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 Yellow Pages links good for SEO
-
I have a client that has 2500 yellowpages.com links like this one http://m.yellowpages.com/hillside-nj/guardianship-services Are these SEO relevant? Can they hurt SEO efforts. Is this something should push for clients? Can Yellow pages be a good link building strategy? What say you?
-
These links are coming from when a business advertises with Yellowpages.com. I have seen evidence that they are destroying one of my clients NAP's because each link is coming from a different city that the local business doesn't belong to them. Have your client Stop advertising with them immediately and disavow all links just to be safe.
-
Without having the client's site to be able to check, I'd guess that the reason you're not seeing these links popping up within Open Site Explorer is due to the size of Yellow Pages' site in conjunction with the way that we compile our index.
When we crawl through a site during the indexing process, we limit the number of pages that we'll crawl on a single domain in order to help us sample a broader and more diverse link landscape (or Mozscape, if you will
). There are a few million pages on Yellow Pages' domain, and since we elect to cap out indexing a single domain around ~50,000 pages (I'm uncertain of the exact value), only a relative handful of the most prominent pages on the domain would be included to avoid index saturation. I hope this helps to explain what you're seeing there! -
Hi Miriam,
What a great question. Yellowpages.com has linked to individual blog posts on my clients site from each town listing in New Jersey. I have like 70 posts on the site and there are like 550 twps. in New Jersey so there you go.
They don't show up in my Moz Analytics or open site explorer. I see these links in google search console. I imagine that these are no follow?
Thanks
-
Hey Donald,
YP can be a good citation for a local business but I am puzzled by the sheer number of links you've found - 2500? Most businesses would not have 2500 listings (unless they are McDonald's or something like that). What is the origin of this many links from a single entity?
-
Hi Donald,
I normally stay away from yellowpages as google can see this as spam and even more so when you have 2500 coming from one site. I normally disavow them altogether. If they acted like a other local listing sites and didn't give so many links it's fine but yellowpages is known to do this for sure.
Local Citations can be a great part of your link building but you need to be careful and insure its done right. Here is a page Moz has put together https://cloudz.click/learn/local/listings about local listing/citations and why you should do them and how to get started.
Hope this helps.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
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.
Related Questions
-
What do I need to do for SEO when moving a business out of state?
Hello! So I have a business that I run out of a single location for the last 3 years. I am unfortunately having to move here in the next few weeks My question is what do I need to do in order to have the best chance at SEO for the new location? When should I make the changes? Does it take a long time for me to stop showing up in the previous location? and is there something I need to do to remove those? Also, is there an app or a website where I can find and update all listings at once or at least a bulk of them? I know that there are some weird sites that have my business info in them that I did not put there. Obviously these would have the wrong address. Some do not have a contact info or a way for me to log into them. What would I do with these sites? Thank you!
Local Listings | | Rmarkjr810 -
Places.SinglePlatform.com "Menu" links on your GMB listing?
I just experienced this and after lots of frustration was able to figure out how it happened and how to fix it (keep reading). **HOW: **So apparently Google did a deal with Constant Contact which owns Singleplatform.com that allows them to publish edits to ANY local business and they have used this to SPAM entire categories of local businesses by adding in a "Appointments" and/or "Menu" link to the Google My Business listing for search/maps and they have done it in such a way that it is extremely difficult to remove/fix. (NOTE: they are not listed in Google's list of 3rd parties which automatically add info to your listing....https://www.google.com/maps/reserve/partners) **THE PROBLEM: You have a link to a menu or appointment page that you did not add and can not edit. **The options for setting a URL for "Menu" and/or "Appointment" (and a few others https://support.google.com/business/answer/6218037) are tied to the Primary Category set on your GMB listing and are only available to certain categories. FIXING: You would think if you are a verified owner of your GMB listing, it would be simple - but Google/SInglePlatform.com have gone to great lengths to make it more difficult.... Step 1 - Make sure you are a verified owner of GMB listing Step 2 - Change your Primary category on the business to one of the categories which supports the link in question (no definitive list, but I know setting Primary to "Restaurant" will get you Menu and "Interior Designer" will get you an Appointment link) Step 3 - Save the new category Step 4 - Now you will have the option under your "URLs" section of GMB listing. Step 5 - Change the URL from the SPAMMY link to a relevant page you control and Save Step 6 - Change Primary Category back to what you want.
Local Listings | | arowland2 -
How Do I Remove Address from Google Business Page?
Not very up to date in handling local listings, so here's my situation. I have an office that is not going out of business, but instead going virtual. So that physical address will no longer exist but the team is intact. So I am dealing with the Google Business Listing page for this office at https://business.google.com/ In the "Published on" section, it has Google Search, Google Maps, and Google+. I want to remove it from Maps and the address from this account. There's an address for this store, but editing it only seems to allow changing, but not removal. There is also the option of "Mark as Permanently Closed", but surely that isn't the best option since that will leave a nasty red "PERMANENTLY CLOSED" in the results when searching. What's the best course of action here?
Local Listings | | nbyloff0 -
How will changing the phone number on my website affect SEO?
We are considering changing the phone number to our website to one of those 1-800-eat-cows. How will changing a phone number we've had 10 years affect our SEO. Do we need to change all citations, Google maps, etc etc? What if we don't? Thanks!
Local Listings | | RoxBrock0 -
Do you need contact details (NAP) on every page of your website for local search ranking ?
We’ve got a clients site which doesn't have the contact details on every page, all the contact details are on the /contact page which is using the schema.org local business markup Some sites that our outranking us locally have their contact details on all pages, where as others only have it on the contact page also. Is having your contact details on every page a ranking factor for local search ?
Local Listings | | mike8780 -
SEO - Should individual doctors at facility claim a Google My Business profile?
My client is a physician facility with several doctors practicing at the facility. When doing a Google search for some of their practices such as "family practice" one of the doctor's profiles will display in the Google Local pack - however it is not linked to the facility website where their profile exists. As of right now, we are using YEXT and other tools to claim Google Business Profiles for each practice, not the individual doctors. If there are unclaimed accounts for individual doctors, they are alerting Google that it’s a duplicate and should be taken down. Is this the right process to follow for SEO best practices or should we be claiming both the business and individual doctor profiles? The reason they are not claiming individual doctor profiles is to cut down on duplicate reviews as part of the Reputation Management Program. Advice much appreciated!
Local Listings | | chrisvogel0 -
Address Format for Local SEO
Hi, Ive been reading how important it is to get the address of a business consistent and written in the right format to help with Local Search Engine Rankings. Is this correct? If this is the case, are there any online generators to help create this html in the right format to put into a webpage. Thank you.
Local Listings | | Ampweb0 -
Should my website link to my google business listing given that I already link from google business to my website ?
I have a website with individual Location Landing Pages for each of my Depots. I also have individual Google Local Business Listings for each of my depots. Should I have a link from my Website Location Landing Pages to the associated Google local Business listings or not ?... Given that I already have a link on my Google Business listing to the relevant Location Page on my website. I wasn't sure whether linking both ways would be more beneficial thus enforcing things better or whether it's not needed to link both ways . thanks Pete
Local Listings | | PeteC120