the local record as they are referenced in the “Web Pages” tab of the record. Here is a list of some of the domains that I identified that were being used by Michael Silvers. Given the total number of domains there may be more than six listings for each address in many locales. I will leave that to Google to figure out.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

dogbiteattorneys.biz
\ncalifornia-dog-bite-attorneys.com
\nwrongfuldeathexperts.net
\nmichaelhsilvers.com
\ncaraccidentexpert.net
\ncar-accident-experts.net
\nCalifornia-WrongfulDeath-Lawyer.com
\nlosangeles-personal-injury-attorney.net
\n motorcycleaccidentexperts.com<\/a> (this one takes on a very cool harley color\/look but alas no new content)
\nsan-jose-personal-injury-attorney.com\u00c2\u00a0
\ncalifornia-truck-accident-attorney.com<\/p>\n

It was of interest to me that some of the records used the round pins instead of the pointed pin, which usually indicates that Google acquired the record elsewhere and has some level of unsureness about their location. It is likely that these records originated from the phone companies and implies that the law firm been using this marketing technique long before Google Maps existed.\u00c2\u00a0The other point of interest is that these folks were pointed out to Google by panzermike last week.<\/p>\n

It turned out that Google’s actual listings of lawyers in Pasadena Ca was in the 950 range. Certainly a more optimistic sign for the future of local than 50 some odd thousand. However it still amounts to one attorney listing for every 16 residents of Pasadena, a likely indication that either there is more spamming to be found or that there will soon be a number of unemployed lawyers.<\/p>\n

We have obviously entered the era of the long-tail local search map spam result. I for one am glad that Google will become more stringent<\/a> on mapspam control.<\/p>\n

Now lets get back to that new lawyer joke about this very real one box….any suggestions?<\/p>\n

\"Los<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Update 05\/13\/08 Google has removed some but apparently not all of the examples below. In the conversation about Lawyers’ mapspam EarlPearl and Stephan Espinosa both wondered what type of spam panzermike and other lawyers were placing into Maps. I decided to delve into the moshpit that is the proxy for on-line legal marketing in LA …<\/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-654","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-google-maps-google-local"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blumenthals.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blumenthals.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blumenthals.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blumenthals.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blumenthals.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=654"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blumenthals.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blumenthals.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=654"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blumenthals.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=654"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blumenthals.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=654"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}