As I have mentioned in my leveraging local seo slide, organic seo needs inbound links while local seo needs citations.

Many people in the seo business finds it hard to look for citation opportunities so I’m hoping that this post will be able to help them.

Local SEO Citation Prospects

Local Directories – Acquiring links / citations from these websites has been the most popular so far. Basically, there’s two type of local directories, the free and the paid.

Sample Search Queries to find Local Directories

• (State) + Directory
• (City) + Directory
• (Zip Code) + Directory

some random local directories

Local Coupon Sites – Do you know a local deals website or a local group buying site? They usually provide some sort of citation within the coupon page so if a local coupon site exist in your target market, consider to offer a coupon then.

Sample Search Queries to Find Local Coupon Sites

• (City) (keyword) Coupon
• (City) Coupon

local coupon site by godeals.ph

Local Groups and Associations – Engage in groups that caters within your market. Try engaging in associations and make them mention your business on its official website (members directory).

Sample Search Queries to Find Local Associations

• (City) (keyword) Group
• (City) (keyword) Association
• (City) Chamber of Commerce
• (State) Chamber of Commerce

Spa Association of the Philippines, Inc

Local Blogs – Make yourself “citable” in the local blog community. With a huge number of blogs existing, they are a nice source of citations. You can invite a blogger/s to come over to your place to see what you have to offer.

A nice sample of a blog that provides citations – restaurant reviews from the food pornographer, she even includes the hours of operations and a map of the business all the time.

Sample Search Queries to Find Local Blogs

• (State) (keyword) blogs
• (City) keyword) blogs

Local Charity / Sponsorship – Making a donation or sponsoring an event is also a good way of citation building. They usually publish “thank you” pages wherein they list all the donors.

One great thing in doing a charity or sponsorship is that you’re not just having citations, but you’re also creating a huge presence within your community.

Sample Search Query to Find Local Charity or Sponsorship

• (City) “our sponsors”

Local SEO Tools You Can Use for Your Campaigns

• Local Citation Finder by WhiteSpark
• Local Search Toolkit by seOverflow
• Local Keyword List Creator by 5minutesite
• GeoSitemap Tool by 51blocks