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Hoopless Contributes to Whitespark’s 2026 SEO Rank Factors (Our Takeaways)

Sam Knight
December 3, 2025

After an extended hiatus, Whitespark’s Local Search Rank Factors report is back! This time, our very own Sam Knight, co-founder of Hoopless, was asked to contribute to the survey – made up of 47 of the most notable voices in Local SEO.

The survey is a comprehensive 2-hour assessment of 187 weighted factors – from Map Pack rankings, local organic rankings, conversion impact, and new for this year – AI visibility!

There’s been massive impact with AI search, but thus far local search has been remained mostly insulated.

(Broader, informational “national” type queries have seen the steepest decline in organic traffic).

But that’s not to say Local SEO hasn’t changed. Local SEO continues to change, and the 2026 Survey gives a great pulse from the brightest minds in the industry.

Here are the top highlights:

Local SEO Rank Factor Changes Over Time

Most Notable Changes in 2025-2026

Top 10 AI Search Factors

These are just some of the highlights, so be sure to check out the full report – there’s a ton of insight!

About the author

Sam Knight

Sam Knight is the Co-Founder of Hoopless, where he heads up strategy & operations. Sam has been actively practicing SEO for over a decade and is an official Platinum Product Expert for Google Business Profile (previously known as Google My Business). You can find him actively posting on the GBP Help Community where he’s assisted over 1,000 merchants.

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