More threads by Jim Froling

Funny that you mention Yelp. I think this has the possiblity of killing their organic traffic for some of these SERPs. They dominate organic but with the addition of this 2nd pack I think it steals a ton of traffic away. Of course, that's me just basically just guessing, it would so sweet if I had access to these people's stats!

I agree. Keeps pushing them further down the page.

Surely they don't keep 2 packs though?
 
More updates on this:

1. It's hitting Los Angeles next (thanks Jim for letting me know).
2. For those wondering if you can dominate the Home Service Ads area with a higher AdWords Express budget. The answer appears to be yes. I got it to trigger again today and compared the businesses I saw previously with who is there today. Notice, 1 changed the other 2 are the same. The ones that changed are businesses OUTSIDE San Diego (suburbs) so it appears that Google is using location as a factor for ranking, but not entirely.
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3. Some searches are ONLY showing the home service ad unit, not the 3-pack at all (just like in the Bay Area).

Plumber National City.jpg

4. The home service ad units are not just showing in San Diego. They're showing in suburbs too (La Mesa, Oceanside, National City etc). I'm still seeing SABs in the 3-packs for these cities so I don't think they cut them all in the suburbs like in San Diego but I'm assuming that's coming.
Plumbers Chula Vista.jpg

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Plumber National City.jpg


Plumbers Chula Vista.jpg
 
Here's a post from Bruce Clay today that links to Jim's post here & discusses the changes.

<a href="http://www.bruceclay.com/blog/google-home-service-ads-local-paid-inclusion/">Why You Won’t Recognize Google Local Listings in a Year:
Home Services Ads Explained by Bruce Clay</a>​

Thanks Bruce!
 
"Paid inclusion (aka Home Service Ads) will become the only chance local business have to appear in Local Packs."

I'm not sure I would say that.

First of all, we know Google reps (the source of this information) get things wrong constantly. Just ask any SEO who has been told lately by a GMB rep that keywords in the GMB description are still a ranking factor (there is no description anymore, PS).

Second, in its current iteration there is still a local pack below the paid ads.

Third, we don't know if this will ever really take off, and even if it does, it may be reworked or even repealed if it doesn't perform well.

I don't think it's a massive stretch necessarily to say that the local pack may indeed go away but it's for from 100%.
 
Personally I surprised this is an Adwords Express product.

I'd look for this feature to move to traditional Adwords if it continues to roll-out.
 

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