To the smart local business owners looking for the best way to increase online exposure, I highly recommend spending a considerable amount of time submitting to various online business directories as this builds quality backlinks to your website (boosting SEO) AND puts you directly in front of customers looking for your products and services. This is the number one factor in small business SEO for local businesses.
You should note that our good friend Traffic Travis also plays a role in all this. By running through the SEO snapshots it creates you can quickly pinpoint specific business directory listings that show up in the top 20 search listings for any specific keyword you’re seeking to rank for. This not only hands you the best directories on a silver platter but it also tells you what keyword(s) to focus on when writing your listing!
Most of these listed below are free or inexpensive to list with depending on whether or not you’re willing to place a reverse link back to the directory site or not.
Generally I recommend paying the small fee for listing in lieu of placing a reciprocal link on your site for any directories with page rank (PR) of a “4″ or higher. Page rank (PR) rates the overall popularity according to Google’s traffic and SEO algorithm.
A small handful of these you will simply register for and leave a comment about your business which is still of value to you. Either way, I know first hand that achieving success with small business SEO and small business internet marketing involves submitting your business information to multiple online business directories.
Each of the links below open up in a new page so you are not redirected away from this site.
You can always search for more by searching for “free online business directories” on Google or perhaps directories specific to your niche.
http://google.com/local/add/businessCenter PR10
https://ssl.bing.com/listings/ListingCenter.aspx PR10
www.hotfrog.com PR6
www.yelp.com PR8
Free Pegasus web directory PR3
http://www.getfreelisting.com/Registration.aspx PR1
www.somuch.com PR5
free.kudzu.com PR6
http://g.live.com/0HEWL_LOCALENUS9/118037 PR5
http://register.local.com/free/update.aspx PR7
http://www.askalix.com/uk/index.php PR N/A
http://www.tyloon.com/index.php?app=apply&step=1&grade_id=14 PR N/A
http://webapp.localeze.com/extranet/add-modify-close-business-listing.aspx PR 5
http://www.bizfive.com/submit-site/ PR 5
http://www.vavou.com/?_kk=free%20business%20directory&_kt=f1d8bbf9-2553-4b51-8428-40b63c4bd3f6 PR 0
http://www.dazzleyellowpages.com/listing-packages.asp PR 3
http://www.sbdpro.com/admin_dir/add_url.php PR 0
http://www.businesslinedirectory.com/ PR 4
http://www.nsphereinc.com/Local_Business.html PR 3
http://www.brightpages.com/sign-up.gwt?gclid=CIGup6bT96UCFcFk7AodXhJBqA PR N/A
https://secure.ezlocal.com/newbusiness/find.aspx?RefererID=adwords&gclid=CIOv37TT96UCFZdM2godMDkHYA PR 4
http://www.businesssearchnetwork.com/index.php?req=submit_site PR N/A
www.yellowpages.com PR N/A
http://botw.org/helpcenter/submitcommercial.aspx PR 6
http://www.alivedirectory.com/submit.php PR 3
http://www.bizcompare.com PR 5
http://www.littlewebdirectory.com/links.asp PR 3
Whenweseo’s List of Free Directories With Traffic Ranking PR 2
Sladco Web Directory PR 4
Promotional Directories – Don’t Worry about PR with These
www.groupon.com (try www.groupon.com/nashville or whatever your city name is)
http://livingsocial.com/getfeatured
http://startagroupbuy.com/group-buying-site-integration/
Directory submissions can take up to 8 weeks to propagate the world wide web but your efforts are well worth it in the long run. Plus establishing backlinks slowly actually works to your advantage. Take time to do a few submissions each day and I encourage you to seek out industry specific directories as well – these prove to be particularly fruitful (example: chiroweb.com for chiropractors) even it there’s a charge associated with submissions.
