Citations are online mentions of your business and structured citations include some or all of your N-A-P = Nmae, Address, Phone number.
However, as a service provider and providing them at your customers location means your address aspect of NAP is not as important. It should NOT be displayed on GMB and doing so breaches Google Policy.
NAP info must be consistent and accurate everywhere.
FACEBOOK
I don't know enough about using facebook to be able to give authoritative advice on the subject. I'm not a fan personally but know people have had very good results using it. It is worth claiming a free business page and keeping it updated, adding lots of photos and engaging with others. It is also an important citation source for SEO.
BING PLACES
Bing's equivalent of GMB and an important citation source. Bing Places could be less competitive and cheaper for Paid Ads. Google is the dominant search engine but don't dismiss Bing because there are still millions of searches done using it every day.
OTHER BUSINESS DIRECTORY LISTINGS
Always choose the most relevant category applicable to you.
If it allows you to add a free backlink to your website use the homepage or most important (i.e. biggest earner) service page and location to give it a ranking boost.
Citation Enhancement - Don't pay for premium listings but make use of the data fields available. If allowed to write a business description make each one unique and sprinkle them with a variety of relevant keywords describing your services and locations you cover. As well as the town or city name you can also be even more specific by referring to particular areas such as boroughs, districts, estates, neighbourhoods etc - if relevant to do so. Also make reference to the county it is in and perhaps even the region in general e.g. Midlands, West Country etc.
You want Google to associate your business with a wide range of relevant keywords in addition to your target keywords, e.g. if you provide pressure washing services you should also use terms like 'jet washing', 'power washing' etc.
Data Aggregators are organisations that collect and sell data to other directories and include Central Index/192 and infoserve (yahoo). Central Index may charge a nominal monthly fee (approx £5 and this is worth paying).
BEST CITATION SOURCES :
Includes but not limited to the following:
The general rule with social media success is that you need to be active on the site and engage with others. For business and SEO purposes it is sufficient to update with posts about recent jobs, promotional offers etc and include photos and explanatory text using descriptive and location based keywords.
Just keep your accounts ticking over in this way and you'll get longer term SEO benefits and it will boost your authority. If you can generate any interest / responses better still, but it's not vital at all.
However, as a service provider and providing them at your customers location means your address aspect of NAP is not as important. It should NOT be displayed on GMB and doing so breaches Google Policy.
NAP info must be consistent and accurate everywhere.
I don't know enough about using facebook to be able to give authoritative advice on the subject. I'm not a fan personally but know people have had very good results using it. It is worth claiming a free business page and keeping it updated, adding lots of photos and engaging with others. It is also an important citation source for SEO.
BING PLACES
Bing's equivalent of GMB and an important citation source. Bing Places could be less competitive and cheaper for Paid Ads. Google is the dominant search engine but don't dismiss Bing because there are still millions of searches done using it every day.
OTHER BUSINESS DIRECTORY LISTINGS
Always choose the most relevant category applicable to you.
If it allows you to add a free backlink to your website use the homepage or most important (i.e. biggest earner) service page and location to give it a ranking boost.
Citation Enhancement - Don't pay for premium listings but make use of the data fields available. If allowed to write a business description make each one unique and sprinkle them with a variety of relevant keywords describing your services and locations you cover. As well as the town or city name you can also be even more specific by referring to particular areas such as boroughs, districts, estates, neighbourhoods etc - if relevant to do so. Also make reference to the county it is in and perhaps even the region in general e.g. Midlands, West Country etc.
You want Google to associate your business with a wide range of relevant keywords in addition to your target keywords, e.g. if you provide pressure washing services you should also use terms like 'jet washing', 'power washing' etc.
Data Aggregators are organisations that collect and sell data to other directories and include Central Index/192 and infoserve (yahoo). Central Index may charge a nominal monthly fee (approx £5 and this is worth paying).
BEST CITATION SOURCES :
Includes but not limited to the following:
- GMB
- Bing Places*
- Yell*
- Yelp*
- Scoot* (also includes The Sun & Independent)
- Central Index
- 192*
- Freeindex*
- Thomson Local*
- My118*
- infoserve
- locally focused directories
- other social media such as instagram, twatter, reddit etc
- (those with an asterisk * are useful review sites)
The general rule with social media success is that you need to be active on the site and engage with others. For business and SEO purposes it is sufficient to update with posts about recent jobs, promotional offers etc and include photos and explanatory text using descriptive and location based keywords.
Just keep your accounts ticking over in this way and you'll get longer term SEO benefits and it will boost your authority. If you can generate any interest / responses better still, but it's not vital at all.
