Unable to build google local listings, are citations still useful?
-
Hello
Google seems to be unhappy about letting us build google local profiles around our 'virtual locations, for each of which we have a dedicated page. We have approximately 100 'virtual locations' with addresses. I was wondering if, despite not being able to build google local profiles, it would still be worth it to build yahoo, bing, and utilize citation building services to each of those virtual locations. Would these citations in any way help bing or yahoo rank higher locally? Would the locally optimized city page rank higher as a result of all these citations?
This is a service-industry based website btw.
-
Hi Ilya,
No, there is not a backdoor way that I could advise. Google+ Local is all about local businesses and that does not fit your business model.
Regarding citations:
A citation is typically defined as any mention of your company name with full or partial contact information (address, phone number). It does not need to contain a link to your business. If it does contain a link, this would obviously help your business, overall, in the organic SERPs. If it is a non-linked citation, I suppose that might increase the prominence of your overall business, in that it would appear that lots of sites are talking about your company, but as you don't have physical offices, you would presumably be promoting places that don't really exist. In my view, that doesn't make sense.
Regarding creating profiles at Yahoo & Bing:
Yahoo's Local Listings Guidelines are here:
http://help.yahoo.com/l/us/yahoo/ysm/ll/guidelines/local-01.html
These guidelines state:
Provide accurate contact information. You must provide an accurate business address (including a valid street address) and phone number.
I cannot turn up Bing's guidelines for some reason, though their FAQ is here: http://www.bing.com/businessportal
While I cannot find them, I am pretty confident that their policy is similar to Google's and Yahoo's, in that they want physical businesses, not virtual ones, in their Business Portal.
Regarding How Google Can Tell You're Virtual:
I imagine they have a variety of strategies. One I've heard discussed is that they can tell via streetview, if something looks fishy to them. Another would be what you are saying about your company on your website, and what others are saying about you. If your business model is clearly virtual, chances of fooling Google are slim to none.
So, I'm afraid this isn't the answer you're hoping to hear, Ilya, but my advice would be to work on your organic SEO rather than trying to fit your virtual business into the Local box, because it's just not the right platform for what your company offers.
-
How would they tell if its a virtual location or not? I understand that they don't 'trust' us enough to let us have 20-30 locations activated even with phone activation, but can we get on google plus the back door way? by having 30-100 citations that all have the same name/address/phone number/etc and having google index them and think that they are missing these entries?
-
As Google has stated in their guidelines, they are not supportive of people having virtual locations or using PO Boxes for their local listings.I'm going to have our local expert chime in with more information as it related to Bing and Yahoo, and if they are at all moving in the same direction as Google.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
How long does it take Google to remove links after using disavow tool?
Hi guys, So we're currently in the process of removing some of the less useful and more suspect links from our profile, and used the Google disavow tool to do so. We uploaded the .txt file to the search console on 7th July this year, 2 months ago now, and according to our most recent site crawl, the suspect links are still showing up on our link profile. Do we have any idea how long this is roughly supposed to take? The ideas I've found online are conflicting - anything from 3-4 weeks to 6-9 months. Which is it? Is there any way of fast-tracking this process? Thanks!
Link Building | | rawdog0 -
Paginated List Links
In a rel=prev rel=next set of paginated pages. Is there a benefit to have prev and next links in addition to the numbered links on the page. Or will the numbered links suffice? Any help would be most welcome.
Link Building | | Andrew-SEO0 -
Should I build internal links to my homepage?
Ive done a lot of internal linking before but its always been for other inner pages but now I need to do it for a websites homepage but this got me thinking if its even worth doing and should I be doing it at all? For the first question I was thinking that surely the homepage has more authority than any of my inner pages so how would internal links from inner pages help and for the second question Ive read a few posts like this Kissmetrics one here where it says you shouldnt do it. There are two types of links you should avoid using in your content: Homepage. Most sites have too many links to the homepage as it is. You would rather strengthen internal pages to boost the overall SEO of your site, rather than simply point more links at the homepage. https://blog.kissmetrics.com/commandments-of-internal-linking/ thoughts?
Link Building | | linklander0 -
Does Google index a content in iframe?
Hello guys, I´ve done a infografic and i want to share it with some bloggers. But, i want to share an iframe, not an image (beacuse there is some links on it). My question: Can Google consider the links inside an iframe (for link building)? Thank you 🙂
Link Building | | seomobly0 -
Value of Link Redirect from Google News
Some sites are linking to us with the URL from Google News instead of using a direct link. For example: "http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t&fd=R&usg=ghjgjhggjhgkjghjg&url=http://www.oursite.com/awesome-news-010123/" Does this pass the same value as a normal link? I asked the publisher to replace the link with a normal link but they pushed back saying that the news URL is better.
Link Building | | ProjectLabs0 -
Outsource Link Building?
Currently we are in the process of creating a new ecommerce website. The site is not live yet, but we have done all of the planning and brainstorming and now are just doing all of the dirty work to get things ready to go live. We are devoting a lot of time on merchandising and developing the site, but currently do not have the resources to put together a good link building campaign in house. Does anyone have any recommendations for outsourcing the link building? The last thing we want is to hire someone that submits to bad neighborhoods and only directories. Is there a good, better, best scenario we should be looking at for pricing, ect? Obviously, like most who are starting a new site, cost is an issue at least until the site gives some sort of sign of life. Also, we are in the Pittsburgh area. We don't need to go local with this, but if there is someone particularly good in the area it would be nice. Thanks in advance.
Link Building | | ClaytonKendall0 -
Link building
Folks would you recommend i build a link on this site for $30... http://www.web-directory-australia.info please let me know detailed reasons as to your recommendation as I'm a new SEO and learning as much as I can 🙂
Link Building | | PHDAustralia680 -
Doing Local Directories for Online Stores?
I am working with some customers on SEO and wonder what to do about directories when they have an online store only. They do not want to list their home address (if they did would this be a good idea?). I know the big push now is for local directories so I'm wondering if anyone has tips for other types of directories to get into that aren't spammy. Or tips for doing SEO for sites that are online only? I know Rand talked a lot about the importance of being "real" with an about us page, contact us, etc. on his Future of Link Building Webinar and I'm wondering how to best make that work in this situation when they can't show themselves as real by being in local directories.
Link Building | | hwade0