LocalEze- Channel Partner Program- Yay or Nay

[Chris Ratchford]

With the recent news about LocalEze and no more free listing management, I'm curious to know if anyone here is a channel partner?

I know that they offer a significant discount for bulk listing management.

 

[Colan Nielsen]

Hi Chris,

Have you seen Phil's post about some of the changes? - RIP LocalEze Free Business Listings | LocalVisibilitySystem.com

 

[Brian]

I am not a Partner. However, I spoke to them about being one. I am small and do not want a big commitment. However they told me I could do a min. listing commitment of 10 listings for $1500 which works out to $150 per listing. Any listings beyond ten would be billed at $100. Each year you get an auto renew of $1500 + 100 per listings.

During the call I asked the rep about stagnant listings. Listings where you rarely or never update. He said there is a benefit to poking the listing monthly even if the data does not change.

 

[Chris Ratchford]

@colan
Yes, I read Phil's blog- and Mike Blumenthal's comment about LE's reseller program piqued my interest. I had a call this morning w/ a LE rep.

But I read Phi's comment about the ability to edit a free listing once... so I'm thinking there's not a need to fork over $$$$ for all my clients' listings.

 

[Phil Rozek]

@colan
Yes, I read Phil's blog- and Mike Blumenthal's comment about LE's reseller program piqued my interest. I had a call this morning w/ a LE rep.

But I read Phi's comment about the ability to edit a free listing once... so I'm thinking there's not a need to fork over $$$$ for all my clients' listings.

Yeah, I'd definitely take the "poke your listing" suggestion with a grain of salt (as it sounds like you've done). They've gotta move product, after all.

I know that at least until recently they'd ask you to re-verify your claimed listing every 6 months. But I've never been sure that doing so matters in any way (and I'm not even sure you can do it any longer unless you fork over). It's not like a "stagnant" listing necessarily goes bad.

 

[JoshuaMackens]

We are a LE partner and if you're a Local SEO organization, the investment is worth it in my opinion.

Just to clear a few things up, the investment is $1,500 upfront but it's $50 a listing after that for a year. The $1,500 gets you 15 listings and you must pay the $1,500 again the next coming year if you want to continue with them.

One issue that Phil brought up that I found interesting was that maybe Google will start to devalue LE in the local search algorithm. I don't know how Google would ascertain a listing in a local search directory is due to LE or not so I don't think it will play a role. Maybe they take a direct feed from LE and may devalue the one citation that LE directly provides but I doubt it. Even then, we don't subscribe to LE for their submission to Google. We subscribe for the syndication.

Also, to put things in perspective, Acxiom does the exact same thing with a little twist. Acxiom will not take a new listing if it's not in their database (much like LE) unless you prove to them that the business actually exists. How do you prove that you may ask? By submitting tax or licensing information to them via fax or email that shows the business name, address, and telephone number...you're kidding me, right? No, I am not.

Even then, they ask for 30 days to get the listing into the system just for you to claim it. Then, from there, it makes its way into the feeds apparently.

Anyways, sounds like a sad change for Local SEO's and a push for their paid product, which will probably work as I think LE is just too important for LSEO's to neglect. It may also be a data integrity issue as well because Acxiom does pretty much the same thing but they do give you a few hoops to jump through just on the off chance that you really, really want your listing in there. Just make sure you feel comfortable faxing or emailing your confidential tax or licensing info.

 

[Chris Ratchford]

Hi Josh

Thanks for your input! You mentioned the hurdles with Acxiom.

I've used their My Business Listing Manager platform and all they require is for the business to call Acxiom from their office... unless something just changed?

 

[JoshuaMackens]

That is true if your business is already listed in their database. If it is a new business and not in their database, you have to go through the process I mentioned above. Basically, they're trying to solidify their data integrity, much like Localeze.

 

[Colan Nielsen]

Just wanted to throw in a side note, just in case some weren't aware. There are no fees associated with removing/deleting listings with incorrect data (old addresses, out of business..etc) on Localeze and Acxiom. This is important to understand if you are going through the process of cleaning up NAP data.

 

[Chris Ratchford]

Great point, Colan!

 

[Brian]

We are a LE partner and if you're a Local SEO organization, the investment is worth it in my opinion.

Just to clear a few things up, the investment is $1,500 upfront but it's $50 a listing after that for a year. The $1,500 gets you 15 listings and you must pay the $1,500 again the next coming year if you want to continue with them.

Localeze is very wishy washy on their pricing. I have received 3 different price quotes from them. The most recent pricing was a min. listing commitment of 10 listings for $1500 which works out to $150 per listing. Any listings beyond ten would be billed at $100. Each year you get an auto renew of $1500 + 100 per additional listing.

 

[JoshuaMackens]

Localeze is very wishy washy on their pricing. I have received 3 different price quotes from them. The most recent pricing was a min. listing commitment of 10 listings for $1500 which works out to $150 per listing. Any listings beyond ten would be billed at $100. Each year you get an auto renew of $1500 + 100 per additional listing.

All I can tell you is what we paid and that I was quoted that same price two other times before we finally pulled the trigger.

 

[russofford]

Does anyone here currently have a contract with Localeze? If so, perhaps we could work out a small reimbursement to add a few of my clients to Localeze via your dashboard.


I had a subscription in 2012, and only used about 1/2 of my credits before the year?s contract expired. I basically wasted 1/2 of the $1,500 minimum buy-in. :S Needless to say we did not renew our contract.

Please send me a private message if you are interested in listing some of my clients.

Thank you,


Russ

 

[Blake Denman]

I was quoted the same as you, Brian.

$1500 up front for 10 listings, then $100 per listing after that. If you have more listings to add, such as a bulk update, they can work on getting the price down.

 

[JoshuaMackens]

Honestly, at this point, I won't be renewing our contract with them when it comes due. We didn't use all of the listings and I don't really know how powerful it was in the first place.

We may cancel and realize we made a mistake later on but for right now, I just don't think I see it.

 

[Dustybones]

He said there is a benefit to poking the listing monthly even if the data does not change.

We get this with YEXT as well, but never see anything come of it. So we stopped.

 

[travelincat]

We are a Localeze partner and will not be renewing. We have seen no benefit at all to any of the clients that we submitted to them over the course of a year.

We found that hand submitting to about 25 of the top citation sites is far more effective. Yes it takes time, but the results are much better as you can more completely fill out each site's necessary information.

 

[Drew Goettemoeller]

I'll be honest we started with localeze reselling late last year and saw some great returns, distributions already. We put them in and tracked with white spark and brightlocal to test the difference. I saw listings for 1 location pass 300 citations this month, it was very cool to say the least. Also, +1 for brightlocal truly a great asset in tracking and showing value.

 

[JoshuaMackens]

So, this always seems to happen, but we've completely switched our tune with Localeze

We did actually decide to renew and are pretty excited about it.

Just wanted to update my post where I told people we wouldn't be renewing. We'll do it this year and see how it works out again.

 

[Chris Ratchford]

What made you change your mind?