Relevance of Google Local Business Results in Australia

Meg, who writes the excellent blog Dipping into the blogpond left a comment on my post about Google local search in Australia.

She talks about searching for local content but getting US results. The example she gives is “palmdale cemetery”. Instead of getting information about palmdale cemetery located in NSW, Australia, the local listings are for cemeteries in Palmdale, California.

I had a look at this particular example. I could find some online references to Palmdale Cemetery, NSW but couldn’t find a Google Maps listing or a website.

That doesn’t alter the fact that the Californian results displayed as “local business results” are not relevant for someone searching in Google Australia from an Australian location.

I guess we’ll see a few more changes to local search and a lot more discussion on it. This is a good post from Bill Slawski. It mentions some of the difficulties with contact information including what to display and when.