In the simplest and most non-technical terms, understand that your company listings, consisting of your name, address, and phone number (NAP) makes your business visible online and the more business listings and citations you create, the better chance you have of customers finding you in the search results.

Your Local business listings or citations are important to search engines like Google, so they should be extremely accurate and just as important to you. These are factors in the ranking algorithms used to create search engine results and a company with more business listings and citations will (if all other factors are equal) rank higher than a business with less.

Local Business Listings and Citations (NAP)

Different than back links or link building, citations and business listings don’t need to link back to your website to matter. Search engines are using this information in the context of confirming that your business is in fact a legitimate business and should be recognized, and even promoted, as such.

Knowing the importance of local search results to your business, managing your business listings is not something you want left undone or haphazardly maintained. Ranking high in local search results is highly dependent on search engines being able confirm your correct contact information and properly categorize your business.

If a local business does not have a website or a strong web presence, search engines are going to pull whatever information they can find. For these small businesses maintaining correct and consistent online business listing is crucial to appearing in local search results. Five-star ratings and on review sites and proper business listings on well-established sites like chambers of commerce and business association pages help create a positive online presence that a search engine can trust and use on its results pages.

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Thanks to our friends at “Reputation Loop” for supplying this newsworthy information.  Look for more great articles in the future