Directories
The purpose of a directory listing is very simple, but the impact on local SEO can’t be overstated.
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A typical business directory listing includes your company’s name, address, phone number, hours of operation, website, social media accounts, a short description of what the company does, photos, and a listing of products and services sold. Online directories abound, and most of them are free.
Unlike those old, archaic telephone books, online directories are more than just a tool for a customer to find your phone number. These platforms provide perks such as advanced filter options, boosts in SEO, and a higher Google ranking, your company’s brand awareness, and visibility will improve significantly.
Google, Bing, Yahoo, Yelp, LinkedIn, and YP.com are just a few of the most popular directories for your business. But there are thousands of them out there. Listing your business in online directories is one of the quickest, easiest, and most effective ways to get your services in front of qualified potential customers.
To optimize the potential of directory listings in your local SEO campaign, you need to be making the effort to regularly check your listings for accurate information. This includes directories that you know your business is listed on, along with a search to find the entries you might not be aware of.
This is especially important every time there’s a change of information for your business. This includes a new location, phone number, email, website, hours, or even a change in services like a seasonal menu. You want your customers to have accurate information, wherever they are when they find you.
Taking the time to check for accuracies means more customers landing at your doorstep, and there’s nothing better for your business.
Key things commonly found in directories that are essential for your ranking are consistency and ratings and reviews. Customers want consistent information. When Google looks at your directory listings, if inconsistencies are noted, it’s going to lend an air of untrustworthiness to your business. This counts as a Google strike against you. Your customers want to see all of your ratings and reviews, including the good, mediocre, and the bad. Honest reviews found in directories are important. Purchased reviews can hurt your image more than a few negative ones. Work on building up your reviews through customer engagement instead.
It’s time for your business to get noticed. A presence in business directories is an important component of a strong local SEO strategy.
Backlinks
Backlinks are incoming hyperlinks from one web page to another website. They are especially valuable for SEO because they represent a "vote of confidence" from one site to another. Also known as “inbound” or “incoming” links are simply links that point to your website from another website.
In essence, backlinks to your website are a signal to search engines that others vouch for your content. If many sites link to the same webpage or website, search engines can infer that content is worth linking to, and therefore also worth surfacing on a SERP (search engine results page). So, earning these backlinks can have a positive effect on a site's ranking position or search visibility.
Earning backlinks is an essential component of off-site SEO. The process of obtaining these links is known as link earning or link building. Some backlinks are inherently more valuable than others. You want links from high-ranking pages as opposed to low-ranking sites. Listing your business with popular directories is one way to earn high-quality backlinks.
High-quality links on sites can also drive targeted traffic to your website around the clock. A single link on a popular website can continue to push traffic to your website for years. The main focus of a link-building campaign will always be to improve the organic position of a website, but driving quality, highly-targeted traffic to your site is another huge benefit.
Backlinks can be time-consuming to earn. New sites or those expanding their keyword footprint may find it difficult to know where to start when it comes to link building. We can help uncover these links so you can target those domains in your own link-building campaigns.
Backlinks are one of the most important elements of the SEO equation. Don’t forget to factor them in when looking to boost your ranking and increase your prominence.
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