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Local SEO Citations Are No Longer A Secret

Local search marketing experts have known for some time that traditional link building was on its way out. Mobile marketing and local SEO citations are ready to lead businesses and local search marketing experts to local internet marketing Valhalla, and it is no longer a secret.

With the rapid rise of mobile and a new generation of internet user and consumer, doing link building the same way it was done five years ago is not nearly as effective as it used to be. Creating a huge silo of backlinks was the main way to build up “link juice” and boost your site’s authority. Mobile data speeds continue to improve and smartphones have become as prevalent as water. The internet is literally at people’s fingertips no matter where they are.

NAP and Local SEO Citations

Local search marketing experts have been using a NAP in their clients’ Google+ local business listing to help deliver local traffic to their clients’ websites. NAP stands for Name, Address, and Phone. Maintaining a consistency of NAP throughout all of a client’s only entities and listings ties the entities and listings together for Google. Using NAP consistency and local SEO citations are key neo-link building strategies that will drive a business’s online success for the foreseeable future.

The Elements of a Local SEO Citation

The new approach to search marketing has focused on delivering a business’s products or services to their customers on any device, no matter where the customer is or what time of day it is. Delivering your products and services on demand is key to your success, as devices and users transform and grow. Here is “secret” local search marketing experts use and how to develop the necessary elements to utilize local SEO citations to dominate local search engine and local business listing optimization.

  1. 3 initial questions…
    • How do you get local citations?
    • Will the local SEO citations happen?
    • When should you expect the local citations?
  2. Collect and save your business name, full address, phone number, hours of operation, sales, coupons, discerning qualities, etc… for use, when the time presents itself.
  3. Use the website getlisted.org. GetListed.org features tools to help make claiming a business’s local listings on Google +Local, Bing Local, Yelp, and other prominent local search engines easier.
  4. Follow the instructions at GetListed.org.
  5. Pay attention and update the local business listings GetListed.org lists in red.

Use Your Local SEO Citation to Your Advantage

If you want to truly take advantage of the authority local SEO citations can generate, you should consider acquiring the services of local search marketing experts. Professionals can help you take advantage of services such as UBL and Surefire Social to help propel your NAP references into the best local internet neighborhoods. Utilizing local directories should be used in conjunction with social media, social bookmarking, and business directories.

Traditional link building strategies should not yet be completely neglected, as they still provide link juice and authority for your website. Link building strategies, such as blogs, press releases, article writing and marketing, forums, and PPC ads are still viable methods for gaining traffic and links. Do not, however, be set in your ways. Mobile marketing and local SEO citations are moving to the front of the line as the preferred methods of competing online and in search engines for the foreseeable future.

Written By

For nearly three decades, Chris Marentis, founder and CEO of Surefire Social, has been responsible for driving innovation and sales growth for large media and e-commerce brands as well as start-ups. With a long-history of counseling local businesses about their marketing efforts, Marentis provides insight on what it takes for small businesses to succeed and thrive in today’s evolving digital environment. His notable career includes creating the foundational blueprints for online marketing, e-commerce and content branding for AOL's Interactive Marketing group, where he served as Senior Vice President. While CEO of Clearspring Technologies, Marentis developed one of the most widely adopted venture-backed Web 2.0 technology platforms. Marentis is a frequent speaker at local digital marketing conferences and a contributor to SMB and technology-focused publications.

10 Comments

10 Comments

  1. candice michelle

    January 13, 2013 at 12:17 pm

    This is very informative and useful to, really SEO is a simple tool to implement as long as the content is unique and useful for the users

  2. James

    January 15, 2013 at 12:36 pm

    SEO is a vast technology, we have to try all possible ways to rank on a high position in search result query. Along with traditional ways, we have to up-to-date with latest SEO trends.

  3. Simon

    January 16, 2013 at 12:42 pm

    Hi Chris,

    A good post Chris. The understanding of citations has exploded across 2012, but all that’s really changed is the way we refer to local/regional directories, or anywhere we can record structured information for search engines.

    I think it’s also important to explain unstructured citations – places where you NAP occur without even providing a link – linkbuilding without links – yay!

  4. Santosh Kumar

    January 18, 2013 at 7:06 am

    SEO is not easy task that anyone can get success in ranking the site in good position. we do more seo algo for ranking of site.

  5. Frank

    January 19, 2013 at 10:11 pm

    It’s getting to the point that companies need to work on SEO just as hard as they do when developing their product.

  6. Miranda Harver

    January 30, 2013 at 10:16 am

    Now this is a good nudge to remind us that we can’t depend entirely on our old-school mode of link building. We really have to consider the saturation of all things mobile, too.

  7. Lee

    March 21, 2013 at 9:44 pm

    Hi
    Seo is changing so fast and I think that a lot of automated techniques have gone which in the long run may be a good thing as hopefully now the more you put in the more hopefully you will get out. Getting the right set up for mobile now being high up the priority list.

    Thanks lee

  8. jennifer richard

    May 14, 2013 at 1:55 pm

    SEO is always changing, Google update occurs time to time. continuous link building and submit right content on website is way to get keyword ranking in google.

  9. Jim Delgado

    June 3, 2013 at 5:59 am

    Citations are an essential component of the ranking algorithms of the major search engines. Businesses with more citations will probably rank greater than businesses with fewer citations.

  10. Adam

    June 18, 2013 at 7:23 pm

    The rise of Google Local searches will also have a massive effect on link building- Local or not. Developing a link building strategy that uses local and mobile for local businesses will be more important than national or international businesses

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