Almost 50% of Business Listings Have Incorrect Information States New Study

Have you ever visited a business after checking their information on Google only to find out they are closed? If so, you wouldn’t be alone.

Before the Internet, businesses had to rely on word of mouth or printed directories and phone books to get their business information in front of consumers. And if you wanted prime placement you had to pay for advertising or have a name starting with AAA. Now, you have to rely on listings on sites like Google, Yelp, Bing, Facebook and Foursquare. And while business owners would NEVER let their information be incorrect in phone books, they seem to have no problem allowing their business information to be incorrect on online directories.

Almost 50% of business listings have incorrect information according to a new study conducted by Uberall, a leader in location marketing technology, where they analyzed the business listings for 73,000 businesses including SMB (single location), mid-market (2-9 locations) and enterprise (10+ locations).

While the study, Voice Search Readiness Report, focused on how optimized businesses were for voice search, it not only highlighted how many were ill-prepared for not only voice search but local search as well.

From our own analysis of over 73,000 businesses, we can categorically
state that not only are most businesses not voice search ready, many
businesses are not even optimized for local search to a satisfactory
level.
Having accurate business information online such as the correct address
and opening hours are foundational key elements every business needs
for consumers to have an uninterrupted buyer journey and engage with
that business both online and offline.

Uberall Voice Search Readiness Report

This report highlights that not only are most businesses failing when it comes to voice search but are failing when it comes to local search in general.

When it comes to voice search, they identified Google, Yelp and Bing as the 3 most important directories to have correct information on out of a total of 37 that are essential for voice search. You could argue that these would also be the most important for local search as well.

Yet only 4% of business locations have correct information across Google, Yelp and Bing.

What businesses are missing the mark the most – ones with 1-9 locations.

The Biggest Errors and Inconsistencies

The study analyzed 73,000 businesses across 37 platforms giving a possible 2.1 million possible listings and identified the following as the most glaring issues.

• Opening hours – 978,305 errors (almost 50% of all listings)
• Location name – 510,010 errors (about 25% of all listings)
• Website – 710,113 errors (almost one third of all listings)
• Street – 421,048 errors (almost one fifth of all listings)

The fact that approximately half of all business locations we surveyed
had inaccuracies with their opening hours represents one of the great
problems for all users searching locally today. They are putting in the
research and effort to find your business online and travelling there
offline only to find the business closed.

This is one of the most glaring mistakes businesses continue to make.
When a consumer conducts a search for a business online, they expect
and trust that the information listed will be accurate. If the customer
then turns up and finds that the business is closed, the immediate result
is a loss of trust that will likely discourage them from ever returning to a
business location.

Uberall Voice Search Readiness Report

Incorrect information in your listings doesn’t only impact your visibility, it impacts customers trust in your business and ultimately your sales.

If your business relies on customers finding you online there is excuse for not having correct business listings especially when there are extremely affordable solutions out there to help you manage them.

How Can You Check Your Listing Accuracy?

It’s relatively simple to find out how accurate your business information is online. Send me an email at lesliewhittaker@yahoo.com or submit a form on the Contact page with your business name, address, phone number and website and I’ll send you back a free report with how accurate your business information is on the top directories.

For more information on the importance of local listings, see Local Business Listings – What Are They and Why Accuracy Matters

---

About the Author – Leslie Whittaker

As a seasoned Digital Marketing Consultant with over 13 years of experience, I help businesses increase leads, close more business, retain customers better and, ultimately, make more money. I manage over 2.6 million a year in digital marketing budgets for clients across the United States. Recently, I helped one client grow their website traffic by over 950%, reduce their cost per lead by 60% and increase their leads by over 400%.