How To Get Listed in Local Search Engines &
Internet Yellow Pages
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The first step to getting your business listed in Local
Search is (surprise) to buy a listing in the offline Yellow
Pages (yep, that cheesy doorstop-to-be we
just dis'd) . Here's why:
Most search engines get the bulk of their local business
listings from just two companies:
- InfoUSA
- Acxiom
...or else from Internet Yellow Pages sites which also
derive their listings from these two companies. Both
have compiled enormous databases containing detailed
information on most of the businesses and consumer households
in the US and Canada. And much of their data is pulled
from your basic Yellow Page and Business White
Page directories (aka, the cheesy doorstops) .
The good news may be that your business already has
a listing in your local Yellow Pages - if not, then
you should get one! Don't worry about taking out
a big colorful ad with lots of information about
your company. We haven't any reason to believe that
expensive ads offer any advantage in local search
rankings. Nor does lots of business information
in your Yellow Pages ad seem
to enhance your local search listing's comprehensiveness. It appears to
us that any Yellow Pages listing at all will
get you included in most local search engines just
fine.
Top Internet Yellow Pages
You can improve your chances of getting listed with
the major local search engines by making sure your
site is listed in the top Internet Yellow Pages.
The table on the right provides a list of top Internet
Yellow Pages (IYP) in roughly their
order of importance. Most of these IYPs provide a
free business submission process. In addition
to getting listed, it's also important that your
business information remains consistent throughout
all of the IYP sites. Information consistency across
IYP sites is crucial to the process of getting your
business listed quickly and accurately in the major
local search engines.
Yahoo Yellow Pages, AOL Yellow Pages, MSN Yellow
Pages, SwitchBoard.com, and YellowPages.com are all
used nationally, so you can submit to these sites without
worrying too much about regional targeting. SuperPages.com
has also become much more of a national Internet Yellow
Pages.
A good place to start is by filling
out the free business profile at SuperPages.com.
Follow that up by placing a paid listing with YellowPages.com.
Then pursue listings with two or three other IYPs.
Since nearly all local search engines take their results
from Internet Yellow Pages, these steps will greatly
improve your chances of getting listed with and ranking
well in all of the major local search engines. From
there it's just a matter of keeping your listing accurate
and up-to-date with these IYPs. Doing so will help
to ensure that the major local search players have
your latest info, and that there's no conflict between
the information they're pulling from the various IYPs.
Don't worry about purchasing an expensive listing
in the IYPs. Just buy the cheapest one available, such
as YellowPages.com's Basic
Business Card (currently $12 per month) . This
will be enough to make sure your site is picked up
and ranked well by all the major local search engines.
Of course, the more expensive listings won't hurt your
site, and they do allow you more control over the way
your business appears on that IYP site. If your marketing
budget is fat, then you might consider purchasing a
more full-featured listing. Just remember that the
pricier listings are really not a critical part of
a local search optimization strategy. To start with,
just be sure you at least have the basic listing.
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This article is copyrighted
and has been reprinted with permission from FirstPlace
Software, the makers of WebPosition
Gold. FirstPlace
Software helped define the SEO industry with the
introduction of the first product to track your
rankings on the major search engines and to help
you improve those rankings. A free
trial of WebPosition Gold is
available from their Web site.
