What are citations, and why does NAP consistency matter?

If you have ever ordered "local citations" or "directory submissions", this is what you were buying and why it works.

What is a citation?

A citation is any mention of your business name, address and phone number on another website. Most come from business directories, maps apps, social profiles and industry listing sites.

Why Google cares

Google wants to show real, trustworthy local businesses. When many independent sites confirm the same details, Google becomes more confident your business exists where you say it does.

What goes wrong

• An old address after you moved
• A tracking phone number on some sites and the main number on others
• "Ltd" on some listings and not others
• Duplicate listings created by data aggregators

Each mismatch weakens the signal. Cleaning these up often moves a business up the map pack without any new links.

Structured and unstructured citations

Structured citations are directory listings with fields for name, address and phone. Unstructured citations are mentions in blogs, news or local guides. You need both, but structured citations are the foundation.

How we build them

We first audit your existing listings, fix or remove the wrong ones, and then submit new listings by hand on directories that matter in your country and industry. You receive a report with every live link and login.