If you own a local business, or oversee digital marketing for a brand that has online listings, you're likely aware of just how important local business listings are when it comes to your success with customers. Your listings contain key facts about each of your business locations — including store hours, holiday schedules, products and services offered, contact information, and more — which are necessary for both search engines and consumers to make informed decisions about you.
How necessary? Well, on average, business listings receive 2.7x more views than a brand's owned website* (including local store pages and directories). So even if the information on your website is perfect — and it certainly should be! — if the same business facts are not up to date and consistent across third-party services and directories, there's a good chance customers won't find the information they're seeking.
Of course, just as the quantity and specificity of the facts about your business increase, so too does the number of places you need to provide with that information. And though the effort to keep your business information up to date across diverse apps, maps, search engines, directories, and voice assistants can eat up valuable time (at least, without the right tool to help you manage it all), it's necessary work that helps you deliver better answers and drive more conversions.