December 13th, 2009

Best Local Directories for Your Online Advertising

Getting started with your local online advertising? Well, you should consider the Yellow Pages for your advertising dollars. The online version that is! Not to mention the local search engines and online directories. And guess what? Most are free and all are affordable.

Start by listing your business with the 33 best local search engines and directories shown here. We’ve ranked them based on our editorial review, monthly US visitors (estimated by Quantcast), and Google page rank (a key factor in determining ranking in search results… the higher the number the better).

 
Local Directories
Business Listing
Monthly Visitors
PageRank
Google (Local)          Free   141,000,000       10
Yahoo (Local)          Free   120,000,000         9
Bing (Local)          Free     41,000,000         9
YellowPages.com          Free     17,200,000         7
Yelp          Free       6,600,000         7
SuperPages          Free       6,300,000         7
MerchantCircle          Free       5,800,000         8
Citysearch          Pay       4,500,000         8
Local.com          Free       4,200,000         7
Yellowbook          Free       2,400,000         7
InsiderPages          Free       2,400,000         7
DexKnows          Pay       2,000,000         6
LocalPages          Free       1,800,000         5
Hot Frog          Free       1,600,000         6
MagicYellow          Free       1,500,000         5
Switchboard          Free       1,300,000         8
YellowBot          Free       1,200,000         7
GenieKnows.com          Free       1,200,000         6
Discover Our Town          Free          691,000         6
CitySquares          Free          523,000         5
GetFave          Free          436,000         6
Judy's Book          Free          433,000         5
Kudzu          Free          375,000         6
MapQuest          Free          254,000         6
Best of the Web          Free          244,000         6
Matchpoint          Free          203,000         5
YellowPageCity          Free          151,000         5
USDirectory          Free            94,500         3
OpenList          Pay            87,000         5
Yext          Free            84,000         4
HelloMetro          Pay            71,000         3
MojoPages          Free            37,000         6
CityWaboo
         Free            35,000         3

Of course, there are quite a few local search and online directories to list with. So you may instead want to use services such as Universal Business Listing, iBegin.com, and Localeze. They’ll do the submitting for you at little or no cost… plus save you a ton of time!                                                                      

When submitting your business listing, don’t forget to include the same descriptive keywords and compelling copy that you use on your website. This will improve the chances of your business showing up in the right search results and sending qualified prospects to your website.

What if you don’t have a website? Then start with directories like YellowPages.com, SuperPages, Yelp, and MerchantCircle. They’ll create a business listing for you that’ll include the name and description of your business, phone number, and street address. And if you’re willing to pay ($25 to $50 per month), you can also add photos, special offers, and more!

So what are you waiting for? Let’s get the phones ringing!

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