• BBgmoro

        See all notifications

        Skip to content
        Moz logo Menu open Menu close
        • Products
          • Moz Pro
          • Moz Pro Home
          • Moz Local
          • Moz Local Home
          • STAT
          • Moz API
          • Moz API Home
          • Compare SEO Products
          • Moz Data
        • Free SEO Tools
          • Domain Analysis
          • Keyword Explorer
          • Link Explorer
          • Competitive Research
          • MozBar
          • More Free SEO Tools
        • Learn SEO
          • Beginner's Guide to SEO
          • SEO Learning Center
          • Moz Academy
          • MozCon
          • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
        • Blog
        • Why Moz
          • Digital Marketers
          • Agency Solutions
          • Enterprise Solutions
          • Small Business Solutions
          • The Moz Story
          • New Releases
        • Log in
        • Log out
        • Products
          • Moz Pro

            Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

          • Moz Local

            Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

          • STAT

            SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

          • Moz API

            Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

          • Compare SEO Products

            See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

          • Moz Data

            Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

          Turn SEO data into actionable content briefs

          Turn SEO data into actionable content briefs

          Learn more
        • Free SEO Tools
          • Domain Analysis

            Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

          • Keyword Explorer

            Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

          • Link Explorer

            Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

          • Competitive Research

            Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

          • MozBar

            See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

          • More Free SEO Tools

            Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

          Let your business shine with Listings AI

          Let your business shine with Listings AI

          Get found
        • Learn SEO
          • Beginner's Guide to SEO

            The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

          • SEO Learning Center

            Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

          • On-Demand Webinars

            Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

          • How-To Guides

            Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

          • Moz Academy

            Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

          • MozCon

            Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

          Access 20 years of data with flexible pricing
          Moz API

          Access 20 years of data with flexible pricing

          Find your plan
        • Blog
        • Why Moz
          • Digital Marketers

            Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

          • Small Business Solutions

            Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

          • Agency Solutions

            Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

          • Enterprise Solutions

            Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

          • The Moz Story

            Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

          • New Releases

            Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

          Surface actionable competitive intel
          New Feature

          Surface actionable competitive intel

          Learn More
        • Log in
          • Moz Pro
          • Moz Local
          • Moz Local Dashboard
          • Moz API
          • Moz API Dashboard
          • Moz Academy
        • Avatar
          • Moz Home
          • Notifications
          • Account & Billing
          • Manage Users
          • Community Profile
          • My Q&A
          • My Videos
          • Log Out

        The Moz Q&A Forum

        • Forum
        • Questions
        • My Q&A
        • Users
        • Ask the Community

        Welcome to the Q&A Forum

        Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

        1. Home
        2. SEO Tactics
        3. Local SEO
        4. Local Listings
        5. Are citations the way to go even if there is no Google Places listing

        Moz Q&A is closed.

        After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.

        Are citations the way to go even if there is no Google Places listing

        Local Listings
        4
        4
        940
        Loading More Posts
        • Watching

          Notify me of new replies.
          Show question in unread.

        • Not Watching

          Do not notify me of new replies.
          Show question in unread if category is not ignored.

        • Ignoring

          Do not notify me of new replies.
          Do not show question in unread.

        • Oldest to Newest
        • Newest to Oldest
        • Most Votes
        Reply
        • Reply as question
        Locked
        This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
        • Gavo
          Gavo last edited by

          If there are no Google Places / Local listing for a keyword search term, for example... "web design vancouver", do building citations still help in enabling websites to move up the organic rankings?

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • MiriamEllis
            MiriamEllis Subject Expert last edited by

            Hi Gavo,

            While what Marcus points out is true (you can prompt local results for web design companies by adding 'in' to your query), it's important to understand that Google does not view web design companies as being truly local, hence their lack of inclusion in the results for the most common service + city or city + service queries. To my understanding, Google's thinking on this is that most web design (and SEO) companies operate virtually (don't meet with clients face-to-face).

            So, you can add your web design company to Google's local index, and you can build citations for it, but it's likely that your overall organic rankings will hinge more on other forms of marketing in which you engage. Think content development, earning links, social outreach, etc.

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
            • Marcus_Miller
              Marcus_Miller last edited by

              Hey,

              Not sure if you aware of this but local search results do show up if you search this term: ‘web design in vancouver’...but hey thats not what you asked so lets get on with the answer:

              Creating citations simply to improve your website ranking will work, but your on-page optimisation needs to be at its best. My first tip would be to fill every citation with as much detail as possible. Make sure you add photos and videos and have a unique description for each citation site, but remember to include your keywords in the description. The Name, Address & Phone Number (NAP) will need to be kept consistent to get the full benefit of creating these citations.

              For on-page optimization, I can recommend a few small changes that can go a long way! My first step of advice would be to add a schema markup of your address into the footer of the website. A schema markup allows google to recognise the address as a formatted address, instead of viewing it as a piece of text. Another useful tip is to make sure you are getting the full benefit from your page titles. I tend to structure page titles like this:

              target keyword | Business name

              so for a web design company in vancouver called Funky web design, I would do something along the lines of this:

              Web Design In Vancouver | Funky Web Design

              Hope this helps!

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
              • Asjad
                Asjad last edited by

                Yup It will But Do Add your Website Link whole building these listings. Adding NAP Only will not help much.

                Thanks

                Asjad Afzal
                COO
                Globital PTY LTD

                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                • 1 / 1
                • First post
                  Last post

                Browse Questions

                Explore more categories

                • Moz Tools

                  Chat with the community about the Moz tools.

                • SEO Tactics

                  Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers

                • Community

                  Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!

                • Digital Marketing

                  Chat about tactics outside of SEO

                • Research & Trends

                  Dive into research and trends in the search industry.

                • Support

                  Connect on product support and feature requests.

                • See all categories

                Related Questions

                • Ben-R

                  Verifying Google My Business After An Address Change

                  google my business local listings

                  Hello,
                  We are trying to verify our Google My Business listing, however, the current unverified listing is using an old address we no longer have access to. The only option for verification is through the mail. We tried requesting an edit but it didn’t go through. Would the best option be to create a new one and try to have the old (unverified) listing removed? Any insight would be appreciated. Thank you in advance.
                  Best,

                  Local Listings | | Ben-R
                  0
                • nhhernandez

                  Google listing only appears when I move / zoom in or out of the map

                  Hi everyone, We are having an issue with this local business. The Google listing isn't immediately appearing on the map. You have to move the map or zoom in and out for the listing to appear. I find this really odd as our competitors - with no reviews and way further in proximity - are appearing with no issues. The listing is only about 4km where I'm doing the search, while competitors with no reviews are about 20km away. We are ranking in the top 5 organically for the search term I used (pool renovations brisbane), but nowhere in local unless the map is moved. When the listing appears, sometimes the pin also looks grey instead of red, while others are red (if that makes sense). On top of this, their organic rankings have also been on a downward trend since June. I'm currently doing a backlink audit to see if it's contributing to the issue. If anyone also has other ideas, could you please let me know? Thanks.

                  Local Listings | | nhhernandez
                  1
                • StantonOptical

                  Can I use the same interior photos for multiple stores in Google My Business?

                  Hi, The company I work for has many store locations across the country. Getting good/quality interior pictures has become very difficult for us. We recently good a Virtual Tour from Google for one of the locations, and they took some really pictures. According to Google, the "Photos should represent the actual business" and "Represent the real-world business location". My question is: since our stores are VERY similar in the interior, can we use the same pictures for them while we get more pictures? Would Google penalize this? Thanks!

                  Local Listings | | StantonOptical
                  0
                • varun1800

                  Issue in "Suggest an Edit" feature of Google My Business

                  "Suggest an Edit" feature of Google My Business is allowing the competitors to change your business details, that too without your prior permission! I have put together a piece on the issue we faced and you can review the same here: https://www.kvrwebtech.com/blog/issue-in-suggest-an-edit-in-google-my-business-is-it-a-bug-or-a-major-pitfall/ What are your thoughts on the same and what should be the right solution?

                  Local Listings | | varun1800
                  1
                • KempRugeLawGroup

                  Removing Unverified Listing From Google

                  We have an old unverified listing that has our information on it, but we can't get it off google. I told them months ago it was closed, and it is marked as closed in Google...but it still shows up. Moz Local is telling me this is an inconsistency that hurts our local rankings. I went to delete the page from our Google Business/Place, but if I did that, the warning said that I would just not have access to the page, and that the listing would still show up on google. How do I permanently get rid of those thing, so it's not longer an inconsistent listing? Ruben

                  Local Listings | | KempRugeLawGroup
                  0
                • EcommerceSite

                  How long until an address changes after verification on Google My Business?

                  Started working with a company recently that had a Google My Business with an old address. I went ahead and claimed it and verified it with the postcard, but it still shows the old address if search. How long will that be?

                  Local Listings | | EcommerceSite
                  0
                • BohmKalish123

                  Google My Business- Will a large service area dilute local search results?

                  I am considering adding our actual service area to our Google My Business profile, but I don't want this to dilute our local search results.  As it is, we come up in the top 3 or so when searched in our HQ's city and several nearby cities when you search for us in Google Maps (although when I look at the top 10 organic for Google for some reason when you search for these cities + our keywords Google doesn't show any local results). Our actual service area is fairly large, comprising the states of CA & Hawaii & parts of CO, AZ, and UT.  I would be adding the service area by zip code rather than radius, as a radius wouldn't make any sense in this case (particularly considering the distance between HI and CA).  Is it better to keep our relatively high ranking in local results?  Will adding the service area not affect local results negatively? Also, do you know why Google isn't showing me local results when I look for our keywords + our nearby cities?  When I look for these keywords in larger cities like LA or San Diego, Google always shows me local results.

                  Local Listings | | BohmKalish123
                  0
                • billyguyette

                  Why I'm I ranking so low on Google Maps

                  About 3 months I started a website (www.guyetteroofing.com) for my roofing business in Montgomery, Alabama. The site is still a work in progress, however, because the competition doesn't really market via internet it was fairly easy to rank on Google Maps. Within 1 month the business was letter "A" in Google Maps. About 3 three weeks ago my ranking was dropped considerably, not showing up at all in letters A through G. The business is still indexed in Google Maps, but only represented by a small red dot. My website is still ranking pretty high for "roofers in Montgomery", but my position on Google Maps has all but disappeared. I have no idea what I've done to be rank so low on Google Maps but still have a solid position on regular Google Search. I've checked my citations and my NAPs, there are a few inconsistencies but nothing major.  How can I rank so far below my competition if I have twice as many citations, an actual website, and a Google Plus page?

                  Local Listings | | billyguyette
                  0

                Get started with Moz Pro!

                Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

                Start my free trial
                Products
                • Moz Pro
                • Moz Local
                • Moz API
                • Moz Data
                • STAT
                • Product Updates
                Moz Solutions
                • SMB Solutions
                • Agency Solutions
                • Enterprise Solutions
                • Digital Marketers
                Free SEO Tools
                • Domain Authority Checker
                • Link Explorer
                • Keyword Explorer
                • Competitive Research
                • Brand Authority Checker
                • Local Citation Checker
                • MozBar Extension
                • MozCast
                Resources
                • Blog
                • SEO Learning Center
                • Help Hub
                • Beginner's Guide to SEO
                • How-to Guides
                • Moz Academy
                • API Docs
                About Moz
                • About
                • Team
                • Careers
                • Contact
                Why Moz
                • Case Studies
                • Testimonials
                Get Involved
                • Become an Affiliate
                • MozCon
                • Webinars
                • Practical Marketer Series
                • MozPod
                Connect with us

                Contact the Help team

                Join our newsletter
                Moz logo
                © 2021 - 2026 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
                • Accessibility
                • Terms of Use
                • Privacy

                Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.