How important is citations for an online business?
-
If you run an online business, just how important is citation building? Our client does not want to disclose her physical home address from where she operates and the campaign does not consist of any local keywords.
Should we then focus on link building and growing the site's DA instead? As well as getting onpage elements optimised.
Many thanks in advance for your input!
-
hi, having alot of quality business citations, is important, make sure all of the NAP information matches, this is how we got a Bristol summerhouse company onto page one/
-
Thanks, everyone, for your responses. They are very helpful and much appreciated!!
Cheers.
-
Hi Gavo,
Citations are critical infrastructure for local businesses, but in order to qualify for them and for them to be useful, the business must:
-
Have a physical address, even if they are only going to list themselves on directories that allow the address to be hidden
-
Serve local consumers face-to-face
If your client doesn't serve clients face-to-face (which I'm wondering about as you mention her marketing doesn't include local keywords), then, no, citation building isn't appropriate. But if she meets both of the above criteria, then she should be marketing locally and building citations. And, she should also be building DA, as DA directly impacts local rankings.
-
-
That's right, Donna. Good answer.
-
I agree with Alick,
That's not to say you shouldn't set up a Google My Business listing as well as a few others where you can hide your client's address. Those things lend to the credibility of your business and are factored into your domain authority as well. Just don't focus on citation building. Your plan is a good one.
-
Hi Gavo,
Citation is really important for local SEO but your case is different because your client doesn't want to disclose physical address so you have to focus on other things e.g 1>Quality backlinks 2>Perfect on page optimisation
also read this article on citation @ https://moz.com/learn/local/citations
Thanks
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 to rank in Google against a business with the same name?
My client has a coworking space in London, but shares its name with a recruitment company also in London. When searching for my client's brand name, they don't appear anywhere on the first page as this recruitment company dominates. How can I rank prominently for my brand term if there is someone else in these top spots who isn't a direct competitor (in the typical sense)? Thank you!
Local SEO | | WhitewallGlasgow0 -
Considering Switching Domain from .ca to .com for Service Area Business - What is the Risk / Reward?
Hello, Thank you to anyone who takes the time to share their thoughts on this. I will preface this by saying that I am very new to the community and have lots to learn, so please forgive any obvious errors on my part. That having been said am very happy to receive positive criticism and feedback 🙂 Quick Background: We are a high end mobile wellness business based in Toronto Canada offering in home/office servicing including: yoga, pilates, nutrition, meditation, chiropractors, etc... As we are expanding we are transitioning form new leads coming from business partners and word of mouth to driving new business online As such we have an new Squarespace site (which is the first site I ever built, so any feedback is welcome) and are venturing into social media, SEO, local citations etc... for the first time We have a significant content catalogue originally for client and instructor education that we are now repurposing for this new digital adventure but have not yet deployed While currently focused in Torotno, we have plans to expand to several other countries in the next two years. As the site is quite new and we have little content or incoming links I was thinking now is the time to switch to .com from .ca before we roll out Website: www.anahana.ca Risk Reward? & Other Issues? Both domains are currently verified with Squarespace, and it seems easy enough to switch. What could blow up by making this switch which I might not be aware of? Our emails and business card use the .ca, but I don't think this would matter too much 6-12 months out... is there something else I might be missing on this? .com and using subfolders or subdomains as opposed to country specific TLDs ? This is something I am still working on understanding, but from what I have learned thus far, if we are going to progressively roll out a large content library, is it not better from an SEO standpoint to have this all in one domain? Local SEO and legal considerations for TLDs when operating local Service Area Businesses. I am sure there are many other angles here that I am missing and am not really looking for any hard answer on much of this, but any general advice, suggested resources, and experienced insights would be extremely helpful. Thanks so much, cj
Local SEO | | CJ7770 -
Local SEO in business acquisition context
Hi everyone, I have a client who just acquired 4 business. Basically, the 4 compagnies will stop existing and my client will integrate the production at his own adress under his compagny name. My issue here is that my client wants to know what is the best solution for his local results. The 4 compagnies still have a website that present the new business name will a CTA redirecting to the new website. Their GMB account are still active. I was about to delete the 4 GMB accounts so when a customer do a brand research, the organic result will show the old business website that will present the new business with a CTA on the website. My thinking is that since the old and the new compagny will compete on the same keyword since they are in the same industry, I don't want the old compagny to be in competition with the compagny of my clients. Is there a better solution that could benefit the local SEO ? Thanks y'all !
Local SEO | | alexrbrg1 -
Importance of backlinks from legal indexes such as avvo for lawyers
I have a client who is a general practice Lawyer. This particular client refuses to acquire free profiles from legal sites such as AVVO, Super Lawyers, and Justia. I have been working with this client for a year and have had a tough time getting him to rank in an ultra competitive marketplace. The other law clients I handle have all secured these backlinks and traffic is produced, domain and page authority is much higher. My client say that he has heard from other lawyers that sites like AVVO produce bad or little results, so he wants no part of them. I feel these lawyers are giving him bad advice. They are competitors and each of them have their profiles on these sites. I thought I would get some thoughts from the community to maybe help back my thoughts on these particular back links. Thanks
Local SEO | | donsilvernail1 -
SEO: Directory Listing Help with Two business locations in different states
Hello! I am in the process of building my second location, and will be moving to Nashville TN. My first location is located in ohio, and I am changing my primary location to nashville, but still want to keep my clients in Ohio... At least for the first year. As for directory building, what is the best option? 1.) Should I create two separate directory listings for each location and then direct www.domain.com to Nashville directory, and then www.domain.com/ohio-wedding-photographer/ to the Ohio listing in the directory? Or do you create one directory and mention I have offices in both Ohio and nashville? Is it bad to have two listings for each location if they have different addresses and phone numbers? Thank you!
Local SEO | | jean78780 -
.ca for Canada-specific business currently using .com?
I work for a Canadian company and we are re-doing our website (corporate and branch sites) and the question has come up if we should change our current main domain from .com to .ca for local SEO benefits since we don't target an international audience. We own both versions but the .ca re-directs to the .com and we use .com in all our marketing materials. My understanding is that we can specify in Google Webmaster Tools that the focus of the site is Canada and I feel that switching to the .ca as the main domain isn't necessary, but I was wondering if there are real SEO benefits to make us seriously consider the change? Thanks, Taira
Local SEO | | ArborMemorial0 -
How worthwhile is schema markup for a local business?
One of our clients was told that they need to implement schema on their website, and now they're very concerned that the lack of schema might be holding them back. We could certainly implement it for them, but I'm doubtful how much of a difference it will make. The client is a plastic surgery practice, so their content is fairly straightforward (services, locations, photo galleries, etc.). We're planning to add schema markup to their name, address and phone info in their website footer, but we're not sure if it's worthwhile doing anything beyond that. (I'm assuming schema markup for customer ratings would best be handled by a dedicated review management system like RealPatientRatings.com). What would you recommend for schema implementation?
Local SEO | | ClearPivot0 -
Citations for a non-local campaign?
Is it worth building citations if one is targeting a national campaign with NO local keywords? Even if they have some effect, are they really worth the time, effort and costs?
Local SEO | | Gavo0