3 Reasons Why Citation Building Must Not Be Overlooked
We strongly believe that building citations are essential for any business looking to target locally based customers. Along with helping to increase rankings in relevant Google Maps (and general search results), the offer the following benefits for businesses of all size.
The number of citations, the location of the citations and the consistency of the information can all play a key role in helping to influence Google’s rankings, particular with regards to Google Maps.
What Are Citations?
A citation is essentially any online mention of the name, address, and phone number for a particular business. Citations can be listed on business directories, on websites and apps, and on social media channels.
Citations can provide the ideal way for internet users to discover details relating to local businesses and also offer the chance to positively impact local search engine rankings.
One of the most important ways that citations can help to benefit a business is by increasing the chances of local customers to find your business online. These will include third-party sites that people use, like Google Maps, Yell, Yelp, FreeIndex, Yelp, Thomson Local and Foursquare to name just a few.
How Can We Help?
Citations offer a number of benefits but 3, in particular, stand out.
- They offer trusted sources of location information
- They help to create an excellent link profile (links back to your website)
- They form a key component of an impressive review profile (lots of destinations for customers to provide independent reviews)
Setting up or claiming existing citations (some directories may actually create a listing for you!) is just the beginning of the process. We will make sure that you squeeze every last drop of potential out of each and every listing.
We will do this by completing the following steps:
- Making sure that all of the information listed on your account is accurate, relevant and verified
- Flesh out your listing with as many relevant details as possible
- Make sure there are no duplicate listings which may prove harmful in the future
- We would actively seek to encourage customer reviews. For example, if you have an e-mail database for current and past customers, we will contact them on your behalf with links to your listing and a guide for the best and quickest way to leave a review
- Keep your listings up to date
Getting In Touch
The above information is designed to offer a guide towards maximising the exposure and potential of your citation portfolio. There are also, of course, additional factors which must be taken into consideration. If you would like Footprint Web Design to help optimise your Google Maps listing, simply give us a call today on Tel. No. +44(0)1883 372488.
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Is Your Website Ticking The Right Boxes?
If you have paid any attention to our blog over the past few years, you will know how strongly we feel about the importance of local SEO.
For the uninitiated, local SEO is a tailored solution designed to achieve maximised visibility in search results in key local areas. For businesses providing any type of service (electrician, plumber, gardener, driving school etc), we don’t believe that we are going overboard by saying that this strategy can take your business to another level or leave it lagging behind if you choose not to implement it.
Which Areas Does A Local SEO Campaign Target?
Covering a wide variety of areas which must be targeted, a typical local SEO campaign will include amongst others:
- The creation of an optimised GMB listing
- Mobile friendly/first website
- Geo-focused content
- Online reputation management
- Citations and NAP consistency
- Social media campaigns
- Local link building
- Google LSAs (Local Services Ads) (possibly)
By placing an emphasis on the most beneficial areas of SEO, our local SEO marketing techniques can often take less time to produce effective results, therefore quickly helping to increase the levels of traffic to your website.
Footprint Web Design’s expertise in all aspects of SEO offers the chance to receive a swift and effective ROI.
- Top of the Google’s Listings with Footprint Web Design Local SEO –Footprint Web Design and our team of SEO experts possess all of the skills needed to get your business to the top of Google’s natural listings and to appear on Google Maps & Places. These are vital if you want people locally to easily find your small business.
- Achieving Fast Results –Google’s PPC (Pay Per Click) platform, Adwords, offers the most effective method of quickly attracting business on the internet. We will get your PPC Marketing up and running for you and have customers finding your business and services in the shortest possible period of time.
- Social Media Interactions With Customers –Social Media for business is the fastest growing method of opening lines of communication between a small business and its customers. By allowing you to offer updates, receive feedback and get in on what your customers want – all a very low cost – social media platforms are quickly becoming one of the primary advertising methods for businesses throughout the UK.
Further Information
If you’d like to speak to us regarding any of our services, including our online marketing services, please give us a call on 01883 372488 or contact us via Facebook and we’ll be happy to talk you through your options.
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Can Twitter Help Your Business? We Think It Can
Creating a Twitter account offers the perfect conduit to let your clients know about upcoming deals or events, interact with people personally (dealing with both praise and grievance) and reach an international audience.
When you bring your business on Twitter, you connect with our powerful audience where you can make an impact and drive results. In fact, brand involvement in culture is especially important among consumers between the ages of 18 and 35. People on Twitter vs. the general population are more passionate, informed, and feel more strongly about brands aligning with culture.*
Your audience is already on Twitter and they can’t wait to connect with you. Setting up a Twitter could not be easier, follow the URL www.twitter.com, enter your details and you’re away! However, if you don’t have the time to create and maintain your Twitter presence, Footprint Digital can do this all for you.
Some top tips:
- Keep your message concise
- Limit hashtags to 1-2 per Tweet
- Include a clear call-to-action where applicable (e.g. “Read the full story”)
- Avoid writing copy in all-caps
- Keep a conversational tone
- Consider using emojis to add emotion
To help you along the way, we have drawn up 5 ways Twitter can be used to help your business.
No 1 – Helping To Spread The Word
Tell the world what you’re doing, what’s coming up, success stories or ask your followers to get involved. Set quizzes and questions that’ll get people onto your website and share your details.
No. 2 – Market Research
Looking for some feedback? Your Twitter audience are your clients; ask their opinion directly and you’ll have the right answer (you will also have made your clients feel valued).
No. 3 – Monitoring Your Market Sector
Following your competitors and other names in your industry is a great way to keep abreast of progress, changes and market trends.
No. 4 – Easy Access to Customer Views
It’s now commonplace for businesses to allow their clients to contact them through Twitter. Praise on Twitter can reap huge benefits in terms of swelling your number of followers. Conversely, if someone complains publicly? You can deal with it instantly – letting everyone know your side of the issue and how you propose to deal with it. People who complain are generally just looking for someone to listen; do that and you’ll turn a negative into a positive every time.
No. 5 – Growing Your Audience
Twitter has allowed businesses to reach a global client market. The above points will all help you work towards getting your name out there; to potential client sources, you didn’t even know existed. Inciting your existing followers to share your posts and feedback using “hashtags” (which we’ll go into in the next blog) will ensure their followers become your followers.
Further Information
If you would like to put your Social Media marketing in the hands of a company that will take it forward, please contact Footprint Digital on Tel. No. 01883 372488 today.
