Study: Google’s New Local Pack Shows In The Number One Spot 93% Of The Time

Earlier this month, Google replaced their “7 pack,” the local results box that showed seven local businesses in the Google web search results, with the 3 pack. The change was significant in that less businesses, four fewer businesses, were showing up in the local pack than before.

But a new report from seoClarity shows possibly an even more shocking change. The local pack before it changed to the 3-pack use to show up in the number one slot in the web search results only 25% of the time. Now, with the new 3-pack, the study says it shows up 93% of the time in the number one position.

Here is a rank graph from seoClarity showing the before and after rank distributions:

As you can see, the top spot now will show a local pack 93% of the time versus 25% of the time. And 99% of the time you’d see it in the top 2 positions, up from 31% of the time!

seoClarity documented their methodology:

• Start with a list of keywords which on 07/25 showed the 7-pack map listings
• Narrow down the list to only those that showed the new 3-pack format on 08/15
• Retrieve the rank position at which the local pack showed for each date
• Compare the visibility of the old 7-pack map listings vs. the new 3-pack local listings

You can see even based on the 7-pack to 3-pack switch chart, that there was an uptick in seoClarity’s data:

And even Mozcast shows a similar pattern:

You can learn more about this data at seoClarity.

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