Who doesn’t like money (or puppies for that matter)? As a business owner, I’d like to make more money by having more customers. In order to get customers, a business must invest in marketing tools to reach their potential clients. For many companies, one of the best strategies for getting more customers is to optimize their listings so that clients in their area can find them online. The best example and most powerful local search engine is Google’s map section. If you’re looking for a plumber or a pizza in your area, chances are you’ll find them on Google’s local listings (again, the map section). Optimizing your local search engines will help you rank in local search results and will get you more business and money. From there, you can buy puppies and your life will be awesome.
How does one optimize their local listings? The first thing you need to do is set up tons of business citations (a citation is a mention of your business that includes your company’s name, address, and phone number) on different directory sites like Google+ Local, Yellowpages, Bing, Yelp etc.…There are hundreds of these directories and the more citations you have on directory sites, the odds are higher that potential customers will find your business. When customers can find you, you have a much higher chance of earning their business.
The problem for many businesses is that the process of building citations can literally take days to complete and who has the time for that? Some businesses turn to companies like Yext to save them the hassle.
Yext offers customers the chance to build citations for your business on almost 50 directory sites all at the same time. This is called batch uploading and it saves a lot of hours, you can then use to play with your puppy. You can also make any changes to your business like changing a phone number, almost instantaneously across all 50 directories in one fell swoop.
If you’re wondering what the catch is, you’re one smart cookie because there are more catches with Yext than in an NFL game.
Catch number 1. If you ever decide to cancel your relationship with Yext, much of the content you created on your citations while you were a client of Yext will be lost. This includes photos, videos, branding images, and taglines. Some owners have even reported that their citation information reverted to outdated NAP (name, address, phone) information that existed on a directory before they had signed up with Yext. Obviously, this will kill your ranking on Google. You will also have to claim your listings across these directories so that you can update and make the appropriate changes. In short, there will be no playtime for you.
Catch number 2 For most businesses, Google+ local is the most powerful directory out there. Yext doesn’t build citations on Google+ local; you’re going to have to do this by yourself if you use Yext. You can expect pain in your backside, lots of pain.
Catch number 3 In the last blog article we discussed the importance of responding to both positive and negative reviews found on your business listing. With Yext, you can’t respond to reviews left on your business’s listing because you can’t do this from Yext’s dashboard and they don’t give you the username and password to access the directory site on your own. Not being able to respond to such reviews will hamstring your efforts to mitigate the damage that a negative review can cause and also hurt your company’s ability to reach out to promoters of your brand.
Catch number 4 8 of the directories that Yext loads to aren’t compatible with Yext if a business is already advertising on that site.
At WebPunch we have a better solution. We will upload to more directories than Yext. In fact, we upload to more than 100 directories. Duplicates won’t hurt your ranking because we will clean them up and get rid of any erroneous information that could hurt your dating chances with Google Maps. Oh yeah, speaking of Google, we’ll create your citation on there as well, just because we like you. WebPunch hates to lose clients but if you ever want to breakup you’ll have full access to your listings because we’ll give you the usernames and passwords. WebPunch likes to keep you in the loop too, so you’ll be able to use our robust local listing dashboard. There you can see how complete your citations are on any given directory along with account notes that our specialists update with progress or challenges we are overcoming on your business’s behalf.
Don’t believe us? Look at Yext’s reviews on Yelp
https://www.yelp.com/biz/yext-new-york
Call us and ask to see how we can make you the obvious choice over your competitors. At WebPunch we help you knock out the competition, one citation at a time.
