The Multi-Location SEO Skill: Portfolio Visibility at Scale
You manage 35 locations. You know some are underperforming. You don’t know which ones, or why, or whether the problem is GBP completeness or citation drift or a competitive shift in that specific market.
Per-location reporting gives you individual metrics. Nobody is synthesizing across the portfolio.
The location sitting at 43% GBP completeness for 18 months is still there, still invisible, still losing business — and you only find out when the regional manager calls asking why that market is down.
Portfolio management isn’t 35 individual audits. It’s one analysis that shows you which locations need attention, which problems affect multiple locations, and what can be fixed in bulk vs. what needs individual work.
What Changes With the Multi-Location SEO Skill
One prompt. Portfolio audit across all 35 locations.
Completeness scores ranked worst to best. The 5 most common problems appearing at multiple locations. The 10 locations that need attention first and exactly why.
What was invisible in per-location reporting becomes obvious in the portfolio view.
The skill treats the portfolio as a portfolio — not 35 separate clients who happen to share a brand.
See It Work: Portfolio Analysis in One Prompt
Prompt: "Audit all 35 GBP profiles for QuickBite Restaurants. Rank by completeness,
find the common problems across the portfolio, tell me which 10 to fix first."
Skills that fire: dispatch → multi-location-seo + localseodata-tool
Data pulled: profile_health ×35, business_profile ×35 (sampled for worst performers)
PORTFOLIO AUDIT: QuickBite Restaurants — 35 Locations
COMPLETENESS RANKING (bottom 5 shown)
Rank | Location | City | Score | Primary Issues
1 | QuickBite #12 | Chattanooga | 41% | No photos, wrong category, missing hours
2 | QuickBite #7 | Knoxville | 49% | 0 secondary categories, no menu link
3 | QuickBite #23 | Savannah | 53% | Old phone number, no outdoor seating attr.
4 | QuickBite #31 | Memphis | 56% | Missing 8 attributes, no service menu
5 | QuickBite #4 | Birmingham | 58% | Description 89 chars, 0 posts last 90 days
PORTFOLIO-WIDE PATTERNS (problems at multiple locations)
1. "Outdoor Seating" attribute unclaimed: 29/35 locations
→ One-time bulk fix via GBP API: 1 hour, all 35 locations
2. Zero secondary categories beyond primary: 24/35 locations
3. Photo count under 20: 21/35 locations
4. Review response rate under 50%: 18/35 locations
5. Old phone number in at least one directory: 11/35 locations
QUICK WIN — ENTIRE PORTFOLIO (1 hour)
Add "Outdoor Seating" attribute across all 35 locations via GBP API bulk update.
See gbp-api-automation skill for the API call structure.
TOP 10 PRIORITY LOCATIONS
1. QuickBite #12 Chattanooga — 41% — fix this week
Issues: No photos (0), wrong primary category ("Restaurant" vs "Fast Food Restaurant"),
hours show closed on Tuesdays (actual: open)
2. QuickBite #7 Knoxville — 49% — fix this week
Issues: 0 secondary categories, no menu link, description 45 characters
[continues for all 10 with specific issue list per location]One prompt. 35 locations audited. Portfolio patterns surfaced. Priorities identified.
Why Portfolio Analysis Is Different from Per-Location Audits
Patterns Emerge at Portfolio Scale
Problems affecting multiple locations are invisible in individual audits. You’d have to complete all 35 audits, then manually cross-reference to notice that 29 of them are missing the same attribute.
The portfolio view surfaces these patterns immediately:
- “24/35 locations have zero secondary categories” — a systematic gap, probably from original setup
- “18/35 locations have review response rate under 50%” — a process problem, not individual negligence
- “11/35 locations have citation inconsistencies” — an address change or phone number change that wasn’t propagated
These patterns point to systematic fixes: bulk API updates, process changes, aggregator corrections. One action fixes multiple locations.
Outliers Require Individual Attention
Not everything is a pattern. Some locations have unique problems:
- “Location 12 has 3.2 star rating vs. 4.6 portfolio average” — investigate what’s happening there
- “Location 28 has 0 GBP posts in 6 months” — the local manager isn’t engaged
- “Location 37 has NAP inconsistencies across 12 directories” — maybe a recent move or name change
The portfolio view identifies which locations are outliers and why, so individual attention goes where it’s needed.
Resource Allocation Becomes Clear
With 35 locations and limited time, where do you focus? The portfolio audit provides the answer:
- The quick win affecting 29 locations (1 hour, bulk fix)
- The 10 worst-performing locations (direct attention this month)
- The 5 patterns affecting 15+ locations (process changes)
You’re not guessing. The data tells you where the highest-leverage work is.
What the Skill Analyzes
Completeness Scoring Across All Locations
Every location gets a completeness score using the same methodology. The skill then ranks them worst to best, creating a prioritized list of which locations need attention.
The ranking shows:
- Score by location
- Primary issues per location
- Gap between worst and best performers
- Portfolio average vs. individual locations
Portfolio-Wide Pattern Detection
The skill cross-references common issues across locations:
- Attributes: Which attributes are consistently unclaimed across the portfolio?
- Categories: Are secondary categories systematically missing?
- Photos: How many locations are below competitive photo counts?
- Reviews: Where are response rates low?
- Citations: Are there NAP inconsistencies that appear at multiple locations?
Each pattern comes with an impact count (“29/35 locations”) and a fix recommendation.
Competitive Benchmarking Per Market
Each location operates in a different competitive environment. The skill can pull local pack data per market and identify which locations are underperforming relative to their specific competition.
Standardization vs. Localization Framework
Multi-location brands face tension between brand consistency and local optimization. The skill helps identify:
- What should be standardized across all locations
- What should vary by location
- Where localization is missing (generic content across all profiles)
- Where standardization is missing (inconsistent naming, categories, attributes)
Who Uses This and When
Any business with 5+ locations where per-location management is creating blind spots. The threshold isn’t a specific number — it’s the point where you can’t hold all the individual details in your head.
Any agency managing a multi-location client. Your reporting to the client should show portfolio health, not just individual location metrics. The portfolio audit provides that view.
Any franchise brand doing quarterly triage. Where should regional managers focus? Which locations are dragging down the brand? Which need intervention vs. which are performing?
Any brand launching new locations that needs a baseline-to-campaign workflow. Audit the new location at launch, identify gaps vs. established locations, create the optimization plan.
What You Don’t Get Without This Skill
Without the multi-location-seo skill, portfolio analysis means running 35 individual audits and manually synthesizing across them.
The pattern affecting 24 of your 35 locations is invisible until you’ve completed all the work — and then you still have to do the cross-referencing manually.
With the skill:
- One prompt audits the entire portfolio
- Patterns surface automatically
- Worst performers are ranked
- Bulk fix opportunities are identified
- Priority locations are listed with specific issues
The difference is hours of synthesis done automatically, plus patterns you’d miss doing it manually.
Scale Considerations
When Manual Management Breaks Down
Different scale thresholds create different challenges:
1-5 locations: Manual management works. Time-consuming but not overwhelming.
6-20 locations: Manual management starts straining. Consistency issues emerge. Need for tracking systems.
21-50 locations: Individual location management becomes impractical. Need portfolio-level views.
51-100 locations: Operational complexity requires systems. GBP API integration becomes necessary.
100+ locations: Everything must be systematized. Manual touches only for exceptions.
The multi-location-seo skill is designed for the 5+ threshold where portfolio visibility becomes essential.
GBP API Handoff
For bulk fixes identified in the audit, the skill hands off to gbp-api-automation:
"The audit found 29 locations missing 'Outdoor Seating' attribute.
Use gbp-api-automation to push this update to all 35 locations."The audit identifies what needs to change. The API skill executes the bulk update. The separation keeps each skill focused.
Get This Skill — It’s Free and Open Source
The multi-location-seo skill is part of the LocalSEOSkills library. MIT licensed.
Installation:
- Download LocalSEOSkills from GitHub
- Upload to Claude.ai or configure in Claude Code
- Connect LocalSEOData for profile data across all locations
- The skill is active immediately
First prompt:
"Audit all [N] GBP profiles for [Brand Name].
Rank by completeness, find portfolio-wide patterns,
tell me which locations to fix first."The portfolio audit will surface the patterns hiding in per-location data, rank the locations that need attention, and identify the bulk fixes that improve the entire portfolio in one action.
Skill Documentation
For technical details on how this skill works, what data it pulls, and complete prompt reference, see the full skill documentation.