The Local Search Ecosystem is a convoluted web of data that can be nearly impossible for a newcomer to navigate. With mobile search volume growing each day, being found in local search results is imperative to the small business owner’s success online. Join us to learn about local citations, directories, and data feeds and how these affect online visibility for clients.
2. ABOUT ME
ALISON ZERINGUE
• Partner Accounts Team Manager
• LSU Mass Comm / Advertising Graduate
• Leads team of 15 Account Managers
• Social Media Marketing Columnist on
MarketingLand.com
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3. WE HELP YOUR CLIENTS
GET FOUND
WITH DIRECTORIES & DATA FEEDS
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5. DIRECTORIES PROVIDE 2
MAJOR BENEFITS FOR SEO:
• Local Search Optimization
• NAP Citations
• Search Engine Visibility / Discovery
• Barnacle SEO
• Authority building
• Inbound Links
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6.
7. WHAT IS A CITATION?
• Your local search fingerprint
• Any online instance of the
business’ Name, Address and
Phone Number (AKA N.A.P.)
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8. THE ANATOMY OF N.A.P.
NAME
ADDRESS
PHONE NO
WEBSITE
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9. LINKS ARE
THE STREETS
OF THE WEB
Links are like the streets
between webpages that help
Search Engines navigate the
web to discover new content.
When other trusted sites like
directories link to your website:
• Your site can be found and
crawled by the Search
Engine spiders more
frequently
• Your site will be seen as a
trusted / authoritative source
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10. 2 TYPES OF ONLINE
DIRECTORIES:
1. LOCAL Directories
2. CATEGORICAL Directories
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19. ESSENTIAL: A
CONSISTENT
NAME
ADDRESS
PHONE NO.
The first and primary local search ranking factor is
Name, Address, Phone Number consistency across the
web. While the quantity of citations on the web is
important, the consistency of them is even more so due
to the Local Search Ecosystem.
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21. DON’T CONFUSE GOOGLE!
• NAP should be in each of these places:
• Website
• Social media profiles
• Business directories
• Number of citations is important, but
consistency is more important
25. HOW DOES THIS FIT INTO
OUR SEO CAMPAIGNS
FOR YOUR CLIENTS?
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26. MONTH1-2
• Month 1
• Claiming, verification, and
optimizing local listing on:
• Google+ Local
• Yahoo Local
• Bing Local
• Support from client is required
to complete these crucial steps
• Month 2
• On-site location optimizations
• Submit business to 2 major data
feeds:
• Universal Business Listing
• Localeze
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27. MONTH 3+
• Month 3 - 4
• Submit to 50 local directories
• Process to begin in this
month but does take time
to complete
• Month 4 + Beyond
• Submit to categorical
directories
• Month 7 - 8
• Submit to additional 50 local
directories
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your directory listings, or social media channels, can rank for the keywords you care about when your website can't/ sometimes they can even show up with your listing.
In many cases these directories will provide both a citation AND a link to the website
search engine marketing experts feel that citations , in other words mentions of your business name and contact details, on these secondary portals are absolutely critical for ranking well in Google Places . Google spiders all of these secondary portals regularly, so it's important to make sure your information is correct and consistent EVERYWHERE across the web.
The Local Search Ecosystem is a complex, tangled web of information and data feeds, so it’s important for a business’ NAP to be consistently listed across as many directories and data feeds as possible. We submit to Universal Business Listing & Localeze in Month 3 to ensure a consistent NAP is seeded out to major directories as a result. Localeze and UBL are both considered data feeds. Local directories, 411, publishing sites come and scrape these sources for new / updated information. You could think of them as the local directory watering holes.
search engine marketing experts feel that citations , in other words mentions of your business name and contact details, on these secondary portals are absolutely critical for ranking well in Google Places . Google spiders all of these secondary portals regularly, so it's important to make sure your information is correct and consistent EVERYWHERE across the web.We will verify the business’ true mailing address with the US Postal Service or the local BBB to ensure the citations we create are accurate and consistent. This format, even down to the way you list a suite number, should be consistent in all places where citations are created, including your own website.
For local businesses, having inconsistent citations on the web of your name, address and phone number can cause confusion among searchers and result in a lack of trust.
For local businesses, having inconsistent citations on the web of your name, address and phone number can cause confusion among searchers and result in a lack of trust.
For local businesses, having inconsistent citations on the web of your name, address and phone number can cause confusion among searchers and result in a lack of trust.
For local businesses, having inconsistent citations on the web of your name, address and phone number can cause confusion among searchers and result in a lack of trust.