Local Citation Building: major data aggregators vs citation service?

[Jessica C]

I am local, small business owner (photographer), working on citations for SEO. I've combed through many threads, trying to understand the difference between claiming my business on the major data aggregators vs using a citation service? I have one location that likely will not change for years. So why wouldn't I just claim my business on the major data aggregators and skip citation service? What am I missing?

 

[cdghouston]

Hi Jessica,
The only thing I can think of would be that not all data aggregators are made equal. I would guess that data aggregators only cover certain sites, and citation services also only cover certain sites. If you want to ensure that coverage is vast across these directories, I would suggest looking into which directories are covered by both services. Did you have a certain data aggregator or citation service in question?

 

[Jessica C]

Hi Jessica,
The only thing I can think of would be that not all data aggregators are made equal. I would guess that data aggregators only cover certain sites, and citation services also only cover certain sites. If you want to ensure that coverage is vast across these directories, I would suggest looking into which directories are covered by both services. Did you have a certain data aggregator or citation service in question?

thank you so much. Ok, for some reason I thought that the major data aggregators (Foursquare, Data Axle, Neustar Localeze, etc.) would over lap with the sites that a citation service would set up for me? for example, if I claimed my business on Neustar Localeze and Foursquare, wouldn't both of these data aggregators create listings for my business twice?

 

[cdghouston]

thank you so much. Ok, for some reason I thought that the major data aggregators (Foursquare, Data Axle, Neustar Localeze, etc.) would over lap with the sites that a citation service would set up for me? for example, if I claimed my business on Neustar Localeze and Foursquare, wouldn't both of these data aggregators create listings for my business twice?

I would imagine that if one aggregator attempts to list on a site that one of the other aggregators already took care of, it would skip those. I'm not 100% sure on that, but that is my theory of what might happen.

 

[keyserholiday]

I stopped using the data aggregators years ago. Since you are in the US, you only need Facebook and Yelp. Yelp pushes data to Apple Maps, Yahoo, and Bing. If you hide the address on Yelp, they won't add you to Apple Maps.

 

[BSDChicago]

I stopped using the data aggregators years ago. Since you are in the US, you only need Facebook and Yelp. Yelp pushes data to Apple Maps, Yahoo, and Bing. If you hide the address on Yelp, they won't add you to Apple Maps.

Is it the same as adding to Apple Maps using Apple Business Connect?

 

[keyserholiday]

Is it the same as adding to Apple Maps using Apple Business Connect?

Yes.

 

[cdghouston]

I stopped using the data aggregators years ago. Since you are in the US, you only need Facebook and Yelp. Yelp pushes data to Apple Maps, Yahoo, and Bing. If you hide the address on Yelp, they won't add you to Apple Maps.

This is 100% correct. Apple Maps only supports businesses with a physical address. They are not like Google Maps where you can list without an address, Apple Maps actually requires them.

 

[DClark]

Data aggregators & citation services may publish data to some of the same/overlapping directories. Directories will use entity resolution (name, address, phone, category) to identify which listings coming from multiple different sources are referring to the same business location to reduce duplication chances. Directories may also prioritize data from specific sources (direct claims on their directories, certain sources/aggregators, etc.) over others based on agreements, data quality analysis, etc.

Just a heads up, you are service area type business (i.e. photographer without a physical office location) some mapping apps (i.e. apple maps) will not list your location without a physical location. For apple, if you have a physical location, the address needs to be listed on your website, and your listing needs to have the your website url present. If you shoot me a DM I can setup you up with a free account for Localeze and you can check out the capabilities.

 

[fisicx]

New to the forum but I'd like to add my tuppence.

Google and potential customers are looking for evidence that you can deliver your products or services. This means referrals, citations and reviews From Other People!

You can add yourself to directories and whatever but the net effect is almost zero. Google will just ignore these links.

You can use an aggregator if you want but don't expect anything wonderful to happen. These platforms are bulging at the seams with businesses all of which are fighting with each other.

Ask yourself - have you used any of these directories or aggregators to find products or services? I suspect the answer will be mostly negative. If you aren't using them why should anyone else (including Google) use them.

Get lots and lots of reviews - that will do more for your ranking and reputation than anything else.

 

[keyserholiday]

New to the forum but I'd like to add my tuppence.

Google and potential customers are looking for evidence that you can deliver your products or services. This means referrals, citations and reviews From Other People!

You can add yourself to directories and whatever but the net effect is almost zero. Google will just ignore these links.

You can use an aggregator if you want but don't expect anything wonderful to happen. These platforms are bulging at the seams with businesses all of which are fighting with each other.

Ask yourself - have you used any of these directories or aggregators to find products or services? I suspect the answer will be mostly negative. If you aren't using them why should anyone else (including Google) use them.

Get lots and lots of reviews - that will do more for your ranking and reputation than anything else.

I agreed with everything until you mentioned reviews. Getting lots and lots of reviews may not do much if the website is not properly optimized or they aren't using the correct primary category. I see it all the time when a business owner complains that they are being outranked when they have the most reviews. GBP rankings are more than just reviews.

 

[fisicx]

I agreed with everything until you mentioned reviews. Getting lots and lots of reviews may not do much if the website is not properly optimized or they aren't using the correct primary category. I see it all the time when a business owner complains that they are being outranked when they have the most reviews. GBP rankings are more than just reviews.

Very true. It's not that difficult to rank a local business, all you have to do is follow the rules for both a website and GBP. Unfortunately as you say, many business owners try to do it themselves and make a right hash of things.

 

[DClark]

I understand the sentiment.

The point of (a) if I did GPB right and (b) verified by site with Google search console, I don't need to worry about anything... I am not 100% sold on that, but maybe I am just a pessimist GPB help page referencing multi-sourcing data(web crawl, 3rd party, etc,). Even if your verified your GBP, but your listing data isnt consistent where data is crawled, your profile has a higher likelihood of receiving Google Updates/publishing changes to your attribute information.

A question that may be worth asking is why do local search publishers and AI searches use data/signals from aggregators(or directories sourcing from aggregators) if there is no value and they have their own self-serve profile update and verification tools? One possible answer: to generate confidence/trust in location data they receive from different sources so they feel confident in displaying it. Another may be, no data set is perfect and corroboration = confidence.

Aggregation engines in this space are typically designed take in large, complex data sets and use proprietary methodology and data science models to identify and score disparate sources referencing the same identity to build multi-sourced records. Most publishers mentioned on this forum are data aggregators(we just dont call them that dirty word). They multi-source data for businesses and build technology that makes automated attribute and profile publishing decisions based on models they have developed. No one gets its right 100% but attempt to identity the instances of incorrectness and iterate on their platforms to get it wrong less of the time.

yext did an interesting study last year on the topic re: benefits of location management across a wide variety of sites and the impacts in terms of Google clicks. It is also interesting in the day AI to see tools like chatgbt site their sources for business listing information - sure Google is on there, but definitely not the only source.

just my two cents.

 

[fisicx]

What do you hope to achieve using aggregators or any other tool publishing your business data?

The yext study is very misleading as it doesn't give any detail about where these clicks originated. For a local business I doubt there is any real value in doing much more than having a well optimised GBP, website and maybe posting on local forums or SM pages.

What you can't do however is fire and forget. You need to properly mange your profile and website.