First things first - get him submitted to the Google Local Business Center.

tips for higher local map placements:

a full and complete profile! pics, videos, info, etc.
local listings on other directories like yelp, superpages

A great resource for getting listed at a bunch of local directories is to use a service called Universal business listing.

I think it's like $35 to have the biz submitted to a lot of different sites. The key though is to fill out that profile as much as possible.

Take care,
Dustin

Getting Local Listings is not so tough these days, but one needs to be aware with the review at the site.

One can get the profile updated with appropriate details of what the product, service or company is.

You need to fill the relevant categories, accept the right order of service provision & get it verified.

[DELETED]

I signed up for and used the UBL listing service and was not pleased with the time factor. They accept listings all the time, but only forward the data to their directories once per month. Then, it can take up to 6-8 weeks for the business listing info to be reflected in those directories. So, you could be looking at a 3-month delay versus doing it yourself manually. Next time, I'll just outsource it to avoid the unnecessary delay. I understand they provide consitency of the business profile and contact information across the various directories, but not worth the wait in my opinion.

[DELETED]

As a follow up question to everyone who has setup citation for a Google Local Listing (either manually or via UBL), I understand it's a good practice to social bookmark each citation url. I'd prefer not to have to pay $5 per citation to do this on a site like fiverr.com . What is everyone using these days to handle automation of social bookmarking either backlinks or citations?

Thanks

George

Hi,

The trick is to use the local business listings as a ongoing marketing tool. For this reason you have to claim the listing at the various local listing websites, search engines, communities,etc.

Once you've claimed the listing (which is a good thing), then you go start updating information, keywords, categories, coupons, events, videos, photos, etc. Since there are security issues around claiming, it is not something that can be done in an automated fashion.

After the initial round of updates, then it is a matter of going back and maintaining the listing with new information (e.g. videos, photos, coupons, events), getting citations from external sites (other local listing sites, content marketing, HCards), and monitoring/managing consumer reviews.

Overall the process has to be done at multiple locations and I'm not sure that a business will have the time resources to manage this on their own long term. If you add Local SEO, Mobile Marketing and Geo-Social marketing to the mix this will be outsourced over the next 3 years.

There is a difference between marketing services vs. data services too. The data services will not be the most effective method long term. Besides most businesses are already listed, not a matter of getting listed.

Open to commentary.

Thanks.

I have found that taking the link to the Google Map and using that link on your citations can improve the ranking on the map page.
Also, make sure you name the jpg files for your pictures with keywords you want to be ranked for.

Having a full/complete listing on Maps is definitely the first step. Google Maps listings don't necessarily need backlinks...they look for "web references" They'll look for other places that contain the same business name, address, phone number, etc. and will consider matches a reference to the same business. If you're using a keyword as the biz name, make sure your business is listed with that same keyword elsewhere or they may merge the listing to a business name you don't like.

For Yahoo Listings, it's worth forking out the $10/month to get a dofollow link from Yahoo Local to your domain...

Hope that helps!

Thanks, About to enter the offline market and I'm sure this will be of great help. Posting here first just so I can refer back to it later.

http://www.seorabbit.com


Also, check out Mike Blumenthals blog, he is the expert. Hope that helps, Eva

Yeah! this is my 50'st post...finally! I will PM you Caper. I can help.

Reviews are really important too. You want to strongly encourage the business to get reviews on there. Whether it is them having a few happy customers do it, or you helping, I have found it to be a fairly strong factor in ranking.

Matt

"If you're using a keyword as the biz name, make sure your business is listed with that same keyword elsewhere or they may merge the listing to a business name you don't like."

There has been some disagreement in this regard...does anyone have any definitive advice on this subject?