Are you a small business owner looking to expand your market online? Perhaps, you’re trying to build awareness for your new brand? In either case, proper Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is essential for you. If when searching for certain keywords relevant to your content, your site doesn’t appear in the first few search results, then viewers are unlikely to visit your website. SEO is vital in determining the rank that your site obtains on search engines. 

Nowadays, an unreal amount of people relies heavily on the internet when searching for local businesses or service providers to fulfill their needs. Therefore, having a sound online presence is likely to benefit your site or your business in numerous ways, including greater traffic, increased sales, and more. Local citation building is a practice that can help you accomplish just that. This will greatly improve your site’s visibility by ranking it on the top of the search results. 

To know more about the practice of local citation building and how it can benefit you, be sure to read till the end of the article. With that said, let’s not waste any more time and get straight into the guide.

What is Local Citation Building and How Does It Work?

A local citation basically refers to an online reference pointing towards any local business’s name, address, and phone number. These citations can be found in business directories, social media pages, websites, and apps. Local citation building is a process of sending out accurate and relevant information about your business to listing directories where such information might be stored. This allows search engines and consumers to know exactly when, how, and where to find your local business. This also impacts your site’s rankings as search engines direct users to certain local businesses according to their requirements. 

When searching for specific keywords on search engines, the results are determined on the basis of three essential factors; namely prominence, distance, and relevance. Understanding how these factors work in determining your site’s rankings will allow you to maximize the frequency of your business being discovered by potential customers. 

Prominence

Prominence refers to the popularity of the business. Businesses that are widely known all across the globe are likely to be preferred in search results than new startups with small markets. This is also reflected in the search results rankings. Search engines determine the popularity of a certain business by searching for links, directories, and articles with the mention of that business. Furthermore, a review count is also used to estimate how popular any business is. 

Distance

The location of your business is also taken into account when determining your site’s rank. Distance is calculated from the business to the potential customer’s current location or the location mentioned in the search. The businesses with the lowest distance are preferred in the search results. 

Relevance

As the name suggests, relevance refers t how relevant your business is to whatever the potential customer is searching for. You can ensure your business relevance by consistently updating your business profile information on directories and listings. This will attract greater traffic to your site and will eventually result in increased sales for your business.

How to Perform Citation Building for Local SEO?

The next step for you is to learn how to develop an effective local citation SEO strategy that guarantees convincing results for your business. Here are some tips that you can utilize to make this process much more convenient for you. 

Complete Your Site’s Local SEO

First and foremost, you need to ensure that your site’s SEO is complete and up-to-date. You must develop a website that fulfills the various SEO requirements, such as optimized content, mobile-friendly, link building, and more. If in any case, your site’s local SEO is incomplete or outdated, you would not be able to develop an effective local citation SEO strategy.

List Your Business with the Top Aggregators

Moving on to citation building, you must first look for the top aggregators in your region. These are basically companies that collect relevant information about businesses and distribute it to various other websites. Doing so will relieve you of the burden of providing your business information to the hundreds of directories and listings available online. You also have the option to submit your business information to multiple popular director sites. 

Advertise Your Business Using Geotargeting

Geotargeting is a method of online advertisement that delivers specific content to the consumers based on their location. Therefore, your business would have greater visibility in your region if you provide the exact location where your business is situated. Geotargeting greatly helps in increasing brand awareness in your local market, allowing you to get ahead of your competition in terms of visibility and recognition. 

Why is Local Citation SEO Building Important? 

The primary goal of every new business is to increase its recognition in the local as well as international market. Doing so allows potential customers to discover these businesses and benefit them with greater sales. This is where local citation building can benefit your business. By uploading accurate and up-to-date information about your business on directories and listings, you could help potential customers discover your business with ease. Furthermore, this will also reinforce your site’s SEO by ranking it higher in search results for relevant keywords. 

Local citation building can prove to be extremely beneficial for new businesses as it helps them expand their market and reach new regions. If you want to ensure convincing results, you need to have an effective local citation SEO building strategy for your business. Although doing so can prove to be confusing at times, you don’t need to worry because WebSuited is here to help. At WebSuited, we assist businesses and websites with the best quality of SEO services that can help them rank higher in search results. With our help, you can get all the tools that you need to take your business to the next level.