Do Call Tracking Numbers Impact Ranking?

[JoyHawkins]

I know it's historically thought that call tracking numbers on 3rd party directories (Yelp, Yellowpages.com etc) is a bad idea and hurts ranking. When I first started in this industry over a decade ago, we used to see duplicate listings like crazy that were created on Google due to having mismatched phone numbers on 3rd party directories. I do not see this anymore in recent years.

To be clear - I'm not talking about using a call tracking number on Google My Business - I already know that doesn't negatively impact ranking.

What I want to know is if anyone has seen or done a recent case study that shows how mismatched data on 3rd party directories impacts ranking?

Personally, I have not been able to test this because most of our clients don't have this issue. I did have a case recently where a client moved and I updated his website and GMB and nowhere else until the next month. His rankings went up overnight due to his new location being in a more prominent location in his zip code.

What have you found?

 

[cdawg2610]

Joy -

Kind of related, The study I completed this year on using CTN Numbers included pushing out the number to GMB and all 3rd party directories we managed through Yext.

Call Tracking: The SEO Update You Need to Know | CDK Global

Additionally, we looked at the organic traffic and visibility once we implemented Yext and cleaned up all those random duplicate listings, and we saw an increase in traffic of around 20%.

 

[JoyHawkins]

Thanks for sharing Colleen. So in the article you state "Bottom line, using a local call tracking number properly will not have a negative impact on organic rankings.". Was this specific to organic or were you also measuring ranking in the local (3-pack) results.

Was the cleanup via Yext mainly targeted at removing duplicate listings or did it also cleanup incorrect data (wrong phone numbers etc)?

 

[cdawg2610]

Kind of both for keywords - part of the keyword rankings for dealers we track are the local pack for "MAKE IN CITY" so that's part of the keyword roll up.

We completed both of those pieces in the cleanup. First was cleaning up incorrect data, second was removing duplicate listings. The lift we saw came after the duplicate cleanup.