What is Local Citation in SEO 2020

What is a Local Citation?

A local Citation (also called an online directory list or business listing) is an online mention of the name, address, and telephone number of a local business. The citation can take place in local business directories, on websites and apps as well as on social platforms. Citation helps internet users discover local businesses and can also affect local search engine rankings. Local businesses can actively manage many citations to ensure data accuracy.

Types of Citations 

Citations can be divided into two categories

1. Structured
2. Unstructured

Structured Citation

A structured citation is your business information (NAP) in a business directory. When you see lists of citation sites, it's almost always business listings where you can submit your business and get a quote. Sample pages for structured citation are:

Howl

Yellow Pages

Facebook

Superpages

MapQuest

Etc.

Here is an example of a structured citation for a restaurant on Yelp:

Unstructured Citation

Generally, an unstructured citation is your business information (NAP) on another website that is not specifically a business directory. Common examples of unstructured quotes are blogs, magazine / newspaper pages, wikis, etc.

Here's an example of unstructured citation on freelocalclassifiedads:

Why Citation Is Important For Local Search Rankings

Verification and trust

citation helps search engines like Google and Bing to check if your business exists. If several credible sources have the same exact information about your company, this signals search engines that your company is legitimate.

By listing your business on the major national and local websites, your company can build authority, build trust, and improve your company's ability to rank in local search results.

Importance

The local ranking algorithms used by Google and Bing take citations into account when it comes to local search rankings. In the latest survey on ranking factors for local search, experts for local search rated dating-related factors as approximately 13.31% of the 50 most important factors.

Ranking factors for local search, 2020

The more places your business information appears online, the more popular your business will be on Google. It makes sense. When search engine algorithms see your company mentioned on hundreds of websites compared to the competition, which includes just a few dozen, it can make it look like a more popular company and give you a ranking boost.

Why is it important to keep my citations up to date?

Inaccurate or inconsistent data on citation sites will damage your SEO and rankings

You may have already noticed that we mentioned that precise quotes can help your ranking. Well, the opposite is true if you don't keep them up to date. Search engines search these websites regularly to get an accurate picture of your business. So if you find that the individual names and addresses are inconsistent, it will be difficult for you to know how trustworthy your company is when it comes to deciding where to display it. their websites on SERPs.

As a result, only the companies with the most precise and consistent quotes rank well in the search. If you are a business with a location, it is easy enough to update your citations every time a location, name or contact number changes. However, larger brands with multiple locations have a larger order in hand when changes are required.

How can I create local citations for my Business?

Well, we covered the "what" and the "why", so let's go to the "how". There are three approaches to practicing local citation SEO, each with its own strengths and weaknesses:

Manual citation submission - someone manually enters data into the business listing website. With this approach, you can better reach some of the niche directories, and it also has the added benefit of a human eye, which results in fewer submission errors. The downside is that it can take a long time if you want to do it yourself.

Automated citation submission - As the name suggests, this approach uses a citation creation system to automatically fill out submission forms on citation websites. In contrast to manual submissions, this unfortunately often leads to errors, and automated systems are not as extensive as with manual creation of citations.

Submission of data aggregators - This is a much more accurate way to automatically create quotes about important websites and directories of online business listings. There are four main data aggregators in the United States: Neustar Localeze, InfoUSA, Foursquare, and Factual. Each of these methods has a widely used automated process for sending citations to your trusted partners.

Just send your data once and the aggregator will send it to all major dating sites. With this approach, however, you won't get all the citation sites you need. So it's best to start data aggregation before proceeding to manual submission on more specialized sites.

We are share top local citation sites you need to be listed on which are improve local business.

1. Google My Business
2. Bing Places
3. Apple Maps
4. ExpressUpdate
5. Acxiom
6. Factual
7. LocalEze
8. D&B
9. Facebook
10. Yelp
11. Yellowpages
12. Yahoo Local
13. Superpages
14. Foursquare
15. MapQuest
16. Manta
17. Local.com
18. ForLocations
19. GetFave
20. 2FindLocal
21. Nokia Here
22. Yasabe
23. Angieslist
24. salespider
25. Opendi
26. MyLocally
27. MyHuckleberry
28. iBegio
29. n49
30. Thumbtack
31. MyWebYellow
32. B2BYellowPages
33. BizVotes
34. Tuugo
35. Kudzu
36. Yellowbook
37. citysearch
38. chamberofCommerce
39. Merchantcircle
40. ShowMeLocal
41. BOTW
42. LocalStack
43. HotFog
44. BrownBook
45. Cyle-USA
46. InsiderPages
47. EZLocal
48. Tupalo