Bright Local - Citation Burst. Winner or Loser?

[GaryVictory]

Bright Local have a package called "Citation Burst." This looks great but, we all know directory submissions can have an extremely negative impact.

Has anyone used Bright Local for Citation Burst, please let me know?

Thanks

Gary

[TomRayner]

Hi Gary

I think what Bright Local are looking to do here is earn you more business citations, rather than directories.  It's funny, because the difference is only a subtle one, but rather than getting you on websites that are more "traditional" directories, they instead will look to get you listed on places like yelp, yell, forsquare, bing, yahoo, qype and so on.

Those kind of citations definitely do help.  It does look as though Bright Local offer directory listings on moderated, niche specific and local directories, which is less of a risk (but valuable? I'm not so sure). In the package you can also hand-pick which ones you want - so you could opt out of them all if you chose to, which might not be a bad idea.

Looks like it automates/outsources what can be a pretty laborious process, so it might be worth looking into if the price is right. Bright local are a pretty reputable brand so I'd say the quality would be there.

Of course, you could build those citations yourself and good place to start is right here on Moz.  Moz has the best ones by city, and best by category, while BrightLocal has an international list, as does WhiteSpark. You can probably find more by searching for "best citations for [country]".

Hope this helps.

[GaryVictory]

Thanks so much for your detailed reply Tom. Unfortunately Moz is not available to the UK, yet!

I would love to dig deeper into the true impact citations have on SERPS. What are your thoughts on this?

[TomRayner]

I can't give you any quantifiable data I'm afraid but all I can say is that "they work" from my experience - both for the local map/carousel listing and for the normal vertical search.

One thing that I have seen is that they are more successful when you a) make every citation exactly the same (address, number etc) and b) when you include those details on your website, preferably sitewide in a footer or header.

It's pretty much Google's way of seeing if you're a local authority - looks for your address and phone on your site, looks for that same stuff on places on yelp, yell, qype etc. The more of those citations you have, the better really.

I've yet to see citations like that have a negative effect, providing all of the sites are reputable and legit. That's why I'm slightly hesitant about some of those local/business specific directories - are some of those really "authority" websites? But for citations, it's all good and you don't really have anything to lose.

Plus you throw in the fact that some people do start their searches on some of those sites, particularly yelp, and all of a sudden having a listing there is a decent traffic channel itself.  I've seen a few sites where some of the top referrers are these citation sites.

Just make sure you really are who and where you say you are. If it's virtual offices/VOIP phone numbers, you're gonna have a bad time. Wouldn't surprise me if Google can already detect these automatically.

Would make for a good case study if done en masse for sure.

[GaryVictory]

Yes relevance is a key performance indicator.

Thanks again Tom. Your feedback on this subject has been invaluable. If you do come across any data which supports citations to SERPS, please do let me know. I very interested to know its true impact.

[jezweb]

There are more countries supported with brightlocal, eg, au and nz. Its interesting to see the differences in whats available.

[Houseofhonest]

im am compelled to use brightlocal as moz local is useless to me in new zealand, I came across this discussion looking to see how trustworthy brightlocal is, seems it might the solution