Individual property Web sites – especially in the hotel and restaurant/bar industries – face huge obstacles in their attempts to rank for organic search.

There are three basic issues:

• Significant competition from other hotels and/or restaurants
• Massive SERP domination by aggregator/review sites (Yelp, Expedia, Eater, Hotels.com, Thrillist, etc.) and editorial outlets (local newspaper and TV station sites, national and international hospitality publications, local and niche blogs, etc.)
• Google’s “glass ceiling” effect, which favors third party review and editorial sites over company sites, presuming them to be more objective and to provide a more useful result for the searcher; as a result, it is extremely difficult for a hotel site to break into SERP 1

The Glass Ceiling Effect – Google Algorithm’s Preference for Aggregators

In many cases, the entirety of SERP 1 for a focused, high-value query (such as [best bar in la]) will be dominated by aggregator sites (like Thrillist and Eater) and editorial outlets (TheInfatuation.com, LAWeekly.com, TimeOut.com). In this specific instance, three of the ten results on the SERP are aggregator/review sites, with the remaining seven being editorial.

Sites for individual restaurants and bars rarely penetrate SERP 1. However, it is common to see a number of such sites on SERP 2.

In the wake of Google’s 2014 Pigeon algorithm update, a Location3 audit found that “[m]ore IYP/User Review type sites (like Yelp) seemed to be displaying in the search results instead of the local listings pack, store location pages, or local business websites.” (Source) wordSmith’s examination of several markets’ restaurant and bar landscapes (including LA, Seattle, Chicago, New York, Denver, Amsterdam, San Diego, Miami and Portland) is consistent with those findings.

Google’s algorithm, then, appears to place a glass ceiling between SERPs 1 and 2 – by design, Google tends to exclude actual restaurant sites from SERP 1, reserving that space for resources that provide a collection of choices it believes will better satisfy the user’s intent.

Google wants to return the best results for the user, and they have the data to support their decisions on algorithm updates. They have clearly found that people tend to click and visit editorial and review/aggregator sites more often, so that’s what they serve high in the SERP. As a result, a TimeOut.com article on the “Best bars in Los Angeles for cocktails, beer and wine” would be preferred to a specific bar site because:

• The aggregator/editorial entry would provide the reader with several items to consider instead of just one
• The source would presumably be objective with respect to the properties reviewed, as opposed to a hotel site, which has promotion as its goal rather than information
• Google data shows that the editorial site is more likely to be clicked

The described tendency is less likely when the query is narrower and more specific (like [rooftop bar hollywood], which features bar/restaurant sites at #8-10 (the Roosevelt, the Standard and EP & LP).

For more information on SEO strategy and for specific recommendations, contact Sam Smith.