Yahoo Local, can no longer update listing?

[Phil Rozek]

I'm with Scott. These days, I ignore Yahoo altogether. It's not like it ever affected your Google visibility, so the question has been whether people actually search on Yahoo Local. Can't be many.

Plus, having duplicates there isn't always a bad thing: sometimes that's the only way to have both your Yelp reviews and Yahoo reviews showing.

 

[Scott Barnett]

That's a great point Phil. We know some businesses that "lost" their Yahoo reviews when Yahoo sync'ed up their record with Yelp. Yahoo Local is more trouble than it's worth. Glad that's settled

 

[Phil Rozek]

Well-said, Scott.

But wait - there's more!

Yahoo takes forever to update the Yelp reviews it's showing. A month or two ago I noticed year-old unfiltered Yelp reviews showing up on businesses' Yelp listings but not on their Yahoo listings (the ones feeding off the Yelp reviews).

Yahoo seems to have done a refresh within the last month, but at least for some businesses (if not for all of them) Yahoo let their reputations fossilize for a whole year.

 

[NewSunSEO]

I have had success reclaiming listings in the new dashboard. If you had a basic listing before, you should be able to edit your listing through the new unified dashboard:
https://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/dashboard/v2/install/apps/basiclisting

Just search for and reclaim your business, update and verify. Yahoo will then review and publish the edits to your listing.

"For Basic Listings, please allow 30 days. After approval, allow an additional 1-2 days for the updates to show up in Yahoo Local."
-https://help.yahoo.com/kb/yahoo-local-basic/local-listing-statuses-sln15969.html?impressions=true

Unfortunately, sometimes it can take more than 30 days for Yahoo to "review" a basic listing.

I've been able to edit my listing through that link, HOWEVER it has been saying for MONTHS now that the changes need to be reviewed... Apparently Yahoo takes FOREVER to approve edits...

 

[Ashwin]

Just got off the phone with my Yahoo Local sales rep. I've been trying to work out a bulk upload deal of their enhanced listings the past couple of weeks and it's been slooow to say the least.

I just heard from him that they no longer support bulk listings and the only way I could work with Yahoo would be by using LocalWorks (which is Yext).

 

[Scott Barnett]

Yup - I'd say it's the beginning of the end, but I think the end is probably already here....

 

[NewSunSEO]

I'm a reseller of the Yext platform. I put it on hold to check out some other services. When I was using Yext, our Local SEO placements were showing up in the top three for numerous high traffic keywords. I put Yext on hold to check out some other citation services. Yext apparently does have some good value, as about a week after pausing my account with them, our Local positions nearly vanished. I've activated my Yext service again & in less than a week I'm seeing Google Local positions coming back. Yext also updated Yahoo's listing the way we wanted. When I login to Yahoo it says it is still being reviewed... But the change I wanted is now live. It seems like Yahoo is trying to extort people to use their Yext service...

 

[Dustybones]

... When I login to Yahoo it says it is still being reviewed... But the change I wanted is now live. It seems like Yahoo is trying to extort people to use their Yext service...

I was talking to a co-worker who handles all the Yahoo listings and he said that "Pending Review" can easily stay there for ever, but the listing is live. Yahoo who is also going to try and spin off there Small Business Services.

Yahoo About Spin Off Small-Business Services

 

[NewSunSEO]

The change I submitted through Yahoo was several months ago & it never went live through them. Using Yext, it updated in about 3 or 4 days. I'm NOT trying to push Yext, but it does have a benefit how it pushes out the citation & the changes update in a few days. These are some other good citation resources also:

Local Marketing Software From Synup
https://tools.brightlocal.com
The Definitive List of Local Search Citations | LocalVisibilitySystem.com
Local SEO Checklist | SEO Checklist 2015
https://moz.com/local (Just an aggregator, we did not see any notable results with our local rankings)

 

[katandmouse]

The reason pausing Yext had that negative affect for you is because when you cancel Yext your local listings go back to their previous condition. On the other hand, if you were to manually update your listings yourself without Yext, they would remain indefinitely. So you don't need Yext to get that value. You can do it yourself. The question every business owner needs to ask is, is the cost of Yext worth it for my unique situation? The recurring fee to keep your listing data the same year after year may be a lot more than hiring someone to do that for you manually once and be done with it - or until you move.

---------- Post Merged at 12:36 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 12:26 PM ----------

Yext also updated Yahoo's listing the way we wanted. When I login to Yahoo it says it is still being reviewed... But the change I wanted is now live. It seems like Yahoo is trying to extort people to use their Yext service...

That's one of the benefits of Yext. They tie into platforms that are difficult if not impossible to edit. So far, I've managed to get around the seeming inability to edit data on Yext partner pages, but Yahoo is the worst. As to extortion, from the deceptive tactics I see I out there and the fact that they lock down your bad data where you can't get to it, I would say it borders that. I think Yext would be better off if they worked to become the brand everyone knew to be the small business owner's helper instead of extortioner. How they approach building their business could possibly make a good class action suit for some attorneys.

 

[Scott Barnett]

Something that's important to realize - the time/effort to enter and validate data is obviously hard - that's why very few directory sites do it anymore. So, when you look at the option to do it yourself (expensive and time consuming) or have somebody send you data via an API and PAY YOU TO TAKE THEIR DATA (if you partner with Yext), the lazy or dead directories will jump at that chance. There is no way that a directory that is running an authoritative directory would take data from any third party as absolute.

This is not a knock on Yext - they have figured out how to take advantage of this market issue - but in my mind, the minute a directory site agrees to take Yext data in lieu of all other options out there (including the business owner updating their own info themselves), they have admitted defeat. This is why I believe beyond a shadow of a doubt that Yahoo Local is dead.

And I have no issue with somebody paying Yext if they think having all those citations are valuable to them. To me though, they are getting citations on dead directories, which in my mind hold very little value. If you are on the valuable directories, you have enough link "juice" from them alone. A lot less stuff to worry about too.