Local Citations

Some online directories are industry-specific while others are more generic. Building citations on authoritative industry-specific directories can help pass more value to our business. For generic online directories, take the time to choose the correct category for our business.

Here are some places we can build structured citations for our business:

• Data Aggregators, such as Express Update and Factual.

• Local business directories, such as Yelp, and Hotfrog.

• Industry-specific directories. We can find these by searching [industry] directory in Google. TripAdvisor.com, for example, is a popular directory and review site for hotels and other hospitality-related services.

• Social platforms, such as Facebook.

Unstructured citations

Unstructured citations are mentions of our business data on websites other than the ones specifically designed for displaying business listings. These types of citations can appear on online newspapers, local blogs, or any other website that’s not a directory. Unstructured citations display our complete or partial business information, and it is typically not grouped together in a structured format, as was the case with structured citations.

Though unstructured citations are less formal as compared to structured citations, it’s still very valuable to our site’s local SEO. Mentions of our business on authority sources help build trust in the eyes of search engines and users. At the same time, if the citation also includes a link to our website, it gives us the added advantage of an inbound link.

Acquire unstructured citations from authoritative, relevant websites to help build brand awareness and brand trust in the audience. For example, if we run a business of dog grooming, a citation from a local blog on pet services would be more valuable to our business than a mention in a gardening blog.

To find local blogs in our niche, we can type a query similar to the following in Google:

[Location] [industry] blog

How to submit citations

Manual submission

We can find citation sources and submit citations manually. Go to each citation source and search for our business name. Many aggregator sites pull listings from other sources, which makes it possible that our business may already be on a site even if we didn’t add it ourselves.

If our business is already listed in the directory, check to see if all the information is correct. If the information is not correct or up-to-date, there’s typically an option to claim the listing. Once we claim the business as our own, we’ll be allowed to make changes to the data or add more information. Make sure the data is the same as that we have added to Google My Business and other directors. If a listing doesn’t exist, add a new one.

Automated submission

Manually submitting citations to a bunch of websites can be a monotonous task. There are tools available to automate the process. Yext and BrightLocal are some of the popular companies that offer tools to submit and manage our listings across the most important directories. We can use the tool to check if our business listing exists in these directories and if the information on the listing is correct. Using these tools, we can build and maintain citations from a single hub.

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