A couple of weeks ago I referenced David Mihm’s top 20 most important factors for making your local listing work. I talked about how proper category placement could boost your business listing’s presence, number of clicks to your website, product purchases and so forth. With the third most important factor out of the way, I figured I would leap over the second and go straight for the top dog of them all: Claim Your Local Listing. And I’m not just talking about Google, Yahoo and Bing. I’m talking about the syndicated online directories such as CitySearch, Info USA, Localeze, etc.

Don’t be fooled by the fact that some of these directories seem a little barren with how much information you’re allowed to add. Sites like Info USA act as a data pool for other online directories to fish out phone numbers, addresses and the actual business name itself. So then what happens if an old phone number or address hasn’t been updated? The other directories will simply hold those numbers until they’re changed, and quite frankly, that’s just not going to end well. Get in there immediately and change your old habits before customers think you’ve gone out of business!

Okay, now that you’ve done that, it’s time to search for that pretty little icon: “Are You The Business Owner?” Even if you update your listing on Yellow Pages with new products, more phone numbers and other cool tidbits of info, you still have a 30 day grace period before they go live. During that time, you could be vulnerable to competitors jumping in and dropping misleading data bombs. They could simply create a bundle of nearly identical listings that have a few changes here or there to the point your customers would have no idea which one’s relevant.

So where’s the love? It’s right in front of you. Or maybe it’s perched up in the right hand corner of the listing. Or maybe some directories like to make you jump through a couple hoops before you get there. Wherever it is, just know that a little security lies inside that simple claim. Once you enter that realm, you wait for that calming robot voice to give you a PIN number, tell you everything’s going to be just fine, and before you know it, the listing’s officially in your hands.

And now that it’s there, how does your listing stay on top? Well, with a little SEO touch, a few photos and other enhancing tools, your page can come off smelling like authenticated roses just waiting to be touched.

Still wondering why your local search page may be down on its luck? After reading a diagnostic chart surveying the successful factors for a page, there are plenty of ways to get back on your feet. Even though a few of them can seem straightforward, there’s a reason why they are at the top…some businesses keep missing those marks. For the time being, let’s focus on the 3rd most important factor: properly putting your business in the right category.

To better understand this, I need to go to Fantasy Island in search of a business starting from square one. How about…pets. Better yet, Pet Babysitters, Inc.! You’re an upstart company looking to corner the local pet-sitting market.

Now let’s get going to your first order of business: Google Local Listing Center. First and foremost, if you haven’t listed with Google, stop what you’re doing immediately and get your business on there! That’s one gigantic claim to leave dangling in the wind.

With that locked down, your next course of action is to scroll down to the categories. With a limit of 5 to choose from, you must carefully go through and choose the best possible categories for your business to show up in. Type as many words as you can to associate anything with pets, pet products, grooming services, etc. Depending on the variety of services your business possesses, being a pet babysitter can be narrowed into: “Dog Day Care”, “Pet Sitter”, “Dog Sitter”, “Pet Supply Store” and “Pet Groomer”. There are a few more that could be tagged along with it, but these are by far your strongest.

And while we’re at it, let’s go to the wonderful world of misguided pages! Here are a couple dreadful mistakes:

1. One and Done: Having one category or none at all is akin to putting blinders on. Simple as that.
2. Upon Further Review: You don’t look over your categories. For example, you were about to select “Dog Day Care” and instead you select the one above it, “Cremation Services”. Oops.

All in all, these errors can simply be avoided with a watchful eye. Making them as detailed as possible can ratchet up the percentage of clicks to your website. Rather than “just enough”, focus your thoughts on “not enough” and your doorbell may thank you for it later.

Forgive me. I ranted last week about Google not giving in to your business descriptions, character limits, blah, blah and more blah. And now I’m turning my ire to certain online directories who think mass confusion is the best way to add a business listing. Don’t get me wrong, there are some that hit it right on the nose, but the rest are built with little tidbits that do nothing but make you stare cross-eyed at the screen wondering if you’re even on the right site. Yay!

First, let’s start with a website that knows what its doing: Google Local Business Center.

Before you click off and judge me a hypocrite, the system works to perfection. Description-lite or not, the format and ease at which you enter your business data is one of the best. As you enter your website address, email, categories, photos, videos, and any other useful information, you get a pretty little box to your right showing you what it will look like. Simple interface, live demonstrations and a phone call with a PIN number for activation. Presto!

Another great online directory is Yelp. Very intuitive format, wonderful use of bolding important boxes, and much more. There’s a reason why it sees a lot of traffic. Throw in Yahoo Local and Yellow Pages for their speedy timing and you have some quality choices.

Now, onto the trouble makers. Here are reasons why adding your business to these online directories can almost be on even keel with a constant water drip to your forehead.

1. Finding the icon: It’s hard enough navigating some, but trying to find the “Add/Edit Business” icon is either non-existent with the home page, or tucked down at the bottom where it’s so small you double check to see if the website’s even an online directory. That arrow points to you, Info USA.

2. Deceiving Site: So you’ve finished what you thought was a free listing, you get ready to click submit, and then all of a sudden you’re taken to a page that basically says: “pick your poison”. It gives you monetary packages for the listing and completely falls back on its prior promise…just a bit. There’s an icon to say “No Thanks” and continue, it’s just too bad the icon is the size of a human cell. That one goes to good ol’ Mercant Circle.

3. Listing Guesswork: “Your business listing is complete: Congratulations, it will be up whenever I feel like it!” Some sites say 30-60 days, others tell you to become psychic, and so on. Simple as that. That one again goes out to Info USA, and most likely a few others as well.

I’m saving a few other horror stories for later on down the road. These are just a few examples of misinterpretation that may leave you wondering how your webpage is doing. With that being said, to every online directory’s credit, your site will eventually make its way onto the stage. Just bring a lot of patience to the table.

Back in September we talked about how the simple act of claiming your Google Local Business page would give you a small boost in your Google 10-pack ranking, which, as we covered, translates directly to fame, fortune and the domination of all who oppose you. Well, should you want to buttress this newfound popularity a bit let’s cover another factor in this land of Local Search Visibility: the volume of your customer reviews.

That’s right, it’s not good enough to just claim the thing and leave it by its lonesome, now you have to actually nurture it. Let’s think about what it will take to get your customers to bother actually going all the way to your listing, and then having to type words… “Ugh, I didn’t expect homework, I just wanted to buy a pair of shoes!” See, this imaginary person I just made up doesn’t even want to do any of that!

How about if we incentivize this whole thing for them? Maybe a 5-10% discount on their next purchase? Maybe you run a competition for a month or three where a random commenter wins a prize? You could even incorporate a video into the listing (yet another boost in the Google 10-Pack – ho-ho!) where you pick a name from a hat, throw a dart at a wall of names, see which bowl the neighborhood cat eats from, however it is you decide to divine your winner. Make it fun, make people want to go and at least check it out, and make it fun for you, or whichever lackey you put on it, to actually do it.

Local Search can be a boon to businesses of any size, all it takes is a bit of attention and maybe just a bit of imagination.

No matter how at odds you might be with computers, the Internet, or technology in general, Mr. or Miss Business Owner, I have a simple tip (hey, with video instruction!) that can help you help people in your general area find you… to, you know, give you money. Now, this is but a fraction of our local search visibility package, but we’re talking about Google, the most-used search engine in the world, so this is not minor.

What this video fails to mention is that your website is more than likely not included in your listing until you claim and edit it. There are so many people who see their physical address and numbers are correct and leave it at that, of course most of them don’t even realize the possibilities and options right in front of them either.

The second thing is that by simply claiming your site you immediately get a boost in Google’s 10-pack (that list of businesses beside the map in certain searches). It’s a tidbit that gets picked up in Google’s algorithm and gives your listing a nice kick in the pants for the smallest amount of effort on your part.

It’s time to break out of our old-timey phone book mentality and take advantage of the little angles we can be working online; naming your business “A1” anything may still get you listed first in the big book of yellow pages, but with more people searching for products and services online than anywhere else, becoming just a bit more Internet savvy can be a boon to your business.