How to Rank Nationwide Without Spammy City Pages

Why city-page networks are risky

A common tactic used to be creating a page for every city: "Web design in Dallas", "Web design in Denver" and so on, with only the city name changed. Google's spam policies call these doorway pages, and its rules on scaled content abuse cover mass-produced pages whether a person, a template or AI wrote them. Google's spam updates in 2026 hit sites that relied on large sets of templated pages, sometimes across the whole site.

Location pages are fine when the business genuinely serves that place with something specific, such as an office, local staff, local projects or local reviews. They become a problem when they are copies.

What works instead

• Service pages that explain each service in depth.
• Industry pages that show how you help a specific type of business, with its own problems, tools and examples. See our industry pages for how this looks.
• Integration and platform pages for the tools your customers use.
• Helpful guides that answer real questions your customers ask.
• Case studies with real results.

Write for AI search too

AI Overviews, ChatGPT and other assistants pull short, clear answers from pages they trust. Help them by:

• Putting a direct answer near the top of each page.
• Using clear headings that match the questions people ask.
• Adding structured data for your organisation, services, FAQs and breadcrumbs.
• Keeping your business name, phone and details consistent everywhere online.

Signals that build trust

• A complete Google Business Profile and regular reviews.
• Listings in respected directories for your field.
• Mentions and links from partners, clients and industry sites.
• Real people, real work and real contact details on your site.

Technical basics

• A clean XML sitemap with accurate last-modified dates.
• Fast pages that work well on phones.
• Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools set up and monitored.
• Translated pages with proper hreflang tags if you serve other languages.