How to Build Local Citations with NAP Data: Complete Guide | Vicinus.ai

Local citations are any mention of your business’s name, address, phone number, and website online. This is called NAP (name, address, and phone number) or NAP+W (name, address, phone number, and website) data. Citations are a key ranking factor for local SEO. 

Although citations appear in a variety of different places, building local citations features NAP (or NAP+W) data.

The places your local citations will appear are:

• Business Directories such as Yelp, Google My Business, Bing Places, and others.
• Social networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and others.
• Other places where potential customers will be looking for information about local businesses.

Why is NAP Data Important?

Name, address, phone number (and potentially website) is critical for local SEO. This is because search engines such as Google and Bing take this type of data into account when showing geo-targeted searches. 

This means that utilising your business’s NAP data across various social networks as well as business directories will help you get found easier on searches.

What Can I Do to Make My NAP Data Optimised?

The first thing you must remember about NAP data is that it’s only worthwhile if it’s accurate and consistent. Ensuring that your business name, address, and phone number is correct throughout the web will allow your customers to find your business quickly and efficiently.

However, maintaining accurate and consistent NAP data isn’t just about your customers finding the right information, it’s for search engines too. Local SEO experts believe that search engines cross-reference NAP data across a wide variety of websites in order to validate your business. 

This is to ensure that the business is legitimate so that they can provide searchers with the most relevant and accurate information they possibly can.

As a result, ‘SEO spam’ websites that aren’t legitimate businesses are less likely to have consistent NAP data across a wide variety of websites. 

This means that for a legitimate business, having more local citations across the internet. From business directories to social platforms, the listings will boost your business’s findability.

How Can I Make Sure My NAP Data is Consistent Across the Web?

This is where Vicinus can help your business.

Vicinus is an AI-powered hyperlocal marketing tool that will enhance your local presence online. 

The Vicinus platform features real-time management and creation of business listings across multiple platforms, insights into performance, building and monitoring online reputation, and more.

For full local optimisation, Vicinus also assists in creating SEO-friendly location pages for each of your business locations.

Two of Vicinus’s best features for locating and suppressing duplicate business listings are:

•  Listing Finder: Claim online your business listings securing trust, exposure, and satisfaction for customers.
• Duplicate Finder: Suppress and remove duplicate business listings to avoid customer confusion.

For more information, please contact us: contact@vicinus.ai

Where Should Name, Address & Phone Number be Entered?

The best places to list your business for NAP data are reputable directories. If you want your citations to hold even more weight, listing them in geographically-specific local directories and industry-specific directories is even better.

This is because it is more likely that your business will show in search results for industry-specific terms in local searches.

Some reputable business directories are:

• Yelp 
• Citysearch.com
• Merchantcircle.com
• foursquare.com 
• & many more too.

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