Nowadays, the internet is crucial to converting prospects into paying customers. Potential clients might hear about you from social media or a “near me” Google Search, and the decision on whether or not to get in contact and make a purchase is based solely on what they read about you on the Internet.
To win at this game, your business has to be seen by customers searching online. And to do that, your business information has to be consistent and trustworthy enough to convince search engines that you’re the right business to recommend to customers in their search results.
Building a strong online presence for both human customers and search engines can be achieved through digital business listing management.
What is digital listing management?
What are business listings?
First, let’s talk about business listings. Business listings are online profiles of your business, with details such as your business name, physical address, website, contact number, operating hours, and more.
They usually appear on various online platforms, such as search engines like Google, directories like Yelp, mapping services like Apple maps, and many more.
Search engines crawl and store your business listings information, so when a potential new customer searches for your services, they get the right information every time on every platform.
This is why it’s important to ensure that your business details are accurate and consistent across all listings—so that wherever customers find you, they receive correct information about how to contact your business.
How does business listing management work?
Business listing management is the process of ensuring your business listing information is updated across directories, search engines, GPS systems, review apps and websites, social media platforms, and other places online.
This is not a one-and-done thing. Listing management involves actively maintaining business details across all your business profiles to reflect changes in your location, store hours, website, and more.
The goal is to ensure that customers get accurate, up-to-date information about your business wherever they might find you online. This makes it easier for them to connect with you, visit your shop, and make a purchase.
However, with all the apps and platforms nowadays, it’s a challenge to keep track of all your business profiles manually. This is where a digital listings management service comes in.
What goes in a business listing?
Here are some of the details that typically appear on a business listing:
- Business name: Your business name should be correct and consistent across all listings, down to the spelling, capitalization, and punctuation.
- Address: List your correct business address so customers can visit you. If you change locations, make sure to update your business listing with your new address to avoid customers going to your old location.
- Website: Direct customers to your website so they can learn more about your business.
- Contact number: List your phone number so customers can call you if they can’t physically drop by.
- Operational hours: Business hours let customers know what time they can call or visit your shop. This is especially important during the holiday season, when hours may vary. Make sure to specify the days you're open and post updated business hours.
- Photos: Up-to-date pictures of your shop and products show customers what to expect when they visit.
- Reviews: Being transparent with your reviews, both positive and negative, helps build trust.
Why is digital listing management important for businesses?
Improves search engine optimization (SEO)
The math is simple: if more people see your business on search results, the more likely that they’ll click on your website, visit your shop, and buy from you.
Digital listing management boosts your presence on search results by ensuring that your business's information is consistent, accurate, and up-to-date across various online directories and platforms. When this information is optimized, search engines like Google will see your business as legitimate and trustworthy, and will be more likely to display it on search results.
Enhances user experience and customer trust
When customers search for a business, they expect to find up-to-date details, such as correct hours of operation, contact information, and locations. Inaccurate or outdated listings can lead to frustration, driving potential customers away.
On the other hand, well-managed listings provide a seamless experience, offering the right information when and where it’s needed. Moreover, consistent and professional listings across platforms build credibility, making it more likely for users to engage with and trust the business.
Supports multi-location businesses
Digital listing management is especially helpful for multi-location businesses, as it ensures that each branch’s information is accurately represented and optimized across various online directories. This helps improve local search rankings for each branch, ensuring the business appears in relevant searches by customers in different geographic areas.
Additionally, it allows businesses to tailor listings with location-specific content, promotions, and customer reviews, which enhances engagement and drives traffic to each individual site.
Best practices for effective listing management
To get the most out of your digital business listings, observe the following best practices:
Consistently update your NAP information across all platforms.
The most critical information in your listing is your business name, address, and phone number (NAP). Make sure this data is accurate and the same across all your listings, as inconsistencies confuse search engines and may lose you valuable customer leads.
Claim and verify business listings on major directories.
Verify your profiles on Google Business, Apple Maps, Yelp, Facebook, and other directories so you’re in control of all your listings.
If you find new listings on platforms that you don’t control, put in a request to claim the profile. This ensures that all your business listings belong to you and can be updated accurately.
Monitor and remove duplicate listings.
On that note, check for duplicate listings on these platforms and remove them. Duplicate listings can confuse customers (especially if the details on the listings differ) and can cannibalize each other on search engine results.
Tools for effective business listing management
Different local business listing management tools have different strengths, so you should choose the one that’s a right fit for your business size and needs. But as a baseline, here are some essential features your listing management tool should have:
- Centralized management. You should be able to monitor and update all your listings from one convenient tool.
- Real-time updates. Whenever you change your business details, your listing management software should update the information in real-time across all the synced listing sites.
- Duplicate listing removal. Your listing management tool should find and remove any duplicate listings on your platforms to avoid confusing customers or cannibalizing your search engine result rankings.
- Analytics and reporting. Your listing management tool should track insights from local search performance, so you know which areas to refine and optimize.
Grasshopper has partnered with industry leader TransUnion to bring the digital listings management solutions to Grasshopper users.
With TransUnion, you can manage your business’ online listings with ease through their user-friendly portal. Quickly edit your business information once and have it auto-populated across 80+ platforms including directories, in-car navigation, mobile apps, and more. Just think, no more wasted time updating your holiday business hours one-by-one on each platform.
By being found where your customers are looking, you can expand reach and visibility, gain significant organic search benefits, and drive traffic and revenue to your site.
Bring customers straight to your door
Managing your online business listings across multiple search engines, apps, directories, review sites, and social media platforms takes up a lot of time and energy—time and energy that is better spent running your business.
This is why a listing management tool is a wise investment. You can rest easy knowing that the information about your business that’s circulating online is accurate, under your control, and optimized to convert customers.
In addition to listing management, small businesses need other tools like virtual phone systems to help connect them with customers. Grasshopper is a full virtual phone system that caters to solopreneurs and small teams. We offer features tailored to support business needs, such as VoIP, voicemail transcription, call forwarding, and more. You can use Grasshopper via mobile or desktop apps, ensuring you never miss a call even while on the go.
