Darren Shaw

🔹 Founder of Whitespark.ca: local SEO software and services.
🔹 Local SEO educator with 45,000+ newsletter subscribers, 10,000+ YouTube subscribers, and 3,000+ email course sign-ups
🔹 In charge of the annual Local Search Ranking Factors Survey, one of the most cited resources in local SEO
🔹 Speaker at local search conferences around the globe and contributor to SEO publications
🔹 I've been doing web development and SEO for 27 years (yes, before Google existed)

Founder

Whitespark builds online tools and provides services that help businesses and agencies with local SEO. We're known for our Local Citation Finder, Local Rank Tracker, Citation Building & Audit Services, and Local SEO Consulting. Our team often collaborates with other industry leaders and frequently presents at top SEO & Marketing conferences in North America.

Most SEOs don’t realize they can see AI search prompts inside Search Console. I saw this tip from Chris Long on LinkedIn, and it’s too good not to share.

Here’s exactly how to do it:

1. Go to Search Console > Performance > Search Results
2. Set the date range to 12 months
3. Click Add Filter > Query
4. Change the dropdown to Custom (regex)
5. Paste in a regex that filters for long queries: ^(?:\S+\s+){9,}\S+$
6. Click Apply

You’ll now see longer, more conversational queries. Some of these may still be traditional searches, so I like to edit the regex and change the character count from 9 to 20.

Now you’re looking at really long prompts that people are likely typing into AI search.

Why this matters:

- I’m not a big fan of AI visibility tracking tools because, in my experience, their data is often garbage. This method gives you real data straight from Google and lets you see how people are actually asking questions about your business.
- You can identify content gaps and optimization opportunities on your website.
- You can track whether more AI-style queries are starting to show up over time.

Try it out and let me know if you see any crazy prompts in your data!

Founder of Whitespark. I share local SEO tips and strategy. Lead researcher behind the annual Local Search Ranking Factors survey. Get everything you need for better local SEO at whitespark.ca

There’s a wild black-hat SEO case study where Holly Starks put 100 cell phones in her car, turned on driving directions to a business, and that business jumped to #1 in rankings.

Obviously you’re not going to do that, but driving directions WILL boost your rankings, so here’s how you can get more of them without driving around with 100 cell phones in your car:

1. Google your business name.
2. In the Knowledge Panel, click on “Directions”.
3. When the map opens, copy the URL from the address bar. That link is a direct driving directions link from the user’s location to your business.
4. Use the link and send it to your customers:
- Add it to appointment reminder emails/text messages
- Put it clearly on your website’s contact page
- If you’re hosting an event, send it out in email and text campaigns

If you’re getting people to physically visit your location anyway, you might as well encourage them to use the directions link. 

More direction requests = stronger engagement signals = better local rankings

Got any other ideas of where you could use this link?

Whitespark’s YouTube channel just hit 1 000 000 views 🎉 Thank you all for watching our videos!

ICYMI: Episode 20 of the Whitespark Local Update is now up on the channel, so go check it out if you haven’t

If you care about local rankings, this one’s worth your time 👇

I’ll be joining the brilliant Joy Hawkins and Elizabeth R. on a webinar for Local University: Google Maps Ranking 2026: 10 Proven Signals That Still Work.

We’ll break down the 2026 Local Search Ranking Factors and discuss what still has a real impact on Google Maps and Local Pack rankings, where AI is starting to matter, and what we agree or strongly disagree on in the report.

What you’ll learn:

🎯 Which Google Maps ranking signals still matter in 2026

🎯 Which classic tactics are holding up, and which ones are fading

🎯 Practical takeaways you can apply right away

Oh, and Joy, Elizabeth, and I will compare how each of us scored the top 5 local ranking factors in the LSRF. Should be fun.

See you there!

If you’re thinking of making money from SEO Services, there’s an insane resource you should know about.

It’s called the SEO Surge Summit, and it’s a free, 3-day virtual event that’s specifically designed to help you sell, deliver, and scale SEO services. 

I’ll be joining Sam Sarsten, founder of Local SEO Academy, Anchen 🌟 le Roux 🌟, and 24+ industry experts for a virtual event like no other.

I’ll be breaking down the 2026 Local Search Ranking Factors Survey in an in-depth Q&A and sharing what agencies should actually focus on.

Over the 3 days, you’ll also learn:

🎯 What’s actually working for SEO in 2026

🎯 How to build recurring revenue with SEO

🎯 How to find more leads for your business

🎯 and so much more!

The summit kicks off on February 24. Hope to see you there!

We just launched an absolutely incredible new feature in Whitespark Local Ranking Grids, and you need to see it. When you click “Plot Competitors on Map”, you can instantly visualize your competitors on the map:

- Who’s outranking you at that exact location
- Where they’re physically located
- How close (or far) they are from that grid point
- How competitor clusters shift across the grid

You can even expand it from Top 10 all the way to Top 100. 

Yes, we track rankings all the way to 100 (unlike all of our outdated competitors).

But what I love the most about this new feature is how visual it makes everything. You can literally click around the grid and watch competitors change depending on their location. It makes proximity, density, and competition incredibly obvious and easy to explain to potential clients.

This data is incredibly valuable for:

- Showing prospects exactly who is outranking them and how close those competitors are.
- Spotting weak areas and competitive clusters on the map and adjusting your strategy accordingly.
- Identifying areas where competitors are farther away and a new location could do really well.

This is one of those features that makes you look really smart on a sales call because instead of overexplaining rankings to potential clients, you can visually show them what’s happening in just a few clicks and they instantly get it.

If you want to test the software for yourself, you can run 8 free 5×5 grid scans with our trial (no credit card required). Go click around. It’s actually fun.

Nobody knows this: you could get sued for spam fighting.

Did you know that a business can subpoena Google and request a record of who’s been making edits to their Google Business Profile?

Yep. It’s a real legal process. And if they go through it, Google will provide a list of accounts that made changes to their Profile.

So, if you’re out there using “Suggest an Edit” on competitor profiles, changing business names, categories, etc, those businesses could potentially find out it was you and take legal action.

That’s why I recommend using the Google Business Redressal Complaint Form.

Doing it this way removes the risk of being personally exposed in a legal request.

Here’s a mistake I see businesses make all the time: They try to make one Google Business Profile rank for multiple categories. 

Well, it usually can’t. That’s just not how Google works.

For example: You’re a plumbing company, but you also do electrical. Can one Profile rank for both? It’s extremely unlikely unless you’re in a small town with very little competition.

If someone searches for “electrician”, Google does not want to show plumbers - they want to show electricians. Look at the local results below. Every Profile has “electrician” as its primary category.

Your primary category is the single most important local ranking factor. It has the biggest impact on whether you show up in the local pack.

So, if you want to rank well for multiple different services, you will need a separate Google Business Profile for each primary service. And each Profile must have:

- a unique business name
– a unique phone number
– a unique website URL

(It’s ok for them to be at the same address)

That’s really the only way to rank well for multiple services.

Google is now literally telling you what to add/fix on your Google Business Profile. 

Have you seen the new “Insights” section on your Profile? Dipa Gandhi recently shared a screenshot of it, and it’s pretty cool. It highlights optimization opportunities right inside your Profile.

You’ll see text boxes with suggestions like:

- Add more photos
- Add updates to your Profile
- Continue replying to reviews
- What’s the parking like?
- Share accessibility info

Each one comes with a short explanation, for example: “Show people what’s new: 20+ businesses like you don’t have fresh photos.”

Google is clearly pushing businesses to complete and keep their Profiles fresh. 

Why? Because the more data you give them, the better they can understand your business, surface you in the right searches, and present you to potential customers. And yes… that data is also training their AI.

Claire and I discuss this in the latest episode of the Whitespark Local Update. We also talk about:

- Google reviews bug on Chrome (Vinay Toshniwal)
- AI isn’t replacing local search (Crystal Carter on the NearMemo podcast)
- How to improve LSA visibility (Eric Levine on the NearMemo podcast)
- Misinformation about chunking (Michael King)
- User satisfaction is the most important factor in SEO (Marie Haynes)
- Schema and AI visibility (Mark Williams-Cook)

Find the full episode on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify!

It’s 2026, and people are still falling for this local SEO myth: if you add keywords to your Google Business Profile Description, you’ll rank better in local results.

Let’s settle this once and for all. The business Description is NOT a local ranking factor, even if you stuff it with keywords. Google does not use it as part of the local search algorithm.

What is interesting, though, and this is relatively new, is that we’re starting to see content from Google Business Profile Descriptions show up in AI-generated results. That makes sense, because at the end of the day, it’s still content.

So yes, there may be some value there, just not for rankings.

The key takeaway is this: don’t write your business description for Google. Write it for humans.

Use it to explain what you do, how long you’ve been in business, and what sets you apart from your competitors. The goal is to convince real people that you’re the right choice.

It is a great joy in my life to record the Whitespark Local Update podcast with the wonderful Claire Carlile 🎺  We’re 20 episodes in and you can listen wherever you get your podcasts.

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Local SEO hack you NEED to know: Google says you can only upload 30-second videos to your Google Business Profile. That’s what the guidelines say. But that’s not actually true.

According to Google, your videos should meet the following requirements:
– Max length: 30 seconds
– Max file size: 75 MB

But I just uploaded a 1-minute and 50-seconds long video, and Google accepted it. Why? Because it was under 75 MB.

The real limiter is actually the file size, not the length of the video. If your video is under 75 MB, Google will accept it, even if it’s longer than 30 seconds.

So now you know how to add a video longer than 30 to your Google Business Profiles.

Though, I once tried to upload a 20x20 pixel version of “10 hour epic sax guy” from YouTube (IYKYK), and it didn’t work, so I guess there is some limit.

No matter how good you are at local SEO, if your business sucks, you’re not going to rank well.

Here’s a recipe for disaster I’ve been noticing more and more: With AI and search evolving, many business owners are hyperfixated on online visibility at the expense of their real-life business reputation.

But some of the most well-ranking local businesses don’t have to put any effort into their digital marketing. They are just awesome in real life, and that translates to the digital space.

For example:

- Good customer service not only makes customers come back, but it also prevents negative online reviews

- Finding something your business can excel at and differentiate itself from the competition with makes you popular in real life AND builds buzz online

- Having good business practices and engaging with other organizations in your local community makes you likeable in real life AND earns you unstructured citations online

The list goes on and on, and Miriam Ellis’s new guide covers it all. Learn how to turn your real-world reputation efforts into local SEO wins and get the free checklist on whitespark . ca / guides!’s new guide covers it all.

Most businesses are missing a huge opportunity with their Google Posts. They add photos to their Posts instead of videos. 
Videos stand out way more in the Google Posts feed, communicate more information in less time, and feel more authentic to potential customers.

Sure, recording videos takes a bit more effort than just taking a picture, but it doesn’t have to be complicated. Just record a short clip inside your business:

- Have the owner or a team member talk about a current offer.
- Show what’s new.
- Show your space.
- Show a product.
- Show how you perform a service.

And if you or your client doesn’t like being on camera, you can make some flashy videos easy-peasy with a tool like Canva.

Videos in Google Posts → more engagement on your GBP → better visibility → more conversions.

How to See Your AI Traffic in Search Console

Read more here: https://lnkd.in/gKmebB2g

One of the Most Underrated Local Ranking Signals?

Read more here: https://lnkd.in/gPbSb4CY

What if you could sit down with your ideal customer and ask them anything before updating your website, and use those answers to 10x your content’s conversion power?

That’s the concept behind Andy Crestodina’s AI Personas. Here’s how it works:

You give AI a prompt that instructs it to act as your ideal customer. Then you use that “artificial buyer persona” to audit your webpages from the perspective of a potential customer. For example:

- Is the page addressing all the buyer’s objections?
- Is it triggering the emotional response you want your buyer to have?
- What are the decision criteria, and are you covering them all on the page?

Claire Carlile 🎺 and I discuss this in more detail on today’s episode of the Whitespark Local Update, plus:

- How To Mine Google Search Console For Conversation Data (Chris Long)
- AI Talking to AI (Ben Fisher)
- Updated Google Business Profile Policies (Hiroko Imai)
- Stop Chasing the Local 3-Pack (Claudia Tomina)
- Google Business Profile Violations (Sterling Sky Inc)

Find the full episode on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify!

Google says you can only upload 30-second videos to your Google Business Profile. That’s what the guidelines say. But that’s not actually true.

Read more here: https://lnkd.in/gdieE2nd

How to Rank for Multiple Services in Google Maps

Read more here: https://lnkd.in/g6fGVbBG

Did you know that you can get SUED for editing a Google Business Profile?

Read more here: https://lnkd.in/gsnyjWrA

Dennis Yu

I help successful founders scale what's already working via the DOLLAR A DAY Strategy-- courses, coaching, and done-for-you implementation

CEO of BlitzMetrics, a digital marketing company which partners with schools to train young adults.  We offer courses, implementation, and consulting.

My personal mission centers around mentorship from my experience with helping people from all walks of life grow their expertise in digital marketing, sharing his insights from managing campaigns for enterprise clients like The Golden State Warriors, Nike, and Rosetta Stone.

I help digital agencies grow, serving doctors and real estate agents as fractional CTO.

I'm an internationally recognized lecturer in digital marketing and have spoken over 730 times in 17 countries, spanning 5 continents.

Featured in: The Wall Street Journal, New York Times, LA Times, National Public Radio, TechCrunch, Fox News, CNN, CBS Evening News and co-authored “Facebook Nation” – a textbook taught in over 700 colleges and universities.

Chief Technology Officer

Making software and tools for young adults and businesses that want to amplify their word of mouth marketing. If you're a university or conference organizer, we want to help your members and students, too.

My AI agents are running in 50+ tabs, while I've got 12 for myself.

Even though AI is supposed to make life easier, I'm working harder than ever and getting 20X more done.

For B players using AI agents, they'll get more B quality work done, if they are even willing to use agents (most are stubborn).

I've felt some whiplash switching between ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Grok, since they constantly leapfrog each other.

Even though the AI evangelists love telling us that today's new release is a "game changer" and that you need to drop everything, I'm tired of these guys crying wolf every day.

So I make changes only when I think we have staying power.

My best is that Grok will be the most powerful AI in 36 months-- when Elon finally has AI data centers in space to win the electricity and inference game.

While we've mainly been using OpenAI (which has 80% market share), I believe Gemini will eclipse them within a year.

Remember when computers advanced so fast that you'd delay buying until the next big chip came out? Or maybe you had an iPhone 8 and wanted to wait for the iPhone 10-- to skip the iPhone 9.

That's my strategy here-- intentional ignorance, since I don't want to spend more time messing with tools than actually making the phone ring for our local service businesses and the agencies that serve them.

I think a smart approach is to spend 10% of your time testing new stuff and 90% of your time doing what is proven.

By the way, those colored boxes are tab groups in Chrome. Each colored box is a set of tabs that Claude is actively using to complete a particular project.  The first few tabs on the left are where I'm working.

Helping contractors show up in Google Maps, teaching AI skills to young adults

Claude in Chrome worked diligently for 25 minutes, taking 240 steps to do a thorough job of tuning 7 articles that relate to each other.

I've tried for several years to get VAs and other team members to do it, but have failed each time.

Partly reliability-- an issue with most humans, but also of knowledge/experience, which is why I filmed the "SEO Tree" training and have concepts like LDT (learn, do, teach).

Before you think this means AI is amazing or that AI is taking our jobs-- consider that the AI is limited not by token usage or context window, but by the skill of the user, like a chef with a knife.

Those of us who have deep experience in any field will get the highest leverage from AI, whether you are technical or not-- because you simply speak to it, being a director and mentor to your team members.

If you're a strong leader and coordinator, you'll naturally thrive with AI tools, since you'll talk to them just like your human team members. 

Still a lot of clunkiness and frustrating things. But I think by end of 2026, most of those will have be solved.

Another project that would have taken me 3 hours took only 30 minutes of AI time-- 10 minutes of human time, giving me an 18X multiple on my effort.

I've completed 25 in-depth projects in the last 3 days that would have taken me at least 8 weeks.

Now my objective is to scale our human capital-- to amplify the A Players in our program. 

B and C players resist you, anyway-- since they're allergic to performance standards.

The folks getting 10X productivity with AI are not better technicians: they're better managers of people.

I've learned this hard truth from watching dozens of folks using AI agents. The already productive ones get a 10X multiple on their productivity-- but

Open article: 10X productivity with AI? When I've seen it work versus fail spectacularly by Dennis Yu • 4 min read

10X productivity with AI? When I've seen it work versus fail spectacularly

Someone just pointed out that some guy has re-uploaded a 2-hour video of mine to his channel.

No attribution, no credit—which would have pissed me off a few years ago.

I've had so many courses and documents blatantly ripped off—sometimes nakedly like this, sometimes with their name slapped on it.

But now that content is basically free, I've changed my view.

Good clients pay for results, not for knowledge, content, or even coaching.

So let these guys promote your expertise. 

Let them keep the pennies from content monetization while we make dollar bills delivering the results.

I spend WAY more time trying to convince team members to use AI agents than actually working with AI agents-- maybe 10 to 1.

Yet in that one hour of firing off a bunch of assignments to our various agents (build a website, edit the videos, optimize the ads, turn Zoom calls into a book, etc), there is enough productivity that I can spend the rest of the day convincing people we pay to use the tools we've bought.

The founder of Twitter cut 40% of his employees yesterday-- 4,000 out of 10,000 folks-- for similar reasons.

But I am not the kind of guy to make such cuts-- even if rational and even if the stock prices jumps 22% upon that announcement.

I believe, perhaps foolishly, that technology as of a week ago, has gotten to the point where if you can verbally speak what you want-- the AI agents will get it done for you, even if you don't know the steps to take along the way or how exactly to state your goal with clarity.

Something interesting I've noticed-- the entrepreneurs I coach who know how to manage teams do far better than the "AI and SEO experts".

Yes, the non-technical folks are getting stronger results with AI agents than the people with deep digital marketing tool expertise-- because success hinges on your ability to manage a team of agents (human or not).

You know who performs the worst?

Consultants--- since they are used to talking all the time, dispensing advice instead of hands-on doing the work itself and coordinating efforts across team members.

So the "older" folks who have businesses of 50+ people crush it (because they have management skill, understanding SOPs) as do the young adults (who are not afraid to try new things).  

Everyone else struggles.

What do you make of that?

I'm spending $6.70 a day to get the work of 10 VAs done-- not a typo.

That's 67 cents per day for the equivalent of 8 hours of work by one person-- typical marketing tasks.

I've burned through 240 million tokens in the last two weeks on Claude 20X Max (which is $200 a month) using primarily Opus 4.6.  

Because I stay within session and weekly limits, I rarely get hit with extra usage, which is at $5 per million input tokens and $25 per million output tokens.  

You want fast mode?  That's 6X the price, so $150 per million output tokens.

Back to the main point, we've employed armies of VAs for years-- loyal workers who do repetitive tasks according to well-documented SOPs.

Many team members are resistant to learning how to use AI-- meaning, applying critical thinking skills and being more manager than worker.

Those who aren't stubborn are experiencing 6-10X productivity leaps, instead of being stuck doing mindless tasks that should be done by agents.

If your business operates via laptops and Zoom calls (which is all marketing and agency work), then your team size 12 months from now will be governed by how many managers you need.

Have you assessed how strong your SOPs are and how many competent managers you have?

How many of your workers are stuck in thinking they can happily continue do the same tasks they've done in the past?

Incidentally, if you use Claude the way we do (providing heavy context and SOPs), you'll burn more tokens than Anthropic anticipates on average.  

This is the equivalent of eating just the lobster and steak at the buffet-- instead of mainly bread and pasta.

I fully expect to switch to Gemini and then Grok, as agents across frontier models become more capable-- currently being limited by electrical generation and inference power.

TLDR: One guy on your team using Claude 20X MAX at $200 a month can easily replace 10 workers.   I've been demonstrating by example in our weekly coaching calls.

https://lnkd.in/ggSqjHgz

Podchaser shows I've been on 573 podcasts, while Listen Notes shows 477.  

The true number is 800+, and it's my fault for not organizing, repurposing, sharing, and optimizing this leverage.  

Like you, I've been too busy to inventory, follow up, and boost these—which is the respect we owe podcast hosts for taking the time to interview us, edit, and so forth.  

But in the last 72 hours, I've gotten Claude and Grok to help me finally organize everything—not for me, but using me as a guinea pig for our clients who all have podcasts and have been on podcasts.  

The tool has pulled some amazing positive mentions from industry leaders—enough to make me blush—stuff I forgot these folks said.  

And now I can finally leverage these assets, much like finding a $20 bill in your jeans when doing laundry, but thousands of times over.  

Are you guilty of not leveraging the valuable trust and authority you've accumulated over the years?

Don't cheap out.

Get the $200/month Claude 20X MAX plan for yourself if you're serious about AI agents and can spend at least an hour a day with it.

The math doesn't make sense for 5X at $100/month or 1X at $20/month if you actually use it.

You and I have initiatives that aren't getting done-- now there's no excuse.

If you know how to manage your agents (human or not), you'll be using up your tokens/credits before they replenish each week.

Buy one for yourself and also for team members who are eager to get stuff done-- technical experience or not, whatever age or experience level.

There is no team/business plan for this level of usage yet-- at least not in the way we have it tune websites, repurpose content, run ads, etc... 

I've done the same thing with Perplexity and OpenAI agents-- stay with Claude for now.

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The Battle

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Dennis Yu

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