The landscaping service industry has grown to become a whopping $88-billion industry.

The swimming pool construction sector has also seen its fair share of 3.8% annual growth, with its total yearly revenue now at $9 billion!

Who wouldn’t want to tap into that pool of money (sorry)?

But with more than half a million landscaping businesses and more than 49 thousand pool builders in the U.S., the competition can quickly drown out your own firm (again, sorry).

All puns aside, how can you make certain this doesn’t happen?

Ever heard of local SEO citations? That’s one way to get your office doors swinging.

You don’t have to worry even if this is the first time you’ve encountered the term. That’s what this article is all about.

So, keep reading to learn about local citations and how they can benefit your company!

What Local SEO Citations Are All About

Local citation revolves primarily around your business’ name, address, and phone number (NAP). Whether this entire string of information appears on an industry-specific or a local directory, that’s a citation in itself.

Similar to how major search engines (Google in particular) use links to your site to determine your business’ online authority, the same goes true for citations. The only difference is that you don’t need those citations to link back to your business’ website to receive credit for them.

Simply put, you can simply list your NAP as it is. To make it even clearer, here’s an example of a complete citation:

Pool & Patio Marketinglocal seo citations
1290 Bay Dale Dr #336
Arnold, MD 21012
410-983-9760

Now, there are two basic ways to lay out a citation. One is through a complete citation (like the example above).

The other is through a partial citation.

As the term already suggests, it doesn’t include all parts of the NAP. A partial citation usually appears either as the combination of your business’ name and contact number, or the name and complete address.

Any kind of citation helps your local SEO campaign. But wouldn’t it be better if you get complete ones so that potential customers know right away how to contact or visit you?

You may have seen local citations using a different format from the example above (vertical). If you want to do things horizontally, then that’s fine too.

The important thing is to ensure high visibility of all the essential details about your business. That means who you are, how people can contact you, and where they can visit you.

Consistency of Info is Key

Using a different format for your NAP is okay. But when it comes to the details itself, it’s not. Also, once you pick a specific format, you need to stick to it.

Make sure that your local citations 100% match the NAP that appears on both your website and Google My Business page.

If your business’ name has an “Ltd” in it and that’s included in your site’s NAP, then make sure it’s present throughout all citations. The same goes true for using the # sign in your office’s address.

Even how you format your contact details (0 or +, with or without spaces) can impact the effectiveness of your local citations.

How Does It Work?

Local SEO citations aren’t limited to directories. Other blogs, social media sites, and forums are great places to get them from.

But to get them in the first place, you need to understand how they fit in your local SEO campaign. In this case, we’ll use content marketing as an example.

Let’s say you’re just starting your business. One of the first things you need to do is research the competition within the same area of your operation. After all, you want to know who (and just how many) you’ll fight with for the attention of the same customers.

Next, come up with ways on how to stand out from the crowd, such as content marketing (because content is king!) With the right marketing strategies revolving around high quality, relevant content, potential customers will flock to your site. They’ll be quite interested in what you have to offer.

Good examples of top-of-the-line content are comprehensive guides and how-tos (whether for landscaping or pool businesses). You should also throw in infographics to make it easier for your readers to digest the content. Also, just so you know, infographics can do this because the brain goes on hyperdrive – about 60,000 times faster – when it processes images compared to text.

Once you’ve built an amazing content portfolio, you’re ready for local citations.

Just think about it:

Content so useful and helpful would gain so much traction that other readers would be more than willing to share it. It may leave such an impact on them that they’ll feel compelled to reference to – or cite – your business.

Along with your entire NAP.

So that reference to your NAP? It’s essentially a citation.

As such, the more people who refer to your business, along with your contact number and complete address, the more citations you receive. Search engines will reward you handsomely for this.

The Fun Part: How Citations Do Your Business A Lot of Good

Search engines rank businesses based on reviews, links, and citations. They find it logical that a business getting a lot of attention and mentions deserve a better ranking.

Especially if the citations appear on topic- or location-relevant websites, blog pages, or forums.

Think of citations as a form of good publicity. Because that’s basically what they are.

For example, you just launched a new service for your landscaping business. Perhaps you now offer fertilization and irrigation too. If a local online newspaper talks about this and mentions your entire NAP, then that’s a citation.

Not only do you get good publicity, search engines will also take this into consideration when ranking your site! Aside from ranking better on search engines, consumers themselves will find you more credible too.

Ultimately, they’ll choose you over the competition.

Let’s not forget that local citations also spread awareness of your brand. They make it easier for potential customers to find you on the web.

So, the more websites, blog pages, and forums your NAP will appear on, the greater the likelihood of consumers finding you.

ranking factors

  1. My Business Signals (Proximity, categories, keyword in business title, etc.) 19%
  2. Link Signals (Inbound anchor text, linking domain authority, linking domain quantity, etc.) 17%
  3. On-Page Signals (Presence of NAP, keywords in titles, domain authority, etc.) 14%
  4. Citation Signals (IYP/aggregator NAP consistency, citation volume, etc.) 13%
  5. Review Signals (Review quantity, review velocity, review diversity, etc.) 13%
  6. Behavioral Signals (Click-through rate, mobile clicks to call, check-ins, etc.) 10%
  7. Personalization  10%
  8. Social Signals (Google engagement, Facebook engagement, Twitter engagement, etc.) 4%

Start Your Local Citation Building Campaign Now

Time is of the essence when it comes to marketing, so it’s best you get as many SEO citations ASAP. We can help you with that.

Shoot us a message and we’ll help you figure out your next step to getting more of those local citations!

Ready to learn more?

Bring in new leads with a website that works for you.

Schedule your free, 15 minute strategy consultation now!

Summary
Article Name
What Are Local SEO Citations And How Do They Benefit Your Company?
Description
Here's the citation building definition and how it benefits your company. It's important to make sure that your local citations match the name, address, and phone number that appears on both your website and Google My Business page.
Author
Publisher Name
Pool and Patio Marketing
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