Brand Marketers Only

Find business riches in local search

Claudia Bruemmer
Contact
follow this author

Search Posted on February 07, 2008

Print
Share
Comment

Previous
2 of 3
Next

Free Yahoo local listing
Your free local listing is called Yahoo Local Basic and consists of a profile listing of the following information:

Address, phone number and FAX number
Website and email addresses
Business category
Business hours of operation
Accepted payment methods
Products and services offered

Yahoo provides sponsored search and local listings as local advertising options.

Sponsored search: These pay-per-click ads on Yahoo can be geo-targeted by user location or user interest (keyword). Geo-targeted sponsored search ads can also be inserted into the Yahoo Local results.
Local listings: These listings appear on Yahoo Local and have two flat-rate fee levels: Local enhanced listings give you a company logo and tagline, up to 10 photos of your business, a detailed business description, inclusion in five business categories and two customizable links to coupons or special offers for a flat rate of $9.95 per month; local featured listings give you all the features of local enhanced plus guaranteed prominent placement in Yahoo Local, customizable listing and business details page and a free five-page basic website for a monthly flat rate starting at $25 per month.

Optimization tips for local listings
To rank well in local search, it goes without saying that your site should be optimized for organic listings. Optimize all on-page and off-page factors, and get your site listed in important directories for your niche.

We mentioned the desirability of adding a footer listing your street address and phone number on all your pages. If you limit your contact information to the Contact Us page, this won't help your site get into the right geographical category, and it won't help your other pages rank organically for locally oriented searches. When the information about your business is presented on each page, it's easy for search spiders to extract local information when indexing.

To achieve good local rankings, concentrate on all your local resources. A link from the local Chamber of Commerce can be valuable. Involvement with the local community can lead to more links. You might sponsor local events, join local business organizations, or sponsor a local sports team, etc. It's important to be a visible member of the community to gain the trust and authority necessary to attract links.

Provide specific information when entering your business profile directly into all local search sites. Not all search engines display the same information, but they all require details about your business, products and services.

<< Previous page | Next page >>

Member Sign In

Not a People Connection member? Register here.

Your Email Address

Password

Keep me signed in for a month Forgot password?

Richard Saling March 30, 2008 at 2:37 AM

Great Post. There are some local companies offering "Local Search Engines" to fill the gap of what the Google's and Yahoo's supposedly can't deliver. Some are the local telephone Companies and Yellow Pages Company for example. One such site is even developed strictly for the CIty of Surprise AZ. I don't see these sites taking over though. I think The big Search Engines will offer something comparable. We are already seeing it with local.google and yahoo.local etc.

Claudia Bruemmer February 15, 2008 at 1:17 PM

Hi Jason,

Glad you had the opportunity to see the importance of a business listing in local search first hand. As you say, it's important for businesses large and small. Can also help you cover more ground in universal search results.

Jason Prescott February 15, 2008 at 12:50 PM

CB,

This is great information for marketers and businesses ( small and large). I spent the last 3 weeks in Manhattan---and it was cold. When I needed a coffee or diner, and didn't feel like taking a guess which block to venture down--- all I had to do was open my Google maps on my blackberry, do a search for a business ( Starbucks) and if a business is smart and using google maps, all of the info about your company will be displayed and google will walk you right to where you want to go. Yes, one better optimize for local search :-)

Thanks CB!

Claudia Bruemmer February 7, 2008 at 1:48 PM

Hi James, Thanks for bringing managedq.com to my attention.I queried "local search tips" and came up with one good result (MHO), which was a pst by Michael Gray on Feb 5 saying he was going to interview search experts all week on local search. This is current and the list of experts was impressive, so this listing was relevant for me. The rest were all either old or irrelevant (for me). So many new SEs and people get confused just trying to remember them. When Collarity came out, I thought it was great (ditto for Rollyo). But I never did use them a lot. As far as SEs go, I still like Google despite sometimes getting irrelevant results. To get what you want, you have to be a skillful searcher. I'm learning. But thanks for bringing this new SE to my attention.

Claudia Bruemmer February 7, 2008 at 1:46 PM

Thanks, Colleen, glad you could use this info. Local search listings are important for everyone these days.