Get Yourself Listed on the Web

Go ahead, do a vanity search (otherwise known as “Google-ing”) for your name or business. Do you like what you find? So often, people say they’ve done this and have been unhappy at the information they find. It’s old, it’s personal, it’s simply wrong. Don’t waste your time trying to get those webmasters to remove your information because they: 1) won’t 2) aren’t home 3) have been closed down 4) there are simply too many 5) they all get their information from somewhere. You can be proactive with your online information (see How to Get Started in Reputation Management) and displace it with content you DO want people to see. Or you can list yourself.

Why is it important?

Yellow Pages Association and comScore found that local search for businesses, products and services grew 58% last year and reached 15.7 billion searches, more than a tenth of overall search traffic. Additionally, see this Sprout Social blog to read more about the benefits of social media on local search results.

According to Internet Reputation Management, 94% of people do research before buying and 60% of those are going to research you online. They might use a phone, they might not. If they were to call you, they most likely aren’t using a traditional phone directory. People under the age of 35 probably don’t have a landline. Did you know that if you don’t have a landline, you may not get a book delivered to your door? It’s true. 18 states have enacted an opt-in policy for delivery and only 2% choose to receive one.

Tools To Use

Here are some tools that I think you’ll find helpful to get your information listed on the web. Granted, there are more here than you’ll ever really use but pick and choose the ones you want to list yourself on. Focus on the biggies towards the top of the list and the ones that have incorrect info about you and get them the right stuff:

Google Places
Yahoo!
Bing
Yelp
Merchant Circle
Manta (really common search result)
Facebook (get a business page and list your address)
Citysearch (click register to get started)
MapQuest
Foursquare
Yellowbook
Yellowbot
SuperPages
InsiderPages (sign up then search for your business, claim it, or create your listing)
Local
Localeze (search for your business, claim or add listing)
Angie’s List
Kudzu
Get Listed (an aggregate and will show you what your listings look like)