Proximity

Google publicly names three signals that drive local rankings: proximity, prominence, and relevance. Before 2021, all three carried roughly equal weight. After the Vicinity update in October 2021, proximity became the primary signal — most searchers now see the three closest businesses in the local pack, regardless of those businesses' review counts or citation strength.

This shift reflects a basic user intent signal: when someone searches 'plumber near me,' they want a plumber within 5 miles, not the highest-rated plumber in the region. Distance is the dominant filter. After the filter applies, prominence and relevance become tiebreakers — but if you're closer, you rank ahead of a weaker competitor even at the same distance.

Proximity is not raw latitude/longitude distance — Google maps it to the searcher's location at query time. For mobile searches, Google uses the device location (from GPS, cell tower triangulation, or IP). For desktop searches, it uses the IP address to estimate location or respects an explicit location modifier in the query (e.g. 'plumber in Brooklyn').

Google then calculates distance from that point to the business address listed in Google Business Profile. The address on your GBP is the canonical location used for proximity calculations — if your GBP address is wrong or outdated, you'll rank in the wrong geographic section or disappear from results entirely in nearby markets.

The Vicinity update also changed how results display. Before 2021, the local pack showed the top 3 results by relevance/prominence across a wide geographic area. After Vicinity, Google applies a proximity filter first — you only see businesses close enough to matter, sorted by proximity, then by prominence within that proximity band.

Practically: if you're 2 miles away and rank locally, you'll beat a competitor 5 miles away even with half the reviews. But if you're 15 miles away and the searcher is in a dense urban area with competitors at 2-5 miles, you won't rank at all — no amount of prominence can overcome the proximity gap.

Proximity shift changed how local SEO operators think about territory. The classic model was: build a profile strong enough to rank everywhere within your service area. The post-Vicinity model is: you can only rank locally where you're geographically close enough to compete.

For multi-location businesses, this means every location needs its own GBP with the real address — not a central office address used for all locations. For service area businesses, it means geotargeting matters more than brand authority. For agencies, it shifts work from citation building (prominence) to geogrid testing (proximity mapping) and client expansion into the markets they actually serve.