You, as a savvy business owner, know the impact a great SEO campaign can have on your bottom line. You’ve likely spent plenty of time and research finding perfectly performing keywords, strategized to increase your page speed, reworked your site to decrease your bounce rate, polished your meta and title tags, formatted your blogs in hopes they become font page snippets, and have detailed your image descriptions to match. Surely your content topics are spot on in their relevance and searchability, too!
One area you may have overlooked in the diligence of optimizing your online presence is the local directory listings. These seemingly menial listings, such as Yelp, Google My Business, Yellow Pages, among others, are integral to a local business’s well-rounded and high-performing SEO portfolio. Making sure these listings are accurately optimized is an imperative step to take to ensure you’re getting in front of the right local customers organically.
Make Sure Your Listings Are Claimed
Often, directory listings exist for your local business once you are open for business. These listings can be auto-generated and will have minimal, and sometimes inaccurate, information like an incorrect phone number or website URL. Claiming these profiles gives you the ability to update and manage your listings and is a simple process. On the listing itself, you can usually see a link that gives you the instructions for becoming the owner of the page. Go ahead and claim these listings so you can go in and add relevant, searchable information such as your business type, your phone number, your hours, photos, logos, and specials.
Ensure Your Listing Matches Your Website
When you’re setting up your profile on a directory, ensure the information mirrors your website. This is important because sometimes these directories will deactivate or restrict your listing if the information isn’t congruent to prevent fraud or identify theft. Do a quick audit to make sure your phone numbers, hours, branding, and website URLs are consistent.
Add Photos
Pique the interest of potential customers by showcasing important photos of the products and services you offer. Not only will this help capture the attention of customers who are looking for what you’re offering, but it will also be a major component in building brand awareness for your company. Great photos can also help you stand out from your competitors!
Ask for Reviews
Your directory listing can outrank competitors if you have a steady stream of positive reviews. It doesn’t stop there, though, because these platforms favor companies who are active and present by responding publicly to good and bad reviews.
Remember, search engines favor brands that are cohesive, consistent, and present across all of the platforms available to them. Spend some time this week auditing your profiles and claiming your listings so you can get in front of the right local buyers, build credibility, and outshine the competition!