How to add local listings for your business

There are many sites that will help promote your business. This helps people find your business location in Google Maps.

Why are local listings important?

I need to start this process by defining what I mean by “local listing.” By this, I mean websites that promote locally focused, brick-and-mortar locations for different businesses. You may also see these local listings called “citations.”

The following are examples of local listing sites:

• Google Business Profiles
• LinkedIn Business Pages
• Facebook Business Pages
• Yahoo Business Pages
• Yelp
• Superpages
• etc.

Hundreds of sites like this will allow you to promote your name, address, and phone number. Many also allow you to include a link to your website and other pertinent business information.

Many of these local listings now allow you to have a listing without including your address if you don’t have a brick-and-mortar location. Google calls these Service Area Businesses. Instead of your customers coming to your location, you visit your customers at their place. Many are home service businesses, like plumbers, roofers, and landscapers. We’ll discuss these more later.

Even if you don’t have a store or office you want people to visit, it is worth building and maintaining your local listings.

Local listing sites are essential for a couple of reasons:

• Having your business listed in local directories helps people and search engines find and trust you. They also help create prominence for your business, meaning it is well known. Prominence is one of the three main factors Google uses to rank local businesses in search results. While Google constantly updates its algorithm, the key for local search is to remember that the basics remain the same – relevance, proximity, and prominence.
• People might look for your business on one of these sites, but they will only find you if you have a profile.
• If you want your customers to find you on the most popular option (Google Maps), you need a Google Business Profile, formerly Google My Business. If you’re going to “rank” in the local pack (when Google shows local businesses in sets beneath a map in the search results), you’ve got to optimize this listing. One of the most important ways to optimize your listing is through name, address, and phone number (NAP) consistency across the web. The more local listing websites list your consistent NAP, the easier it is to show up in Google.

I’ve talked about the importance of these local listings, but you may have read about their declining significance. It’s important to understand that while they may not have the impact you would see ten years ago, you shouldn’t ignore them. Years ago, if you got numerous citations (hundreds), you could see your business rise to the top of the search results. The more listings, the higher you would appear in the search results. Those days are long gone, but having a solid foundation of local listings is still essential.  

The best strategy is to focus on these critical areas: Google Business Profile, Primary Citations, Hyper-Local Citations, and Niche Citations. We will discuss each of these below. You can get additional citations that can help your business, but you need to weigh the cost (time involved) vs the benefits.

Remember that your Google Business Profile is the most crucial listing and can drive significant traffic and conversions for your business. If you don’t have local listings, you may experience trouble maintaining your Google Business Profile, as Google may not trust your company.

What should you expect from local listings?

You’ll see the benefit of your local listings in traffic and conversions. These will come from:

• Referral traffic from the local listing sites.
• Increased traffic from Google search, as your Google MyBusiness listing shows up more often because of NAP consistency (and other ranking factors).
• More phone calls (which you are hopefully tracking). Many customers simply want to get on the phone with you.

The Local Listing Process