If you are not already using online business directories as a part of your overall digital marketing strategy, then now is definitely the time to start. Super simple yet highly effective, you can start leveraging online business directories to boost your brand’s local SEO and authority in a mere matter of minutes.
Not sure where to start? Find out exactly how you can start using online business directories for your business below.
What are online business directories?
Online business directories are essentially an online version of the Yellow Pages. Each one contains an index of companies that are listed alphabetically by industry. These are also often linked to each business’s website. Designed to help searchers find local companies, products, or services, online business directories are also crucial to local search engine optimization.
What are the best online business directories?
There are lots of different online business directories, and if you want to gain maximum exposure, then you want to make sure your business is listed on as many as possible.
Some of the most popular online business directories are:
- Google Business Profile
- Yelp
- Merchant Circle
- Yahoo
- Foursquare City Guide
- YellowBook.com
- Apple Maps
- Bing
How to use online business directories to boost local SEO
There are many ways that you can use online business directories to boost your local SEO efforts and increase your website’s authority.
Our top tips for adding your local business to local search directories are as follows:
- Be consistent across the board
As mentioned briefly above, you want to add your business information to as many relevant online business directories as possible. However, for this strategy to be effective, you need to be consistent in your efforts, meaning you need to have the same information listed on each directory.
- Add all the relevant information
As a bare minimum, you need to make sure you include your business name, address, phone number, website address, and a short description of your business. It can also be beneficial to create a longer description of around 300 characters to provide searchers with more information, as well as adding pictures and videos which can help you to stand out from the competition.
- Avoid spam sites
There are spammy online business directories that can harm your business and hinder your local SEO efforts. As a general rule of thumb, if a site looks like spam, it most likely is. You can check a site’s domain authority using Moz; if it scores less than 20, it is probably spam.
- Check for errors
You need to make sure that there are no errors on any of your online business listings, as this can also hinder your efforts and showcase your business in a poor light. Although this can be time-consuming, it is necessary if you want to boost your local SEO efforts.
- Avoid creating duplicate listings
Duplicate listings as this can confuse both users and search engines. Make sure that you delete any old listings and remove any duplications.