How to Optimize Your Local Directory Listing—Correctly

As a local business focusing on marketing, one of your most important tasks is to get your local directory listings down right. Before you launch any ad campaigns, start making viral videos, or create a sales funnel, it is vital that all of your information and listings throughout the internet are correct, updated, and optimized. Local directory listings are the key to your online success, and getting them just right is vital for digital marketing success. Keep reading to learn more about local directory listings, how to optimize them, and how they can help jumpstart your 2025 marketing campaigns.

What is a Local Directory Listing?

A local directory listing is a listing created by a local business that includes the business’s name, address, and phone number—which is also referred to as a business’s NAP—as well as other helpful information such as photos, videos, service descriptions, reviews, and more. All of this information is very important to the success of the business’s local SEO.

There are hundreds of places to create online listings for your business; many of them are auto-generated by NAP information that already exists on the internet. In addition, many (if not most) of these listing directories are free to use.

When someone searches for something near them—for example, dentist near me, car wash near me, or lunch near me—this gets the local SEO gears going, offering the user results that are listed in local directories. This is why it is so important to have correct NAP information throughout the internet for your business and to have each and every listing be as optimized as possible.

Some examples of local directory listings include:

• Google Business Profile, which is probably the king of local directory listings
• Bing
• Maps like Google, Apple, and Mapquest
• Yelp
• Facebook
• Yellow pages
• White pages
• Super pages
• Mapquest
• Google Map
• Apple Map
• Hundreds upon hundreds more

Who Can Use a Local Directory Listing?

If you are a local business, you should be taking advantage of local directory listings. Whether you are a franchise, brick-and-mortar, or another type of local service, it is essential to ensure your information is up-to-date and complete on all directory listings.
Some examples of businesses that could benefit from local directory listings include:

• Restaurant and food directories
• Healthcare directories
• Attorneys
• Doctors

Selecting the correct business category is critical while building out your local directory listings. This is the first piece of information that search engines look for when generating results for a user. You can select a few subcategories depending on the directory, and making sure you get as granular as possible (or as granular as the directory allows) is best. Easily handing search engines the best, most accurate information possible will be rewarded by higher search rankings and traffic.

Why Local Directory Listings Matter

Take a second to Google a business type near you, such as “dentist near me.” You will then see the coveted Local Three Pack on Google. Most people never click on “additional listings”, since three choices are usually enough for a user to make an educated decision.

If your business is not listed within the top three listings for your business type, you are not being found.

While it is possible to advertise your way to the top of the three-pack, there are two reasons why this isn’t ideal:

1. Most people go with organic results
2. Depending on how competitive your industry is, this can be very expensive

Here are some statistics to show you how important local directory listings are:

• 90% of global searches occur on Google
• 56% of local businesses have not claimed their Google Business Profile
• 75% of restaurants have inconsistent opening hours listed on Google and Apple Maps, which can lead to customer frustration and lost business
• 90% of consumers read online reviews before visiting a business, most of which are amalgamated on local directory listings
• 30% of mobile searches are related to a specific location
• 78% of local mobile searches result in an offline purchase

How Directories Rank Businesses

Wondering how directories choose to rank local businesses? Here is exactly how it is done:

• Complete and optimized data. The data you provide to local directory listings must be complete and optimized. This means leaving no stone unturned—all questions must be answered, every field must be filled out, and, ideally, you will use your best keywords and ranking data.
• Photos and videos. In most cases, people want to see videos and photos of a place before they visit it. Whether it is a restaurant, doctor’s office, or other healthcare facility, people want to be able to visualize it and see if it is a place that looks professional, inviting, and comfortable. Making it easy for search engines to offer this information will help your ranking.
• Product and/or Service Description. Make sure you write a lengthy description using lots of rich keywords about your business. List every product, service, and all the special details regarding your brand and what makes you stand out.
• Reviews. As mentioned earlier in this blog, reviews are a huge part of the decision process for many users. Having a large number of reviews, a large percentage of positive reviews, and responses to reviews are all pluses in users’ eyes. Most users understand that negative reviews happen for one reason or another. As long as you offer a useful reply with action items or a solution, it can be turned into a major positive for a prospective customer. In addition, service keywords that are mentioned in reviews and review replies help rankings, giving you that extra opportunity for SEO boosting.
• Regularly updated profiles. Showing search engines that you take your local directory listings seriously and regularly update it with new photos, videos, review replies, deals, and more will be rewarded with higher rankings.
• Consistent NAP. Making sure that your NAP (name, address, and phone number) are correct and consistent throughout the internet will ensure a higher ranking. If you recently moved, changed your number, or updated your website, you need to spend some time updating all your directory listings, or else you will see a hit in your local organic search traffic.

Voice Search Directories

Did you know that by 2025, over 50% of all searches will be conducted through voice search?

This means that businesses need to optimize their content for voice search, focusing on natural language rather than keywords and unnatural search terms, which is what non-voice search relies on most. Still using keywords and not using conversational language? Time to make the switch.

Our Best Tips for Optimizing Your Local Directory Listings

The easy part is ensuring you have photos, videos, the correct NAP information, and regularly updated review replies. The hard part can be ensuring your local listings are optimized correctly for that extra competitive edge.

Our best tips for optimizing your local directory listings include a completed profile, adding local business schema to your site, listing your services, adding bios, adding special offers, and bringing in professional help.

A 100% Completed Profile

In case we haven’t mentioned it enough, having a 100% completed and correct profile is the least you can do when tackling your local directory listings. This means answering every question, filling in every field, and leaving no stone unturned.

If you’re not sure of the answer or the field isn’t relevant to your business, find a way to fill in the field anyway. The more information, the better, even if you put something like “Not applicable” as the answer to some questions throughout your directory listing.

Adding Local Business Schema to Your Website

Optimizing your website to allow for local business schema is another way to ensure you rank high with search engines. We have an entire blog about schema here, but here’s a quick breakdown of how it works:

When good ol’ trusty Siri is trying to find something for you, she goes through a whole process of mapping the entire internet, looking for what you need in just a few short seconds. She grabs the easiest-to-read and most relevant websites for her to be able to give you the answer to your query, and those are websites that are well-optimized for voice search. Being optimized for voice search is much different than being optimized for regular search, and nowadays, it is important to have both capabilities.

One of the many ways you can optimize websites for her to find is by organizing the data for her via schema. This means assigning categories to certain things, such as person, place or thing. Think of it as doing Siri a favor – she’s working hard and only has a few seconds to come up with an answer, so help her out!

Listing Your Services

This may seem like a no-brainer, but it is very important to take the time to list each and every service that your business provides. You never know what someone may be searching for in order to find you, so put in everything, even if you don’t think it is that important.

If your office or shop specializes in something, that is even better! Make sure to include that information and, when possible, a quick description of what it is. Listing your services is an easy way to include your keywords attached to your business name throughout the internet, so take advantage when possible.

Adding Bios

If you are a healthcare office—such as a dentist’s office, doctor’s office, medspa, or other type of healthcare—include bios for each doctor or professional member of your team whenever possible. Not only is this yet another opportunity to use your keywords, it is also a way to establish trust, authority, comfort, and optimization throughout your directory listing.

Making Special Offers

Most, if not all, directory listings will allow you to make special offers exclusively through them. Taking advantage of this feature will reward your ranking for many reasons. Not only is it another way to have a full and complete profile, but it will give the directory listing more authority as a trusted source, as well.

Post Regular Updates

Google, the King of Local Listings, allows posting to your profile. These look like social media posts. Updating your profile regularly will help elevate your listings ranking, so make sure you take full advantage of this feature to stand out from your competitors and help your chances of nabbing one of the top three spots.

Bring in Professional Help

Does all of this seem overwhelming and time-consuming? It can be, which can leave you procrastinating on the task, no matter how important it is. Instead of putting it off, we can help you.

Businesses using Navazon for their local listings and social media management report significant overall savings and lower customer acquisition costs. Crafting banners, posts, bios, photos, and much more for each and every directory listing can be more than a small business can handle, but we can help.

Get Your Local Directory Listings Right with Navazon Digital

Ready to optimize your local directory listings, get them complete, and start seeing some local SEO results? We are experts in that.

Navazon helps businesses increase profits through data-driven marketing that expands opportunities and reduces risk. As marketers and entrepreneurs, we understand the value of developing a memorable brand through creativity and consistency. This is accomplished through targeted graphics, videos, and websites that reflect our proven, time-tested methodologies and detailed analytics. It is an approach that’s proven effective for companies of all sizes, from start-ups and medium-sized businesses to large firms with an international presence.

Here is a sample of what a certified agency will do that most business owners may miss:

• 100% complete and accurate listings on directories
• Listing of your products and services using proper keywords to increase ranking
• NAP synchronization to ensure high data accuracy, resulting in higher rankings
• Monthly posting of special offers, coupons, and events onto directories and social media platforms
• Professionally designed and branded social media content for your business
• Professionally designed and branded special offers, coupons, and events for your business
• Branded social media posts for special calendar days like Independence Day, Christmas, and New Year
• Full transparency with monthly reporting of results

Navazon does not believe in “one size fits all.” Every part of the marketing plan is customized to address your unique niche and positioning strategy. It’s how we excel. It’s why we succeed.

Schedule a free consultation with us now! Visit us at navazondigital.com for more information.