More threads by tc2

Fair point, you would need to go up to the next tier to take care of sites like Yahoo. There were a few major things that i liked about Yext opposed to another service like Moz (and I've used them both for multiple industries):
  • Automatic (or near automatic) updates for any business info
  • Enhanced features for partner sites = More detailed & complete listings
  • Review monitoring (really awesome if you use their API to integrate) with email updates
  • Data control on major sites
  • Duplicate suppression (extra, but worth it in some messy situations)

My point still stands. The benefit is that you're not spending time on low profit tasks like updating citations in mass, you're spending time on the big dollar tasks for your clients or your company. We all know data consistency is important, because it not only helps with search engines it helps drive sales for the business (having the correct phone number or address helps people contact you). The consistent info creates trust that the business is actually where it says it is, and keeps potential customers from checking out a competitor if they're unsure. I've passed on giving my money to businesses because I couldn't tell whether they were actually at the right location or if they moved - it's really frustrating to drive across town only to find the business isn't there anymore or have a phone number listed that doesn't lead to the right business.

So here's my final point on this:

If you want to spend time on small value activities like spending hours working through fixing Yahoo (or any other lower tier citation for that matter), that's your choice to do. I would much rather pay ~$38/mo to make that change in 2 mins, which in turn I could immediately show a client I got that fixed for them. If you're charging $50/hour for a service and take 2 hours to fix the Yahoo problem (that's a pretty low hour estimate given Yahoo's support), how will you charge that client? Not to mention that 2 hours could be spaced over the course of weeks trying to work with Yahoo support... I'd prefer just getting it fixed, showing the client their issue is solved, and get them to focus on their business instead of questioning what I've been doing for them.

At the end of the day it's a business choice how to solve the problem. There's a hundred different routes to go, and you know your client. If you think they can wait months to see it updated, then do it manually. I'd just prefer doing a full audit or fixing conversion problems on the website than screwing around with a non-responsive Yahoo support team to update the NAP or get rid of a duplicate. That's my option.
 
Eric,

Thanks for the detailed response. Helpful info. My final thoughts, and then I'll give you the last word if you want it!

(1) Totally agree that manually updating Yahoo not worth it. My question though is will Yext take care of the Yahoo issues? My experience with Yahoo (specifically) is that literally nothing these days consistently works. So, not a knock on Yext or anybody else - just Yahoo ;-)

(2) I'm still going to strongly claim that if you have not taken care of Acxiom/Localeze/Infogroup/Factual, then updating other citation sites will be problematic - because most citation info is originally sourced from one (or more) of these four. This is the main reason I like Moz Local - this is their primary focus. I'm still not clear if Yext sends info to these 4 - my understanding is they do NOT. In which case, they are missing (in my opinion) the 2nd most important thing you need to do to clean up citations (the first being getting a GMB page).

(3) It's my understanding that the sites that Yext can update immediately have an agreement with Yext to do so in exchange for compensation. This is where it would be wonderful to have full transparency in this market. I think every citation site should have to publicly disclose where they get their data from - this would help tremendously in understanding how authoritative a site is.
 
Eric,

Don't mean to quibble, but the $199 package (Yext's cheapest) only covers 28% of their citations and frankly none of them are authoritative. Even the tier that covers 100% of citations has no mention of Acxiom, Localeze, Factual or Infogroup. As those are the most important citations of all, it's hard for me to agree that at any price, Yext is a "value". Anybody using Yext would (in my opinion, anyway) still need to find a way to update those 4.

I really struggle with Yext because there are some very knowledgeable people in this forum who find Yext valuable. But I'm not seeing it. And, if most of the folks here are starting to say that exhaustive citation efforts beyond the top ones is not worth it, then I *really* don't see the value of Yext.

Scott, you should just ping Christian and talk to him about pricing and packages.
 
Agreed. Scott, feel free to shoot me a note at christian at yext.com and we can cover all the pricing and partnership rates that we provide professionals.

We should also discuss your point #2 above about aggregators, as we don't "miss" this, we handle it from a very specific point of view which was developed from my experience working with data aggregators.

Thanks,

Christian
EVP, Partnerships
Yext
 

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