What do you think about online city directories?

Question

What do you think about online city directories?

Answer 1

Are you referring to review-type sites like CitySearch and Yelp? They are a smart move if you have a local business. You should sign up for Google and Yahoo local as well.

Also, there are four or five companies that provide the info for most of the local directories, make sure to list with them too. InfoUSA, Insiderpages and Localeze are just a couple popular ones that come to mind.

Search for "local SEO" and you should get some good tips.

Answer 2

What timing - I'm doing an article on geo-targeting for someone..

If you have a local business - it's a must.  You should spend your money on local and not global opportunities.

If you have a global business - there's other considerations - you might want to go the international to national to state to city route....

It really depends on the directories and your business or service.  A city directory that google doesn't give a lot of credit to isn't going to do you much good.  But as far as local searches on Yahoo - yes definitely. Google and Yahoo are paying a LOT more attention to local searches - people are searching locally and not happy with the results they are getting and Yahoo and Google are trying to fix that.  People are also using the internet more than the hard copy yellow pages now.  If you have a local business - it's an absolute. You must. Make sure you have a page concentrating on the city, and relevant geo-targeted keywords thrown in your tags and links so you build up a relevant circle for search engines.  

I'm searching for a new doctor...I search "neurologists city state" and then do searches by zip code, area whatever.  I'd have to go through 3 or 4 local phone books to cover the areas I want to search...and not everyone advertises in the hard copy yellow pages - but a website could pickup a name and phone number and advertise it for free to include in their directory - so they'll have more information.

Anyhow - I'd give it a definite yes.