A working glossary of local SEO, Google Business Profile, reviews, listings, and AI-search visibility terms. Updated as the field evolves. Email [email protected] if a term is missing.
The Google product that lets a business manage how it appears across Google Search, Google Maps, and Google Shopping. Formerly known as Google My Business. The single most important local visibility surface for any business with a physical location.
The cluster of map results Google shows for queries with local intent — typically three results with a map, business names, ratings, and a 'View all' link.
Synonym for local pack. The terms are used interchangeably across the industry.
Name, Address, Phone number. The three pieces of business identity that should match exactly across every directory and listing. NAP inconsistency is one of the easiest local SEO problems to diagnose and fix.
Any mention of a business's NAP on a third-party site. Citations historically influenced local rankings; today their direct ranking impact is reduced but their indirect role in NAP consistency is still significant.
A grid of geographic points around a business location used to query the local SERP from each point and produce a heatmap of where the business actually ranks. Common grid sizes are 5×5, 7×7, 9×9, and 13×13.
The percentage of grid points across a geo-grid where a business ranks in the top three results. The single most useful summary metric for a multi-location operator.
Google's ranking factor that weights distance between the searcher and the business. Often the single largest local ranking factor and the reason aggregate rank metrics hide the truth.
Google's ranking factor that weights how well known a business is online — links, reviews, mentions, structured data, and brand strength.
Google's ranking factor that weights how well a business profile matches the searcher's query. Driven primarily by primary category, secondary categories, and on-profile content.
The Google-defined business type assigned to a profile. Primary category is the strongest single ranking lever; secondary categories support relevance for adjacent queries.
Structured boolean or enum properties on a profile (women-owned, wheelchair-accessible, accepts new patients, has wifi). Surface in search results and influence relevance.
Short publication on a Google Business Profile — updates, offers, events, products. Posts surface in the profile panel and rotate out after a defined period.
The performance data Google exposes for a profile: impressions, clicks to website, direction requests, calls, bookings, and search query data.
A data broker that distributes business location data to many directories at once. The major US aggregators are Data Axle (formerly Infogroup), Foursquare, and Neustar/Localeze.
Apple's free product for managing how a business appears in Apple Maps, Spotlight, Siri, and other Apple surfaces. Launched in 2023 as the Apple equivalent of Google Business Profile.
Microsoft's product for managing how a business appears in Bing search and maps. Smaller share than Google but increasingly relevant given Bing's role in Microsoft Copilot and ChatGPT search.
The rate at which a business accumulates new reviews over time. A strong correlated signal with local rankings, distinct from average rating.
The (prohibited) practice of asking customers their satisfaction first and only routing happy ones to leave a public review. Against Google and FTC policy. Any vendor that supports it should be a hard pass.
The schema.org Review and AggregateRating markup that lets a website expose review data to search engines and AI systems. Required for review snippets in SERPs.
The schema.org LocalBusiness type used to mark up business location pages. The foundation of structured data for any local website.
Google's generative answer surface that produces a summary at the top of some SERPs, citing source pages. Increasingly important for local queries since 2024.
The emerging practice of optimizing content and structured data to be cited inside AI answer surfaces (AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude). The local-search adjacent extension of traditional SEO.
A proposed standard text file at the root of a website that tells AI crawlers what content is canonical, what is most important, and how to cite it. Analogous to robots.txt for the LLM era.
Google's pay-per-lead ad product for service-area businesses. Distinct from Google Ads and from organic local pack rankings — but evaluated by similar quality signals.
Google's database of entities — businesses, people, places, things — and their relationships. Many local visibility outcomes depend on Google having a clean entity record for the business.
Google's enforcement action against a profile that violates the Business Profile guidelines. Suspended profiles disappear from search and maps until reinstated. Reinstatement is operationally painful and worth avoiding through prevention.
The Google process by which a business proves it operates from a claimed location. Methods include postcard, phone, email, video, and instant verification depending on category and history.
A business that serves customers at their location instead of from a storefront. SAB profiles must hide their address. A common configuration mistake costs SABs ranking immediately.
A second (or third, or fourth) Google Business Profile for the same business location. Duplicates split visibility and reviews and must be suppressed through the right channel.
30 terms · refreshed quarterly · request a definition at [email protected]
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