If you search for a Tucson SEO company, you might come across a business called Tucson SEO.
Fair enough. That is a hell of a name for an SEO company in Tucson. Honestly, I am a little jealous I didn't get there first. 💀
And if you visit the website, you would have very little reason to think the company was anywhere else.
The homepage presents it as a Tucson SEO company. The About page talks about helping Tucson businesses and serving local clients. Tucson isn't just one of the markets mentioned on the website. Tucson is the identity of the business.
There is just one problem.
The people behind it appear to be in Scottsdale.
There Is Nothing Wrong With Being in Scottsdale
I want to get this part out of the way because otherwise this turns into an argument I'm not actually making.
An SEO company does not have to be physically located in Tucson to do good SEO for a Tucson business.
My own business partner lives in Iowa.
Tucson SEO Pros is based on the east side of Tucson. I live and work here. Marcus lives in Iowa. We tell people that because there is absolutely nothing wrong with it.
There is also nothing wrong with a Scottsdale agency taking clients in Tucson. Phoenix agencies work with Tucson businesses. Tucson agencies work with Phoenix businesses. We all work with companies in other states.
The issue isn't where you live.
The issue is what customers are being led to believe.
So Who Is Actually Behind Tucson SEO?
Keep digging and you eventually find DIAP Media, an agency based in Scottsdale.
DIAP identifies itself as the team and holding company behind Tucson SEO.
That's a pretty important piece of information.
It also isn't the impression I think most people would get from encountering the Tucson-branded company in a search result.
A business doesn't need to put the owner's home address across the top of its website. But when the entire brand is built around being from a particular city, I think customers should be able to easily understand who they're actually hiring.
You shouldn't have to follow footer links and investigate another company to figure it out.
A Local Name Does a Lot of Work
This matters because local identity has value.
People deliberately search for local companies. They might want somebody who understands the market. They might prefer spending money with a business in their community. They might simply like knowing that the person they're calling is nearby.
And in SEO, a local identity has another obvious advantage.
People search for things like Tucson SEO company.
Build your entire business identity around Tucson and you've managed to answer that question before the prospective customer has read a single paragraph.
That's powerful branding.
It also makes transparency more important, not less.
If you're a Scottsdale agency serving Tucson, great. Say you're a Scottsdale agency serving Tucson.
Then the Reviews Got Weird
While I was looking into all of this, I noticed something else.
Several reviewers also appeared on the profile of another SEO company based in Scottsdale.
Different company. Different name. Same city.
Why?
I have absolutely no idea. But I know their Google My Business is gone.
And that's where I'm going to stop.
There may be a perfectly innocent explanation. Shared professional circles exist. People know each other. Customers can use more than one company. Strange coincidences happen.
I'm not going to turn an observation into an accusation just because it makes for a better story.
But yes, when I'm researching a Tucson-branded SEO company, discover the operation behind it is actually in Scottsdale, and then start seeing some of the same reviewers over at another Scottsdale SEO company, I notice.
The yellow string goes on the corkboard.
It doesn't mean I know where the other end goes.
Local Search Has Become Weird
This is also why I've become increasingly frustrated with local search.
There are rules. There are guidelines. There are entire industries devoted to explaining those rules.
Then you actually look at search results.
You find questionable locations. Keyword-stuffed business names. Reviews that make you scratch your head. Businesses that seem extremely local until you start investigating where the people behind them actually are.
Some of it disappears eventually. Some of it stays up for years.
Meanwhile, legitimate businesses are told to obsess over whether they used the correct business category or accidentally put an extra word in their company name.
I don't think every strange thing I find is some elaborate scheme.
I do think Google's local results have become messy enough that business owners should do a little homework before assuming that "local" means what they think it means.
Ask Who You're Actually Hiring
You don't have to hire an SEO company located in Tucson.
Hire somebody in Phoenix. Hire somebody in Scottsdale. Hire somebody in Iowa. Hire whoever you think can do the job.
But know who you're hiring.
Ask who owns the company. Ask who will actually work on your website. Ask where they're based. Ask to see businesses they've worked with. Look at their work instead of assuming a local-sounding business name tells you the story.
And if a company has built its entire identity around your city, I don't think it's unreasonable to ask whether the people behind that company are actually there.
If you want to hire an SEO company from Scottsdale, hire an SEO company from Scottsdale.
Just make sure you know that's what you're doing.