Offline SEO: How to build authority beyond the digital space
Local SEO goes beyond your website. Learn how offline signals—reviews, citations, community presence, and word of mouth—boost visibility in search.
Topic: Business directory
New Bing Places for Business is live
A new interface, new URL, new commendations and more are now live in the updated Bing Places for Business.
6 Google Business Profile questions asked and answered
Get answers to common questions on GBP listing edits, suspensions, address updates, review management and finding support.
Google adds LGBTQ+ owned attribute to business profiles
These labels can help some businesses with visibility and potentially increase conversions.
Which local citation sources matter now?
An informal poll of local SEOs yields some answers -- and disagreements -- about spending time on citations.
Do local citations matter anymore? Five local SEOs sound off
A range of opinions about how much attention to devote to citations.
Just 4% of businesses ‘voice search ready,’ says analysis of nearly 75,000 companies
Are your local SEO and business listing data optimization efforts ready for voice search?
Google My Business rolls out feature for new businesses, updates local service area settings
Here are two changes that happened in local search over the weekend.
Yext integrates local business listings directly into Amazon Alexa
Name, address, phone and hours, with more to come.
Google may notify you when your local business listing goes live in Google Maps & Search
A new notification from Google My Business will tell businesses when their local listings go live.
Is “Facebook Professional Services” Facebook’s Stealth Project To Beat Yelp?
Unannounced desktop-only feature gives people the ability to find the highest-rated businesses in a given area.
Foursquare Joins Apple Maps Data Sources As Company Builds Out Ecosystem
Apple continues to improve its mapping product by adding new features and content, albeit often under the radar. Last year, reviews and content from Booking.com and TripAdvisor began to show for locations and travel destinations, especially outside the US. In June of this year, the company introduced public transit routing as part of iOS 9 […]
Bing Places Adds Several Agency-Friendly Local Business Listing Tools
Agency dashboard offers local listing management, sharing with clients, features for chain businesses and more.
Apple Maps Using New Partners For Multiple-Location Map Submissions
In October Apple launched Apple Maps Connect, intended to allow individual business owners to edit or add local business listings directly into Apple’s database. Apple told me at the time that it wasn’t intended for webmasters or outside agencies to manage multiple locations or listings on behalf of their clients. However I knew that would immediately arise as a question. Accordingly, local SEO Andrew Shotland […]
Apple Launches “Maps Connect” Self-Service Local Listings Portal
This afternoon, Apple notified us of a new self-service portal to add or edit local business listings: Apple Maps Connect. It’s intended for small business owners or their authorized representatives (though not agencies) to be able to quickly and easily add content directly into Apple Maps. The service is free and the listings (or corrected listings) appear […]
Google Adds Webmaster Tools Verification For Google My Business
Mike Blumenthal reports that you can now instantly verify your Google Local listings, formerly known as Google Place Listing and now known as Google My Business, through Google Webmaster Tools. Google’s Jade Wang announced this in the Google forums saying, “starting today, if you’re verifying a page for your business, you may be instantly verified […]
GetListed Tool Relaunches As Moz Local
Last year, David Mihm’s GetListed service was acquired by then SEO Moz (now Moz). Today, it relaunched as Moz Local. It’s a similar service with a number of enhanced capabilities, the most important of which is local listings submission. Agencies and business owners can use the tool to research where their listings appear online, manage […]
As Google Upgrades Google Maps Business Listings, Conflicts Happen Including Duplicate Listing Issues
Google has been automatically upgrading Google Place listings from the old system to the new Google Places dashboard. With this upgrade, there may be conflicts that prevents the upgrade from completing. The latest conflict is that there are duplicate listing issues and Google needs you to step in, fix the issue and then complete the […]
Google Places International Adds Over 1,000 New Categories For Business Listings
Google’s Business community manager, Jade Wang, announced in a Google discussion forum thread that they have vastly increased the number of business categories available to businesses outside of the United States. Jade said they now have added “over 1,000 new categories in the new Places dashboard” for businesses around the world. The new categories are […]
MapQuest Transfers Local Listings Management To Yext
Last October, MapQuest started outsourcing local business listings management to Yext. The “claim your MapQuest listings” page is hosted by Yext (I believe) with a co-branded look and feel. Yesterday, MapQuest notified business users that its local business center and basic local listings product would be formally shutting down. Here’s the text of the email that went out: […]
The Local Marketer’s Guide To Apple Maps for iOS7
While the launch of iOS7 has received a ton of press and blogger nitpicking about every last detail, little has been said about how the new version of Apple Maps affects local marketers. I feel like most marketers are still ignoring Apple Maps because it got a lot of Apple Maps Sucks-type press a year […]
Bing Relaunches Places For Business
Bing announced they have relaunched the Bing Business Portal under a new name, “Bing Places For Business.” The change doesn’t currently do much with your listings, outside of move the location of where you manage your business Bing Maps listing to bing.com/places. It also removes some features that were available in Bing Business Portal including: […]
How Google’s Lack Of (Re-)Consideration For Local Businesses Makes Life & Listings Difficult
For local business listings, ranking well in Google search results is highly important. So, many proprietors attempt all sorts of things to get their businesses to rank well, and they often unintentionally break Google’s rules in the process. Yet, there’s no real means to get forgiveness once their listing is burned. Confusion surrounding this further […]
Yext “Reinvents The Local Business Listing” With New Rich Content Options
Location data platform and provider Yext has introduced a range of new data types and rich content into its PowerListing local data syndication product. The new offering is called PowerListings+ (Like Google+). Enhanced local data categories enable the inclusion of employee/staff bios, event calendars, product inventory and services (including prices). Yext said that the new content […]
The Mysterious Relationship Between Bing Business Portal And Nokia Prime Place
People have strongly criticized Google for confusing local marketers by having two places to update and enhance local business information (Google Places, Google+ Local Pages). But there’s also something confusing about what Microsoft appears to be doing in local listings management. The company appeared to be trying to establish the Bing Business Portal as the definitive place […]
Bing Ties Yellow Pages Sites For Most Accurate Local Data
In April I wrote about a local data accuracy study preformed by a company called Implied Intelligence. The company offers data services to publishers and developers. In April the company found that yellow pages site Superpages bested Google Maps in terms of the accuracy and completeness of the local business/POI database. The following was the […]
Apple Maps Could Launch With More Business Listings Than Google
If the two companies’ self-reported numbers are accurate, and if nothing changes between now and then, Apple’s new Maps product will launch later this year with more local business listings than Google. As Bloomberg points out, during Apple’s announcement on Monday, the company said it has “ingested” more than 100 million business listings around the […]
Yellow Pages Sites Beat Google In Local Data Accuracy Test
In the brave new world of “SoLoMo” there are an increasing number of sites and mobile apps competing to help you choose a local business or lead you there. In addition to Google Maps, Yelp and Foursquare there are the venerable yellow pages’ sites and many others. They all get their local data from generally […]
UBL And Yext Join Forces To Offer More Complete Local Data Syndication
Several years ago Universal Business Listing sought to become the “one stop shop” for local business listings syndication. The dream was that small businesses and their surrogates could sign up in one place online and ensure their data were in all the right places across the internet. While that has not fully come to pass, […]
MapQuest Launches Local Business Listings Center
Local SEOs have another tool to add to the “citation belt,” as it were: MapQuest has announced its own Local Business Center, a place where local businesses can add and/or manage their listing(s) on MapQuest. As the video below shows, the MapQuest LBC functions very much like Google’s and Bing’s and offers many of the […]
Local Search: Fish Where The Other Fishermen Aren’t
Most businesses tend to focus on the big channels when it comes to local SEO efforts. While it makes sense to optimize your Google Place Page and pay attention to your presence on other big local search services (e.g. Bing Local, CityGrid, DexKnows, Insider pages, Local.com, Merchant circle, Superpages, Yahoo Local, Yellow book, Yelp, YP.com, […]
WhitePages.com Debuts Local Biz Search, Goes After Google
Not long ago WhitePages.com quietly introduced its own local business search. The site, the original “people search” engine, has always offered “yellow pages” listings but now the company has built its own database in the background. Accordingly, WhitePages claims its data are more accurate than you’ll find on search engines and Google in particular. The […]
Bing Outsources UK Local Business Listings
Bing is finally offering local business listings to UK-based small businesses, but in an odd arrangement, it’s outsourcing the data management to a third party — a company called 118 Information. Bing recently launched a site, www.bingforbusiness.com, that invites local UK businesses to add or edit their free business listings and touts the benefits of […]
The Problem Of Inconsistent SMB Contact Details – Part I
Have you ever thought twice about how to find the correct contact details for a local business – i.e., their name, address, phone number? The answer should be so simple: just Google it. Well, the reality is not that simple. In fact, few questions in the local online search world are as complicated as this […]
Can Search Marketing Generate Emails To Local Businesses?
Local businesses typically use search marketing to achieve two main objectives: getting customer calls and walk-ins. They do this by publishing their address and phone number in search engines and local directories so that an interested customer can take action one way or another – by walking into a restaurant or calling a plumber for […]
Google Ties Street View To Local Business Listings
If it sometimes seems that there’s no rhyme or reason to the various tools and products Google adds to its properties, this one will change your mind a bit: Google has (finally, some would say) brought together its local business listings with Street View inside of Google Maps. As the announcement explains, when looking for […]
You Don’t Own Your Own Business Details Anymore
Who owns your business details – your phone number, address, company name? As the owner of a business, do you have the right to choose where your details are listed online in search engines, directory sites, blogs, forums, social networks, and, do you have the right to force such sites to remove your details? What […]
SearchCap: The Day In Search, July 24, 2009
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Google AdWords To Add Addresses On Ads: Location Extensions The Google AdWords Blog announced they will be allowing advertisers to add the full address to their search ads through location extensions. […]
SMN Webcast Wednesday: Mastering Local Listings
Tomorrow, May 20 at 1 PM Eastern, Search Marketing Now presents: “Local Search Marketing: Local Listings GONE WILD!” with Michael Boland of the Kelsey Group and Bryan Simkins from FedEx. Local listings were once relatively easy—businesses targeted Yellow Pages and classified. Today, there’s a range of free online listings—from local search engines to city guides, […]
Is It Time To Send Google Maps Back To The Drawing Board?
Google Maps and its Local Business Center continue to be the ugly warts on Google’s otherwise smooth surface. But rather than the long-running problems with mapspam and hijacked listings, the latest sore spot appears to be an internal problem with Google’s apparently unsophisticated (or perhaps over-complicated?) database systems. Mike Blumenthal points out today that Google […]