What does NAP even mean?
Introduction
When a business starts to invest in local seo, well it can be a confusing time for some business owners.
The reason that is so, is because some seo agencies just use too much blooming marketing jargon.
So, you may well be just getting acquainted with your new marketing business, when they state a sentence something like this:
“Its important that your NAP information is correctly implemented, otherwise conflicting citations may cause confusion the algorithm as to where your business is, jeopardising your chances of visibility in the local map listings”.
Now, this is a mighty confusing sentence, yet one so many marketing types blurt out all too easily.
We are different, we don’t like our clients being confused, this is why we explain everything clearly.
So, without further ado, let’s demonstrate our ability to make the confusing, simple!
What does NAP even mean?
NAP simply stands for name of your business, its address and phone number, and that is it.
The search engines, like Google use this information to gain greater confidence in where your business is based, and its contact details.
So, SEO agencies for donkey’s years have been adding NAP information to a website, then creating a well optimised Google My Business account, and supplementing this with business citation to improve where a business ranks.
Why it’s important that the NAP information is correct on your website
So many businesses get the basics wrong, here are some common mistakes that we often we at our marketing agency.
By the way, this is not the way to implement NAP:
NAP details are written into an image
Googlebot will have a very hard time reading NAP information that’s contained in an image. So instead your businesses NAP information should be written in plain text, and ideally marked-up with a structured language, like Schema.
The Schema part we appreciate sounds a bit complicated, so you might want to ask an seo agency for help.
The NAP details are inconsistent
Sometimes the NAP information doesn’t even match on the same website, so for example, the contact page NAP information may not match with the NAP information written into the footer.
The NAP information should be consistent, that’s both on the website, and offsite. By consistent we mean that the information should match exactly with one and other.
Google My Business
After you’ve got the NAP information on your website, its then time to optimise your businesses Google My Business account.
Here’s our agencies top advice when optimising a Google My Business account:
· Make sure the NAP information matches your website
· Write a detailed business description
· Make sure that your business keeps your Google My Business account up to date, so if you change your businesses phone number, this should be updated on your Google My Business account.
Why using a local phone number is important!
Sometimes a business can’t avoid using a mobile phone number, for instance, a locksmith would often need to use a mobile number, rather than a landline.
But if you can use a local landline number do just that. Most digital marketing agencies think that it can be beneficial for a business implementing local seo to use a local phone number, rather than a mobile number.
Your business should use Schema to mark-up its Nap information.
How our digital marketing agency can help:
If your business requires help with its local seo, then why not give us a call? We offer affordable prices, and our work is always white hat.