Does your FoundLocally listing need a review?

The FoundLocally listing is important for your marketing. It (or, if you have more than one location, they), along with any other directory & search engine listings,  as well as your website, helps your Google Ranking.

What hurts a Google Ranking

Inconsistencies  mess with Google’s algorithm, because it does not connect all the directory listings to the same website. If all the details are matchy-matchy they improve your ranking, any inconsistencies divide them For example if you have TEN links to your site, you might accumulate 10 “google points” as part of their ranking algorithm. If you have 5 right, and 5 somehow different, you might only score 5 “google points”.

If you use the various features of your FoundLocally listings, and post sales, coupons or flyers, or your post job openings, or post events, or post news releases, or f you ask your clients to post reviews  on FoundLocally (they need a Facebook profile to do so) These are MORE LINKS, using your matchy-matchy business information. These can potentially add even more links to your website and therefore more “google points” all from the single listing!

Checking your FoundLocally listing(s)

If you cannot remember, when you added (ore  most recently updated) your FoundLocally.com listing, you should have a look. Use the Site Search box at the top of the page and search for your business.

There are some things you need to check:

If the listing does not have a web link  (and you have a website, or a Facebook page) and it does not have a logo or photo to create a clickable link, or the listing shows the blue “Click for more info” generic button  you NEED TO update your listing.

Listings without a web link don;t help your Google Ranking at all.  And, if you don’t have a web link to an actual website (or  at least a Facebook page), the logo or photo will neither display nor work,

Accessing Your FoundLocally Listing

There are four ways to do this:

1. click the Login button when on the listing and type in your username and your password, assuming you remember it
2. if you forgot the password, click Forgot Password button on the Login screen to generate a password reset email . This works if the e-mail used to create your Registered Contact is unchanged and is also accessible. When yu get the email enter a new password (the emailed link times out after one day, and you may need to request a new Password Reset email)
3. If your email changed (you may have changed email or internet providers)  click on the Claim Listing link in the white stripe and create a new Registered Contact and a new userID and password to update the listing. Typically, In a day (typically) we’ll review the “claim” and approve you to update the listing (assuming it looks to us like a legitimate match)
4. IF ALL ELSE FAILS, click on Free Listing and create a new Registered Contact and a new Listing from scratch… in a day or so, when you get the “Your Listing has been activated” email, reply back and inform us there is an old dup;icate listing we should remove.

What else to Review & Update: Categories

Review your listing’s Categories (from the Profile page, click the View Categories button)  and see if any similar ones apply to what you  sell or what you do.  FoundLocally.com has added over a thousand categories over our 18 years.

(a) You may have added new products or service since you added your listing

(b) we may have added categories for products  or services you’ve sold all along

(c) you may have categories selected for products or services you no longer sell or provide

If you DID THIS, More Stuff to Update

Other indicators you need to update your lsitngs:

1. You have changed your business name
2.  You have changed your physical location
3. You have changed your local phone number or used a tracking phone number for listings
4.  You have used a toll-free number instead of a local phone number (on FoundLocally, chick if you have changed your Toll-Free number)
5. Your business name and your trade name were different at some point (this also happens if you used “keyword spam” instead of your business name, or used a web domain name instead of your business name)
6. You changed your web domain name, or upgraded from a Facebook page to a full website,
7. A  data aggregator may have collected incorrect or outdated information about your business (a website you may not have submitted to but “scraped” and copied another site’s information)
8. Someone managing them on your behalf (and web marketing or SEO provider) didn’t set up your profiles correctly (or they may have broken any of the above rules, suggestions, or facts)

The post Does your FoundLocally listing need a review? appeared first on TransCanada FoundLocally Trusted Local Marketing since 1999.