Is your business listed on LocalEze.com? I hope so: If you run a “local” business in the US, the site can indirectly help or hurt your local search rankings.
On a tight budget and want to list your business for free? You’re out of luck.
As of just this month, LocalEze no longer allows businesses owners to add their listings to the site for free.
I’ve heard this from a couple of people now – including one of my clients and the guys from FireGang– which prompted me to go in and take a look for myself today. I’ve come to the same conclusion.
Apparently, you can still claim your listing for free if it’s already listed on LocalEze (more on this in a minute). It’s just that now you can’t add a listing (for free) that’s not already in the system.
I’m not wild about this change.
As I’ve written on several occasions, LocalEze is a very important site to list your business on if you want to rank well in the local search results – particularly in the Google+Local (AKA Google Places) results. Being listed there and listed accurately is a huge step in making sure your citations are consistent.
I think the paid package is a good deal, but business owners shouldn’t have to fork over just to have basic control of their own business information. Especially given how many other websites LocalEze feeds your business information to.
That’s what I know so far. There are also some things I don’t know at this stage:
- I’m wondering whether LocalEze will remain as important a data-provider, at least as far as Google’s local-search algorithm is concerned. No doubt it will remain important, but the move toward pay-to-play ultimately may mean fewer businesses and less-fresh info in the database – which is the last thing Google (not to mention Apple Maps) needs at the moment.
- If you’ve already got a claimed listing, can you only update it once annually (for free)?
- Will (and should) LocalEze continue to appear in GetListed.org scans?
- What will we be saying a year from now?
Anyway…
What should you do now? At least one of four things:
- Join me in pouring a fohty for the free listings.
- If you’re listed on LocalEze and if you haven’t already claimed your listing, claim your listing while you still can do so for free.
- If you’re not listed and you’re not on a particularly tight budget, consider adding your listing by forking over for the paid package ($297 / year). You can also add and gain control of your listing if you’re on Yext (which I believe is $397 / year for a single-location “small” business).
- If you’re not listed on LocalEze but you are on a restrictive budget, you can still get listed, but it’s going to take some work and patience. You’ll have to list your business on pretty much all the other important directories (AKA “citation sources”). LocalEze “trusts” some of these sites, and if your business is listed on the latter, it will probably be listed on the former after some months. You’d have to list your business on these other third-party sites anyway if you’re serious about your local SEO. The only difference is that now – if you have more patience than money at the moment – you may want to list your business on those sites first, rather than do LocalEze first and wait for it to feed your info to the other sites
Questions? First-hand observations? Not sure which plan of attack might be best in your situation? Leave a comment!
Phil
Several notes about this.
1)Localeze got tons of spurious and totally bogus listings under their free program. The free input was totally inundated with complete garbage.
2)As a result, if a “free listing” used either a mobile or VOIP number, they rarely if ever took the time to evaluate it and it didn’t make it into their data unless paid
3)They primarily verify listings in an automated way via phone switches. I am sure that they obtain listings from other reliable sources as well (ie the phone companies) so it makes sense to me that they would put a stop to the influx of “new” listings that they were not verifying anyways.
4)Localeze has a very bizarre pricing strategy. Their retail price is an outrageous $297/yr but their reseller pricing is way, way less than that (as much as 95% off depending on volume),
So it is a)not unreasonable for them to want to stem the tide of crap listings and b)not unreasonable to charge to verify a listing if it is out of their normal system. What is unreasonable is their retail pricing model.
It has always been the case with Localeze that if a business had a voip or cell number they needed to pay to get verified. That is now more obvious.
Localeze is an important player in the listing game. This will not change that. Google, to the best of my knowledge, does NOT use their data directly but their data goes so far a field that it is, as you point out, a critical place to be accurate.
Thanks for stopping by, Mike. I didn’t know #1 and 3. Well, I’ve known that LocalEze must get a ton of detritus, but certainly didn’t know that was the motivation behind this.
It seems to me that LocalEze’s pricing might just push more people to Yext. As you say, it’s kinda steep unless you’re a reseller.
My big takeaway from all of this is that local SEO – or at least the citation-building/cleanup side of it – now requires a bit more patience than it did even before.
Yext is never an alternative to one of the primary data suppliers nor should it ever be understood that way. I know you know that but SMBs and many in house marketers do not know that. They are a claiming service plain and simple. A sophisticated one but one none the less. The question for Yext is always is it cheaper to outsource or do yourself. They too however have very, very variable pricing. I have heard prices as low as $135 for some chains. At that point, it is one of the few, easy ways to scale “claiming” at a lot of second tier directories.
Localeze is a primary list provider. That has a different role in both the ecosystem and in Google’s universe. Businesses need to be concerned about data quality at Localeze because if there are errors they will get propagated far and wide often being the cause of duplicates at Google and wrong info at other very important sites that Yext doesn’t even touch (like Bing).
Great points, as always.
I just wish LocalEze would offer a comparison chart somewhere. Even if you basically get zilch unless you pony up, I guess that’s legitimate, but I just hate to see the whole data-control process get even more confusing for the average business owner.
I actually like this move. I have purchased lists in the past from the major list providers (for other companies) and the integrity of the data is everything. This should make Localeze a better source for the companies that purchase their data. Which in turn should make their value to all of us better as their list will propagate more. Lets hope at least. I don’t mind paying for inclusion in a well propagated list.
I can see what you mean. As always, my only concern is that business owners may not be able to fix factually wrong info that’s hurting them. But beyond that, yeah, bring on the pay-to-play.
Pricing following granularity of listings, organic is always best for me – more work, more time, but more control. What’s the volume reqs on reseller accts…cause I’m not seeing such grand savings compared to retail – at least not til after the 1st year.
Yext gives me the heebeegeebees, like Yelp. Is it just a name similarity I’m not voting for that guy mental block..time will tell.
Tilting the bottle & twisting the cap!
Hey Chris,
I’m not sure what the following means:
“Pricing following granularity of listings, organic is always best for me – more work, more time, but more control.”
Good question about the volume requirements on reseller accounts. That I don’t know. I’ve talked with a couple LocalEze resellers, but I’m not one myself and don’t know all the ins and outs.
I just went through the process of claiming and editing an existing listing with a new client. It was free to do so, but they made it very clear that I would only be allowed to make one edit per year with the free option. I could still only edit the basic information, and in order to add additional info (including a website URL), they prompted me to upgrade to the enhanced listing. The process and interface was really simple though. In order to claim it, they did do an automated call to the business number (I don’t remember them doing this in the past) and I made some edits that went live immediately.
Hey Eric, thanks for the first-hand, super-recent feedback. (I’ve helped many a client claim a LocalEze listing – but not since this change.)
They’ve always done the automated call. LocalEze’s, ummm, thriftiness surprises me. I don’t think I’m clear on their “one edit er year” policy. So if your listing has the wrong phone number and address, you can (let’s say) change the phone number now, and 2014 will be the year you can fix your address? I hope that’s not the case. I mean, I could see it if what they meant was you can only change your listing on one occasion per year…
Yes, that’s what I (and they) meant…you can edit name, address, phone, etc. on one occasion per year. So basically, you have one shot to make sure everything is correct.
Well, that’s reasonable. Thanks a TON for the intel, Eric.
Pricing for resellers starts at $35 per list g and go down based on volume
Mike, got a link for the resellers program – I got get that. we’ve always claimed everything by hand, but for $35 we’ll do that first then claim it all by hand after.
I am having a hard time finding the $35 per listing. Do you have to do a lot of volume to get this rate?
I spoke with localeze and to be a partner they wanted a minimum 10 listing signup. Charge $1500 to get the first ten listings and an additional $100 per additional listing. They auto renew each year at $1500 +$100 for each addtional listing. They seem to be in constant flux with their pricing.
Yeah, I’m pretty sure you need a lot of volume to get the $35 rate.
I agree their pricing is confusingly variable. It’s like they’re a guy who keeps growing a beard and shaving it off and can’t just figure it out once and for all.
Pretty funny, I literally just talked to someone named Mike Pica at Localeze and he told me that the partner program is only for companies who have 50 or more listings. He said if you have more than 5 and less than 50 that basically they won’t work with you and you need to route your clients directly to them.
@Brian can you give me the name and contact for your guy?
Geez, these guys are hard-nosed. Makes me wonder whether Kevin from Shark Tank just invested in them!
Thanks for the hard numbers, Ryan.
Yeah, I spoke with one of their reps yesterday. I was told $50 per listing per year. Minimum 40 listings.
That’s some volume, all right. Thanks for the intel!
I saw something similar with CitySearch yesterday. The landing page from GetListed.org seems to have changed; I saw no way to register for the free local listing. I had to fill out the lead form, get in touch with an account manager – go through the upsell pitch, then when I said I was sure I only wanted a free listing I was given an email address and told what information to send them. He said that it could take quite some time for the information to be listed because premium listings had priority.
Yeah, the link on GetListed needs to be updated. The place to go to claim an existing CitySearch listing is https://signup.citygrid.com/cyb/find_business
If you want to add a listing for the first time, the way to do it is to send an email to myaccount@citygridmedia.com
Or if you submitted your ExpressUpdateUSA.com listing at least a couple months ago, it will eventually result in a new CitySearch listing for you (which then you can claim using the above link).
More detail here: https://www.localvisibilitysystem.com/2012/07/25/how-to-add-a-free-citysearch-business-listing-temporary-solution/
Thanks Phil – I’ll add that to our notes.
What happens if a business owner pays the $297 the first year and then stops paying in years two and beyond. Will they get delisted? Could they get by leaving it as a stagnanant listing. And then sign up again if they have a NAP change
Great question, Brian. You wouldn’t get de-listed if you stopped paying up. You’d mostly just lose the ability to fix at will any incorrect info that pops up. But assuming you get your NAP info sorted out on other sites, I’d say that you’ll be fine if you leave LocalEze stagnant for a while.
I had an enhanced listing with Localeze (via a 3rd party Marketing Company – Network Solutions/Web.com). I decided to manage my own listings because incomplete NAP data was being sent. I contacted Localeze to get access to my listing. I needed to add my phone number (the Marketing company forgot to include). I updated my phone number; but when I did, it automatically deleted my website URL and email address. I don’t want to pay again after already paying for the enhanced listing via a 3rd party. Will not having a website URL/email address in Localeze be a negative? The rest of my Localeze NAP is now correct and I plan to manually add my info to all the directories. Does it matter if my website URL/email address is not in Localeze?
Hi Therese,
No, it’s fine if your email address and URL aren’t part of your LocalEze listing. It may mean that some of the sites that LocalEze feeds won’t have your site on-file unless you claim those listings and manually specify your URL.
So it’s not a problem if you have one LocalEze listing and it doesn’t have the URL/email. However, if you have more than one, then probably whatever issues you’ve had with a third-party marketing company will have to be sorted out, so that the multiple LocalEze listings don’t cause data-confusion on other sites.
Hey guys, just wanted to say that as part of our recent release, we’ve now updated our Citysearch claim links to point to https://signup.citygrid.com/self_enroll/add_location which seems to me to still allow for a free listing. Thanks for the heads-up.
No problem – thanks, David!
Was just trying to add a 2nd location listing to a client’s Localeze account today and ran in to this. At least you’ve answered that question.
As much as I know people hate to spend money, particularly on something that has been free up until now, it does go a long way to improving quality. The task at hand is educating clients and potential clients that this sort of thing is simply the cost of doing business. We all know how much businesses were willing to spend on YellowPage ads every year, so this is negligible compared to what they’ve spent in the past.
Well said, Bill. A lot of times for any given client it’s a choice between (1) pay now, (2) pay later, and (3) pay nothing but expect to put serious amounts of your own time and energy into cleanup. I still wish LocalEze didn’t charge, and although I know what it’s like to bootstrap, $297 isn’t exactly a lot of money.
One other question Phil…. do you know if Localeze creates new listings when submitted or does it find your existing listing then corrects the NAP info and pushes the correct info out…? I know when I was looking at Yext’s tool a long while back (maybe even a year ago) that they don’t claim existing profiles. They create a duplicate page with the info that you submit to them. If you’re a new business, then it works fine. If you’ve been around for a while it could cause problems with duplicate listings.
Does Localeze help solve that duplicate listing problem? Sorry not super familiar with this tool b/c most of our clients are Canadian and so we have no need for it and even then we try to claim all listing by hand for our clients.
At the end of the day, would you suggest using all 3 tools: UBL, Yext, & Localeze …? is there any benefit to doing this? It might be tad expensive for most SMB’s to do that. Or do you think using one service is enough?
I still claiming all citations by hand is the best policy.
I also think if a SMB is short on time and $ then they should at least make sure they get these 3 listings claimed for free (since they feed almost everyone):
https://www.mybusinesslistingmanager.com/
https://leads.infousa.com/Landing/UpdateListing.aspx
https://signup.citygrid.com/cyb/find_business
TIP – if in Canada get the yellowpaes.ca listing, that feeds most stuff in Canada.
Great question, Matt. I believe that now if you pay, you have the ability to do two things: (1) add your listing for the first time, and (2) claim a listing that’s already in LocalEze’s system and make edits to it and “enhance” it at will. They’ve always made you check to see whether you’re listed already, precisely because everyone’s better off if you claim an existing listing and correct it, rather than create a new one. Because of that, I’ve never found duplicates to be a problem on LocalEze.
I could see how, as you describe, Yext and LocalEze may not play well together in all circumstances, which might result in duplicates.
UBL, Yext, and LocalEze are all good services for businesses in certain situations. I definitely do NOT think that every business needs to be on any of them, let alone all 3. I agree that claiming and correcting citations by hand is still the best policy. Signing up for those services can help speed up the process, but whether it’s worth it is just a question of (1) budget, (2) how many locations you have, and (3) how frequently your business info changes – at least IMHO.
agreed Phil on all points.
LocalEze up, rankings down. Got my mind on my local and my local on my mind.
I’m going to find out about that reseller program!
You have a poet’s heart, Chris 🙂
I claimed a free listing for a client but it won’t let me change the name of the business because it says:
Your current business name: Business Owner Name
Your requested business name: Actual Business Name
The change that you have requested exceeds our system’s parameters for remaining an edit, and will result in the formation of a new business listing. In order to fundamentally change a business name, you must create a new listing. If you believe this to be a valid name correction, please visit our support page.
Interesting. I haven’t seen that before. I take it you have not made a change to that listing since you claimed it?
I’ve paid for tons of Localeze paid packages for clients and have yet to see any impact. The only thing I really found Localeze was good for was for deleting listings from there that no longer exist. So if a business moves, going in and deleting the listing for their old address seems to help get the old information online.
Thanks for weighing in, Joy. It’s never been my experience that being listed correctly on LocalEze (or on another data-aggregator) “impacts” your rankings in the sense of directly boosting them. More like if you aren’t listed there (free or paid), your citations are more likely to be a mess – which of course does affect your rankings, in a bad way.
Hi Phil, great post. Sorry I haven’t had a chance to comment yet. As far as Localeze goes, I know they’ve always catered towards larger agencies and brands much more than SMB’s. To Mike Blumenthal’s point, a lot of the information they got through the SMB-focused channel was junk…and often created customer service headaches for them that they were just not set up to support.
In my opinion, it’s still valuable for a business to know where they stand on Localeze, and if they’re already on Localeze incorrectly, do what they can to get a change into the system. We’re currently working with Localeze to try to figure out a solution for our users but we obviously don’t control what happens once people leave GetListed :/
Thanks for stopping by, David!
I did notice the CitySearch/CityGrid update on GetListed. That link allows you to claim an existing listing, but I think to add a new listing still involves using the other means (pay, email, or wait for InfoGroup).
Very nice tune-ups on GetListed, by the way.
The only issue I’ve noticed is that the review counts seem to be off: For instance, I did a scan that turned up a count of 5 Google reviews on a Google listing that has 35, and another scan that turned up 0 CitySearch reviews on a page where there are 2. But that’s a real minor issue, obviously.
Totally agree on LocalEze. It’s just such a labyrinth for most SMBs but, as you say, one worth navigating.
Phil, thanks for the bug report on the review counts. We’re aware of the conflicting numbers on some listings & working to get a fix out next week.
Any time, David. Thanks for all you do at GL.
My business is in City Search, but when I click the link above to claim the listing it finds my business, I then click on it and get “an unkown error has occured”
I was going back and forth with what to do as far as going in and claiming all my business listings manually or paying for it. I did finally decide to spend the $297 on Localeze since my time is worth more that that right now.
I had let my business website get severally out dated and I can’t believe how much has changed in the last 10 years.
Any help with the City Search issue I am having is greatly appreciated.
Hi Michelle,
So you went to https://signup.citygrid.com/cyb/find_business ? That’s the place to go to claim your listing (so that you can correct it if need be).
I went back the next day and it was corrected. A representative from City Search e-mailed me as well. Seems it was just some weird glitch.
I am going back to training parrots. They are much more predictable than all the internet stuff I have to do so that I can make money training parrots :).
Thank you for a great post. It helped me out quite a bit.
I like parrots 🙂
I am a newbie to this and would really appreciate your opinion. We sold our business, and I will be working for the new business at the same location. I need to shut down our old business listings, which are a MESS (different phone numbers, duplicates). What would you suggest I do to shut them down quickly (I would rather pay a service than do it myself). And will it take care of shutting down the duplicates?
Good question, Ali. It’s going to take some grunt-work, and the only question is: who does it?
Manual route: Comb through my Definitive Citations List and fix/add listings as need be. (Focus on the sites in the first section.)
Get-help route: Pay to get the help of someone who knows what he/she is doing. My suggestions would be citation-building services offered at NGSMarketing.com or Whitespark.ca.
Hi Phil, I’ve been waiting to comment on this until I was able to get a meeting with LocalEze. Although I have about 30 clients in the local space, I have about 10 with incongruities in their listings that have proved to be both problematic for them in the SERP’s, and difficult to get corrected without brain damage. I just completed a short WebEx meeting with my NeustarLocaleze rep, and was offered a package of 15 listings for 1500 up front per year, any overages will be billed at 100 per year, and if I don’t add an account until say month 8 of my one year contract, that listing will remain live for 12 mos from the date of entry.
All in all I was very impressed, I have agreed to sign an NDA and move forward. It is truly small dollars per client to get an enhanced listing and can be edited and re verified weekly if needed. I’ll keep you in the loop with info I am permitted to share as I move forward. Thanks!
Hi Bill – thanks for the detail. I know a few resellers and know the pricing structure, but I didn’t know the part about what happens if you add an account late in the year.
Everyone needs to deal with LocalEze, obviously, and it’s a good deal for resellers, as you say. I’m just a bit concerned about non-resellers.
Hi, I’ve shut down my old business and started listing my new business on the data aggregators, as you recommend. Instead of waiting for new listings to appear, can I manually go into the major business listing sites and list my business.Or will this cause duplicate listings when these business listing sites finally update from Localeze/acxiom/infogroup? Thanks, Ali
Hi Ali,
Yes, you can go to those major sites and make the changes manually; in fact, I’d strongly recommend it. It’s only if you don’t make those changes manually that you’d have duplicate-listing issues.
Hi Phil,
I heard you on BrightLocal’s recent webinar and just want to share my experiences with the three main aggregators…your up-to-date info. on ExpressUpdate was very helpful.
After listening to the webinar I signed up for the three main NAP providers mentioned by the experts: Localeze for $297/year, ExpressUpdate/InfoGroup, for $30/month, and MyBusinessListingManager/Acxiom which is free.
ExpressUpdate was the slickest, they’ve got an intuitive state-of-the-art Ruby on Rails site. I was able to find, claim, and edit my business NAP info. After plopping down $300 for Localeze (no monthly payment option) I was not able to change or enhance my old business NAP listing, I repeatedly got an error message, so I contacted their tech support by email. On Acxiom I was able to claim and update my NAP but am waiting for them to verify it by phone.
One day after buying InfoGroup’s ExpressUpdate $30/month service my updated NAP info. started showing up in their network. They got all the NAP info. correct on their member sites, however they put them in the wrong category: Agricultural Products and Farm Equipment, which would have jeopardized my Google+ Local category integrity if I had not noticed, highlighting the need to follow up on these services to make sure they get it right.
I sent them an email and within one day they had corrected it and sent the corrected categories out to their network before the other two services have even started to distribute theirs: I’m still waiting for Acxiom to verify my claim (but at least it’s free) and I’m still waiting to hear back from Localeze after two emails and a phone message to their tech support so I can even update my listing and then who knows how long it will take each of them to distribute the updated info. to their member listings.
Meanwhile, ExpressUpdate has already updated my NAP in most of their network as I have verified for myself after just two business days. They are powered by Yext which is making me interested in Yext’s other services.
I’ll probably drop Localeze after the 1-year is up but I’ll keep the ExpressUpdate/Yext especially since they offer monthly payments. $30 was worth getting my NAP updated so rapidly in their network. The jury is still out regarding the $300 for Localeze.
Cheers,
Jeff
Thanks for the compliments, Jeff, and for the detail.
The overhaul of ExpressUpdate is nice, as you say. They do sometimes mess with / mess up your info even after you’ve claimed your listing and it’s been approved, so it is worth checking on from time to time – as you’ve done.
LocalEze is worth the wrangling, at least to get all the correct info in the system ASAP. After the first year, I agree that the jury’s out as to whether the paid listing is worth it.
Yext doesn’t power ExpressUpdate or any of the other data-aggregators. They’re independent of each other. They do have a partnership – in the form of the deal you signed up for – but you can get all you need out of ExpressUpdate without Yext, although Yext can be handy in some situations.
“They do sometimes mess with / mess up your info even after you’ve claimed your listing and it’s been approved, so it is worth checking on from time to time…”
Good to know, thanks!
Update: I just got an email from Localeze saying they got my email from Saturday and opened a ticket! Meanwhile, 20 of the 25 listings in the ‘Premium’ service from ExpressUpdate are already updated with the correct information. Aside from my own needs as a business owner it seems to suggest that the data provided by InfoGroup is more current than that provided by Localeze even though they are larger…
Thanks again Phil for your expertise on that webinar.
Thanks, Jeff. I’ll be on another BrightLocal webinar on September 25, where Don Campbell and I will be talking about reviews. In the meantime, BL has a lot of great-looking webinars lined up.
Regarding LocalEze and ExpressUpdate, yeah, it does take a while for either of them to propagate your info. Yext can at least provisionally fix those listings even if ExpressUpdate hasn’t started pushing data yet, though, which is sounds like what you’re experiencing.
Hi Phil,
Do you think its good idea to list same business in LocalEze and InfoGroup?
All of my clients are listed on InfoGroup which i like better since i have better control of my listings and its usually takes two weeks for the the listings to go live.
I wanted to test it out and I singed up my client for LocalEze and then i called customer support and they told me that the process of distributing the data to their partners might take about 60-90 days. So I’m just thinking to sign up for InfoGroup instead .
Good question, Vlad. You need both. And MyBusinessListingManager.com. Sure, all of this stuff takes time – usually frustratingly long – but that’s how it goes.
Phil anyway to bypass document verification on acxiom?
It asks for:
“Federal Tax License Letter *submit the letter that includes your ID#, name, address and/or phone number of business
State, County, or City Business License or Sales Tax License
Doing Business As License
Fictitious Name Registration”
My client’s website name is different from what he has in Federal Tax License Letter,
example “Maximum Roofing” in google place and website, and everybody knows business as “Maximum Roofing”. But when he registered the company(many years ago) it was “His name Professional Services LLC”.
What we can do about this?
There’s no way around it, James.
Speak of the devil- I’m trying to fix a client’s listings in ExpressUpdate… he has two dups with one being a wrong number.
I’ve gone through the process of claiming the business… but I can’t login w/ the username/password.
Is anyone else having issues with accessing the dashboard?
So you’ve claimed the listing within the past 40 days or so? If not, you’ll have to reclaim the listing by phone and set up a new username. The old one(s) won’t work, no matter what. You’ll want to check out my post on the update to ExpressUpdate, if you haven’t already.
Hi Phil- yes, it was about 10 days ago.
I check out your article about the update. Thanks!
Sounds good, Chris. I’d be interested in hearing how that goes.
It would be great if someone had an updated list about which data providers and citations verify by phone AND how. For example, which of these “verify by phone” by giving you the PIN on screen then type the PIN in by phone, and which calls the biz number and gives the PIN by phone that can be input on screen. Each requires a different approach.
For those that give the PIN by phone, as the agency you can hammer out several in a row and just tell the person answering the phone to write them all down. For those that give the PIN on screen and it has to be typed into the phone, you have to be on the line with client while verifying.
If someone has a list to share that would be great. If not, I will start on it and share when done.
As I recall, Nyagoslav Zhekov has exactly that information in his citation-building guide:
https://www.ngsmarketing.com/citation-building-guide/
I highly recommend it.
On a related note, whitepages.com gets their “free listing” info aggregated from ExpressUpdateUSA – no way to add it directly. Paid listings are done with Yext. Interesting racket. Apparently it’s too much to ask for them to list this option on their front page. Chalk it up to “good business” for them; “integrity”…not so much.
Exactly, Len. Directories (like WhitePages) that have been absorbed by Yext seem to have had their day. Yext certainly has some merits, but essentially it’s picking the little shreds of meat off the bones of these sites.
Though unfortunate that it is no longer free, I feel like when one pays for a service, it becomes a better service. Spam garbage is rampant on today’s internet, and really it’s a small price to pay for a fairly complete service.
I however choose to overlook, update and submit local citations for my clients manually and one by one. It may take more time, but inherently more accurate, and can offer value to my clients to show them the work and effort that is being put forth to handle these tasks. As with any type of marketing, hard work and consistency is key. So the same goes for your client’s citations.
Very true, David. Well said.
Does anyone here have a current reseller account 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.
Russ
Hey Russ, We’re getting ready to add several clients to Localeze so I’ll have a few extra accounts to sell if you are interested. Let me know, we’ll be signing up in the next couple of weeks.
Brent
RIP local listings is right. These directories that charge to be listed are bogus, when half of them dont even provide any real value other than a very slight blip on your SEO radar. IMO Dmoz and Yahoo are the only directories with merit. BOTW a distant 3rd.
I agree, Lorne, but LocalEze isn’t a “directory” as the term’s commonly understood: it feeds a ton of directories. I don’t like that they’re charging $300 / year, but free or paid, a correct LocalEze listing is important to have.
DMOZ is a joke. Yahoo and BOTW might have value, though.
Exactly, having a correct listing is really the focus. Not to mention that $300 is really a bargain considering how many directories Localeze feeds. There’s no way I could sign up for and manage that many listings for a client for $300/yr. At 5 minutes per listing I’d have to charge 9-10 hours to cover that many listings, and I charge a lot more than $30/hr.
Very true, Brent.
Moz Local looks like it’s taking care of all the data aggregators for you.
Anyone using it?
Is there a hitch or is this used as a lead generator for Moz? That’s okay if it is…so long as I know ahead of time. There was a time that two other major companies(that everyone here would know) would contact your business clients after your marketing agency used their service.
Moz Local does square away the data-aggregators for you. I use it for several clients. I like it.
You’ll want to read Andrew Shotland’s thoughtful review of it:
https://www.localseoguide.com/moz-local-1-0-review/