MetaLocator has the ability to automatically detect the location of your visitor based on IP address or mobile device location. This article focuses on the IP-address Auto Find used when a web site visitor uses your Interface.
To enable autofind, change the Initial State setting to Show Nearest (IP Address) as shown below.
You can limit the distance for which AutoFind will automatically present results by updating the Autofind search radius setting as shown below:
These additional settings that are relevant to AutoFind:
If you are also displaying the Location Search Field (postal code search) and/or the Radius drop-down. You will want to ensure that the default AutoFind Search Radius matches the default radius chosen for the Location Search. To do that, ensure the Search Form > Default Distance is set to that same number. This will ensure a consistent radius when displaying auto-found results as compared to subsequent searches.
You may also reduce the number of search results displayed by default, which is set under "Results" > Number of Results per Page. Generally speaking, lower numbers work better when using AutoFind since users are often only considering the nearest handful of locations.
There are a few nuances when using AutoFind that are not always obvious. Consider:
A given user may not have locations within your chosen radius. This results in an appearance that looks much like when a search returns no results. Be sure to set your Autofind search radius high enough to account for your geographic distribution.
IP Address location detection (and web-based location detection) is an imperfect solution. Not all IP addresses are known, and many have incorrect location information associated with them. Expect roughly 85-95% city-level accuracy.
If you need to test a certain IP address, you can add a URL parameter to the end of your preview URL as follows to force a certain IP address: &_ip=96.127.150.50