Google Local (the Google map displayed in the results for specific searches) has made a few changes resently. Previously the Local result would appear for specific geographic search terms, such as hotels in London now they are appearing for generic terms apparently based on IP targeting.

The thing that is annoying me is everytime one has appeared it hasn’t been relevant to my search (so Google are going backwards on making the search results more relevant) and the ‘location’ is always showing ‘London’ results, which is probably because my ISP has their IP set up in London which will be the case with most users having IP addresses in different locations to where they live. Basically resulting in the Local results be irrelevant to my search as i live 60 miles from London!

It’s also annoying me for a work related reason – I have been working on Weatherseal for Double Glazing. They have been hovering around 5th or 6th for a while now (from 15th a few months ago) but now Google have added the local results to position 4 of the results for Double Glazing they are a lot lower down in the page, drastically affecting click through rates.

Hopefully Google will see the error of their ways and either remove the Local results for generic terms or implement a better system for geo-targeting the results.