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Harness the Power of Citation Management for Local Search Success

/ local search, user experience / 2 Comments

Managed citations - there are dozens of sites that host business listings. One way or another, you need to manage those local listings.As a small business owner, citations management or local listings management can improve your online presence

Local listings are online platforms that list your business information.

Citation management, or local listings management, makes sure that this information is consistent and up-to-date across all online platforms.

Let’s explore the advantages of local listing management. That includes improving search engine rankings, increasing online visibility, attracting more customers, and building trust with potential clients. We’ll also provide practical tips on getting started with local listing management.

Effective local listing management can help you grow your business.

Main Benefits of Managed Citations

A successful strategy for managing local listings usually entails spreading precise and consistent business information across a wide variety of local search engines, directories, maps, mobile apps, and voice search platforms.

There are two ways to achieve this objective.  You can either do it yourself or use professional citation management services. In my opinion, delegating your citation management is usually the most practical option.

Want to see how you’re doing right now? Run a free scan of a subset of our network.

Citation management manages more than just your NAP.

NAP - name,address & phone - need to be consistent across all of your local listings and citations.Having your name, address, and phone number (your NAP) found widely and consistently across the web is essential for your SEO.

But remember that customers will look for things beyond your NAP, like business hours, online reviews, photos, services offered, and more.

Professional citation management generates robust information about you across all platforms.

Time- and labor-intensive

Manually managing citations is time-intensive and labor-intensive. We can help with that!Submitting significant amounts of business data to dozens of platforms and managing it can be impossibly exhausting of your time and attention.

But bad data out there in the wild can be very bad for your SEO, your visibility, and even your reputation.

Using high-quality citation management tools allows you to keep all data updated in one place so you only enter it once.

And you only need to update it in one place when things change. Keeping it in sync across the web is handled for you automatically.

Helping you reach the broadest possible audience

Enthusiasm is contagious.One significant advantage of our citation management service is the scores of places people can find reliable information about you.

To reach your customers across all types of platforms, you need an automated service. You can’t possibly manage all the listings we can create and support and still have time to run your business.

Managing citation changes

None of our businesses are stagnant. Things change. Addresses, services, holiday hours, and more need to be kept current everywhere.

With our citation management, you only need to worry about keeping one thing updated. We take care of the rest.

Maintain local listing NAP consistency

Bad data in business listings is damaging to you. First, to the impression it leaves with potential customers. Second with search engines, which need to trust that data to be willing to list you prominently.

We’ve seen accurate listings go bad with errant data from other sources. But our citation management alerts you to any potential changes and won’t let a change occur without your input.

Increased search visibility

Local three-pack example from a search for a local attorney. Showing up here is partially based on your local listings management.Your citations across the web are a critical factor determining whether you show up in the Local 3-Pack listings.

It’s true that proximity to the searcher is an important factor in whether you show up next to that map.  But your citations still exert a significant influence on that.

And while you can’t control where people are when they search for you, you can make sure your citations are helping you.

Can you manage your business listings yourself? Or do you need a managed citation service?

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Voice search is expanding

Citation management should make sure you're optimized for voice search. Our services make sure that's done right.People are using voice search more than ever, using the Google Assistant on Android phones and Apple’s Siri on iPhones, or Microsoft Cortana and Amazon Alexa.

According to UpCity, half of US consumers used voice search daily last year, including 58% of consumers aged 25-34.

Manually getting yourself accurately listed for these voice assistants can be a challenge without our citation management services. That’s because they’re not normal websites.  But we have connections to all of them right among our 80+ platforms.

GPS platforms are critical for brick-and-mortar businesses

GPS navigation works for you when the mapping app you use knows exactly where your business is.People are on the move.

When they’re out and about and are looking for your storefront, do you show up in their GPS platform?

They may be using Google Maps, Apple Maps, Bing Maps, MapQuest, Waze, TomTom, Navmii, in-dash navigation, and more.

Trying to make sure you’re listed in all of them and that they stay correct is tough without an automated solution. We can manage and oversee your GPS listings so customers can always find you easily.

Watch for reviews

Forbes finds that customers view businesses that take the time to address their concerns as being more trustworthy and reliable. That may be why businesses that answer or respond to online reviews convert 33% more searchers than those that don’t.

Make sure you know as soon as a customer reviews you online so you can respond promptly. Our citation management services alert you every time there's a new review ASAP.But how do you know when a new review shows up for you? You may monitor the big sources of reviews: Google, Facebook, Yelp. (Or you may not do that often.) But people review small businesses all over the place at sites like MerchantCircle, CitySearch, Trustpilot, DexKnows and many more.

With our citation management, the same connections that ensure your listings stay correct and consistent also monitor for reviews.

And whenever someone reviews you, we send you an email with a link so you can respond — promptly.

Manually checking for reviews at all these platforms is so difficult that I don’t know anyone who does it.  And when a bad review goes unnoticed and isn’t replied to, consumers assume the review is accurate.

Make your own informed choice

Do you have the bandwidth to manage all of this in-house?

Or does a managed citation service with automation make more sense?

Rank Magic manages citations for dozens of small businesses just like yours. If you’re unsure about it for your business, reach out for a free online demo of our citation management services.

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Your thoughts and opinions are welcome. Join the discussion in comments below.

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Top 10 Positive Google Ranking Factors

/ Google, keywords, links, page content, SEO practices, user experience, web design / Leave a Comment

What are SEO ranking factors?

The Google logo.Where you show up in Google search results is determined by an algorithm that evaluates many characteristics of your website.  Those characteristics, or ranking factors — both positive and negative — affect how visible you will be in search results.

Google’s ranking algorithm is reported to contain more than 200 SEO ranking factors, each with its own weight or level of importance.

Nobody knows all of the Google ranking factors, but experience gives us a really good sense of which are the most important.

Categories of Google ranking factors

There are three groups of ranking factors that are important to understand.

  • Technical ranking factors tend to be mostly managed by your web designer.  They have to do with your website’s level of performance and what I refer to as Google-friendliness.  These are typically site-wide factors rather than factors relating to individual pages on your site.
  • On-page ranking factors are typically controlled by you and relate directly to the content of your web pages and keyword optimization.
  • Off-page ranking factors are things you have somewhat less control over because they’re not on your website.  These typically relate to your authority or importance on the web, based largely on backlinks.

Here is what I considered to be the top 10 positive Google ranking factors today.  This list isn’t in any kind of priority order for a couple of reasons.  First, it would be pretentious to claim that I know which of these factors are more important than which others.  Secondly, good SEO is a function of many small techniques that support each other. No one of them is critically essential to good rankings — it’s the sum total of all of them that matters.

Technical ranking factors

Most important Technical ranking factors for Google results.

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Yoiur web site MUST be mobile friendly.1) Mobile-friendliness

Mobile phones now account for more than half of all searches done.  As a result, it’s essential that your website be mobile-friendly.  I typically recommend ensuring your website is “responsive” which means that its display varies depending upon the device connecting to your site.  That ensures that the same information is available regardless of the platform your visitor may be using.

2) Security (SSL and HTTPS)

Visitors may be frightened away if your website is not secure.Whether or not your website is secure is a ranking factor at Google.  Beyond that, many browsers will show a “Not Secure” warning in the address bar when someone arrives on your website.  Some website plug-ins actually display a warning page instead of the page on your site, encouraging people not to visit your site.  Many people mistake the “not secure” warning as meeting your website is dangerous or may load viruses on your computer.  The result is a certain portion of the people trying to visit your site abandoning it, costing you business.

To be secure you need to arrange to have an SSL certificate and your URL needs to begin with HTTPS instead of the insecure HTTP.

3) Page speed and Core Web Vitals

Page speed has to do with how quickly the page on your website loads on someone’s browser or phone.  It can significantly affect your search rankings and conversions.Google's core web vitals metrics are an important part of its evaluation of your Page Experience

Last summer, Google implemented a major algorithm change called the Page Experience update.  It outlines, among other things, Core Web Vitals: critical measurements of three essential components of website speed and usability.  Several months ahead of Google’s implementation of this, we offered 7 Steps to Prepare for Google’s Page Experience Factor.

On-page ranking factors

Most important on-page ranking factors for Google results

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4) Quality content and keyword relevance

High-quality content is essential.  It has a big effect on whether people stay to read it or bounce away (which Google sees as a negative ranking factor.   Readability is a critical part of quality content. Another is customer focus; it’s important to focus on what’s in it for your reader/customer. That means focusing on benefits to the customer rather than features of your product or service.

Keyword relevance is also essential here. Your page has to show search engines that it’s all about your target keywords. That means having your keywords and related words and phrases in your content enough to make sure Google easily understands what your page is all about.  But avoid keyword stuffing as that detracts from the quality of your content.

5) Headings and meta tags

Having keywords in headings and sub-headings gives them some extra weight with search engines and helps readers navigate your content efficiently. For that to happen, they need to be coded within heading tags to search engines can tell they’re headings.

Meta tags are in the HTML code that runs your site and they tell search engines about your page.While meta tags are not visible on the page, two items in the HTML code of your page are very important: the page title and the description tag.  The page title isn’t a heading on your page, but it acts as the headline for your listing in all search engines.  So it’s a critical place to include your keywords.  Google says keywords in your meta description tag don’t influence your ranking, but since this description often ends up in your search listings it has a direct impact on how likely a searcher is to click on your listing.

6) Image keyword optimization

Every image on your page provides two or three places to put your keyword phrases in front of the search engines without keyword stuffing your text content.

The image filename is most obvious. An image filename of img183572x6.jpg tells Google nothing. But one that’s got a keyword in it (like nj-real-estate-lawyer.jpg) can really help.

Alternate text is text describing the image for visually impaired visitors who have their computers read the page out loud. It’s a great place to show your keywords to Google.

And if an image acts as a clickable link to someplace else, a title attribute generates a little text box that pops up when the user hovers their mouse over the image. It’s meant to tell the user what’s at the other end of the link if they click it, and is another place you may be able to use a keyword.

7) URL structure

Your URL structure helps you in three ways.

  1. It improves the user experience of your listings in Google:
  2. Keywords in the URL can help your rankings.
    https://www.njexpungements.com/q1.php
    is not as good as
    https://www.njexpungements.com/expungement-eligibility
  3. Links can sometimes serve as their own clickable text of a link.
    Here’s an example from Moz:
    https://moz-static.moz.com/learn/seo/URLs-page/URLs-2_170315_124322.png?mtime=20170315125811

8) Schema code

Schema markup is a common short term for structured data, named after Schema.org, the website for structured data markup.  It’s sometimes called structured data markup and it tells the search engines exactly what kind of information is on your website.  It’s totally in the HTML code behind your website and doesn’t affect what visitors see on your site.  If you’re a local service area business, it can be especially helpful to identify your location and service area for local searches.

You can easily check out your own schema code in this schema code validator.  If it shows you don’t have schema code, it’s time to fix that.

Off-page ranking factors

Most important off-page ranking factors for Google

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9) Domain and Page Authority

This is a graph of the Domain Authority and Page Authority for one of our clients.Page and Domain Authority strongly impact your rankings.  These are metrics developed by the folks at Moz that attempt to predict how well a given website will show up in search results. It’s based largely on the number and quality of other websites that link to you and is designed to correlate with Google’s internal PageRank scoring.

10) Local prominence

Prominence is an important ranking factor for local search.Prominence refers to how widely across the web you’re listed with a correct and consistent NAP (name, address, phone).  It’s particularly important for small businesses to show up in local search results and in the Google Local 3-Pack.  These listings are often called citations and citation management deserves ongoing attention from small local businesses.  But don’t be misled by many of the common misconceptions about citations that are floating around.

Feel free to use our free tool to check on several dozen top citation sources to see how your own prominence looks.

Bottom Line

None of these are absolutely essential.  But none of them can be ignored either.  Where you rank is the result of all of these things (and more).  Just do your best with as many of these as you can.

How’s your experience been with these issues? What other factors do you think deserve to be included? Start a discussion below.

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If you’re struggling with your visibility and search rankings, odds are good that Rank Magic can fix that. Reach out to us.

 

 

 

 

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Should You Pay for Citation Management?

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Local business search rankings

Before exploring citation management, let’s see how it fits in to showing up on Google.

Where you show up in local search when someone searches locally for what you do or sell is a function of three main factors:

  1. Your overall SEO
  2. Proximity to the searcher
  3. Prominence

Much of the rest of my web site deals with overall SEO factors. And of course you have no control over where anyone is when they search. But prominence is something you can control by managing your online citations.

What are citations?

A citation is an online listing of your business on a platform like directories that publishes information on businesses and often online reviews. Here’s an example of a citation on Yelp, showing basic contact information plus other valuable material like business hours, reviews, images, and a call to action.

 

An online citation on Yelp.
Our own online citation on Yelp

The value of citations for establishing and growing your prominence is clearly explained by Google:

Prominence is also based on information that Google has about a business from across the web, like links, articles, and directories.

How much do citations really matter?

The folks at Moz conducted a study of 115,000 businesses to answer the question: Does listings management still matter for local SEO?

They tracked the results of maintaining listings on just the “big 4” platforms (Google, Apple, Facebook and Bing) compared to managing citations on these sources plus 10 or more directories. You can download the full white paper at the above link, but here are a few of the answers that question.

Improved visibility

Visibility as a function of increased number of local citations
Visibility as a function of increased number of citations

In this chart, Direct Search represents people who searched for a business by its name or address. Indirect Search represents searches for a product or service rather than for a specific business. Maps View represents searches on Google’s maps. And Search View represents the number of times a listing was encountered in the normal Google search.

A 91% increase in search views is certainly worth paying attention to.

Improved conversions

The impact of more citations on conversions
The impact of more citations on conversions

In this chart, were looking at not just the number of people who see a listing, but how many take an action moving them closer to buying. Clicking to initiate a phone call to a business didn’t increase by very much, only 13%. But clicking over to the company’s website to learn more nearly doubled. And clicking for directions to get to your business even more than doubled.

Should you pay for online citation management? Find out!

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How many local citations do I need?

Small business visibility as a function of the number of online citations
Small business visibility as a function of the number of online citations

This chart represents an attempt to identify the “sweet spot” in terms of how many local citations are best to have. I think it fails by not including more than 40 citations. That’s because we don’t know if the increase in visibility would improve even more with additional citations beyond 40. But certainly getting into the 31-40 range adds significant value compared to having fewer citations.

Why do you need citation management?

Isn’t it just enough to go out and get yourself listed in the top citation platforms?

Maybe not.

The folks at BrightLocal found that 85% of consumers found incorrect or incomplete information on business listings this year. Perhaps the worst example of that is that more than 80% went to a business only to find that it was closed despite their online citations indicating it was open. A full 63% said that incorrect listing information would prevent them from doing business with a store.

Online citations can change without your knowledge. Information about your business can change and you may neglect to reflect that in your citations. So is it enough to set up your citations and not worry about them moving forward? I don’t hink so.

Fair disclosure: I offer citation management services to small businesses, so it would be self-serving for me to insist that you need to hire someone (like, maybe, me) to do that for you. So instead, here’s how Moz answered that question.

How do your citations look?

With that said, if you’d like to check the status of your own online citations, there’s an easy way to do that right here. Just run a scan from the button below, enter your NAP data (name, address, phone) and see where you’re listed, where you’re not, and where your listings may be inconsistent.

Run a free scan

If you think your local citations need help, reach out to me for a quick conversation.

What are your thoughts about citation management? Do you agree? Disagree? Have questions? Let us know in the Comments section below.
If you think others can benefit from this information, please share it with the buttons on the left or the Click To Tweet above.

 

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7 Reasons Citation Management Is Important for Small Businesses

/ directories, local search, SEO practices / Leave a Comment

Citation management is an important part of the local SEO services we offer to small businesses. There are several reasons every small business needs to pay attention to this.

7 benefits of good citation management

Broad Exposure

Online business listings
How widely are you known across the Internet?

You need to make sure you’re listed and easy to find across the web at dozens of local search engines, directories, maps, mobile apps, and voice assistants like Alexa. This also helps Google, Yahoo & Bing to have more trust in who you are, what you do, and where you are.

Accuracy and Consistency

It can make sure your NAP (name address, phone) is consistent across all of those listings. Before working with us, a recent client was missing from more than a third of the top citation listings. Even worse, two listings had an incorrect address and 14 had their old company name. When this happens, Google has very low confidence in who or where you are. And that’s devastating to your chances of showing up in local searches.

Visible Reviews

Make it easy for delighted customers to review you.
Having reviews on multiple sites builds your reputation.

Having review stars show up in multiple places enhances your reputation. When you get a word-of-mouth referral, odds are that person will look you up by name before they call, just to check you out. When they do, your website should show up — but so will many of your citations, at places like Google My Business, Yelp, MerchantCircle, Facebook, and more. Some may show up that you’ve never heard of, like Clutch or TrustPilot. If all of those have review stars displaying in the search results, that increases the likelihood that person will want to do business with you.

Review Monitoring

We send our clients an email every time someone posts a new review for them. Responding to reviews promptly has been found to increase conversions and closed business. So it’s important to know about new reviews as they happen.

Suppressing duplicate listings helps search engines trust which is correct.
Suppressing duplicate listings helps search engines trust which is correct.

Duplicate Listing Monitoring

Duplicate and near-duplicate listings can confuse search engines, and that’s never a good thing. We alert our clients whenever we find a possible duplicate so they can check it out and suppress it if necessary.

Robust Business Information

Good citation management doesn’t just start with getting your NAP widely disseminated. All of those citation sources gather and reflect lots of information about your business:

  • Website and email links
  • Description of your business and services
  • Social media links
  • Business hours including special holiday hours
  • Accessibility information
  • Your logo and photos
  • much more
7 Reasons Citation Management is Important for Your Small Business

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Inclusion in Verticals

Google is getting better and better at responding to what’s called vertical search. Proper citation management will promulgate information that can help you show up when people search for specific things like

  • Wheelchair accessible dentist near me
  • Local restaurant with lasagna
  • Woman-led wellness coach
  • Veteran-led SEO company
  • etc.
Focus your info for search engines with structured data markup.
Structured data markup focuses Google on your essential information.

A Bonus

An added bonus to our citation management here at Rank Magic is schema code. That’s structured data markup in accordance with schema.org and it’s very helpful in terms of ranking highly in Google, Yahoo & Bing. We collect and maintain a lot of information about your business for your citations. That allows us to provide a simple script to add structured code to your website with a simple copy & paste.

How good is your citation management?

It’s easy to check! Just run a free scan to see whether your show up in about five dozen places across the web. And where you do show up, the scan will show your NAP and highlight any errors or inconsistencies. It will either give you peace of mind or demonstrate how badly you need citation management.

Run a free scan

Reach out if you’d like us to help put this into perspective for you.

Agree? Disagree? Have questions? Let us know in the Comments section below.

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Are Your Business Listings Sabotaging You?

/ directories, links / Leave a Comment

Many small business owners pay little or no attention to their business listings across the web. That can be a big mistake.

BrightLocal Conducted an in-depth look at the impact of business listings

Among their conclusions are some startling ones:

94% of consumers have used a business information site ro find information about a local business in the last 12 months.

Online business listings

The most commonly used sources of business information are

  • Google
  • Facebook
  • Yelp
  • Instagram
  • Apple Siri

BrightLocal found that finding incorrect information on a business listing would stop 63% of consumers from using that business.

Incorrect business listing information causes customers to lose trust in the business to different degrees:

  • phone number – 66%
  • address – 60%
  • business name – 49%
  • opening hours – 40%
  • email address – 46%
  • photos – 45%

85% of consumers found incorrect or incomplete information on a business listing in the last year.

77% found conflicting information for the same business on different business listing sites.

In the last 12 months, 81% of consumers visited a business that said online it was open, but that was actually closed due to the pandemic.

Find the full report on business listings here.

Are your business listings sabotaging you?

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Business listings can hurt you several ways

Here are some of the more common ways your business listings can hurt you.

You’re missing

If someone is looking for what you do or sell in a search engine, directory, map, or mobile app and you’re not there – clearly they can’t find you.

You’re a local business and your address is wrong

Nothing is more frustrating for customers than showing up at a business and finding that it’s not there.

Your phone number is wrong

Equally frustrating is when there’s a wrong phone number in your listing and customers can’t get through to place an order or ask a question.

Your listing got changed

You may have carefully corrected your online listing only to find that it’s since changed and now is incorrect. Listings can be changed without your knowledge or approval and those changes can sometimes hurt.

Your business hours are listed incorrectly

You don’t want someone showing up at your business or calling you only to find that you’re not open when the listings said you were. If your hours are changed due to the pandemic or holidays — or for any other reason — you need to make sure they’re listed properly across all of your listings.

Vigilance!

You need to pay at least a modicum of attention to this, reviewing your business listings occasionally.

There are citation management products like Yext PowerListings that can solve a number of these problems, including locking your listings so that you’re the only one who can change them. These products typically come with a monthly fee but are often worth it by saving you manually managing all of your listings on an ongoing basis.

Business listing management products don’t typically cover niche directories, though. There are a number of different directories for attorneys, for example, or for people in the building trades, and typically you need to manage those manually.

COVIS - make sure people know your coronavirus practices.COVID

As long as the pandemic continues, some customers will be looking for reassurance that you have appropriate pandemic protocols in place.

BrightLocal found that 74% of consumers searched for a business listing to see what COVID-19 measures were in place. Make sure you identify that in any of your business listings that allow it.

The most important of these places is Google My Business.

  • Log into your Google My Business dashboard.
  • In the left-hand column, scroll down to the section headed From the business. In this section you can add attributes of your business in five categories: from the business, accessibility, amenities, health & safety, and service options.
  • The first section is where you can identify whether your company is black-owned, Latino-owned, veteran-led, or women-led. Be sure to check of any that apply.
  • And in the following section on Amenities you can indicate whether you have a gender-neutral restroom.
  • Health and safety is where you can indicate what COVID-related protocols are in place. This is particularly important right now as many customers are sensitive to possible exposure and if you haven’t updated your Google My Business information since before the pandemic, these were not available the last time you were here.
  • The last section is Service options where you can indicate whether you offer on-site services and/or online appointments.
  • In the next section, accessibility, you can indicate whether your premises are wheelchair friendly.

If you just want to update your COVID protocols, you can do that right in the Home section of your Google My Business dashboard:

Stay Connected on Google My Business during COVID-19

Help Your Customers

A good rule of thumb is to always make it easy for customers to buy from you. You need to also make it easy for them to learn what they need to know about you to help them get to the point of buying. Make sure you’re listed widely and consistently across the web, but perhaps most important is thoroughly and accurately.

Your experience and perspective is valuable. Please share your thoughts in the comments below.

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