How Your Business Listings Could Be Costing Your $21,000 A Year

NOTE: This blog is a transcript from a podcast and therefore may contain errors.

Krystal Vivian: Welcome to Digital Marketing RoWHY. I’m your host today, Krystal Vivian and today I am joined by a very special guest, Melissa Weirick, one of our social media specialists and our Location Concierge expert. Welcome, Melissa.

Melissa Weirick: Hello. I’m happy to be here.

Krystal Vivian: I’m happy to have you here.

Today’s conversation is really important because I think for many businesses we think about, well, we have to make sure that our website is set up right and that all of that is perfect. And that our social media is set up and that all of that is perfect. But there are actually a lot of places across the internet where your business is showing up to consumers, places that you might not even know about.

If your business listing isn’t accurate, it can create a lot of problems for your business, right?

Melissa Weirick: Yes. So many problems, and your business information shows up in over 200 places across the internet. So many of those that you probably have never heard their name before, but who has heard their name is Google and AI search engine.

So we should get familiar.

Krystal Vivian: Yes, we absolutely should get familiar. So that’s what we’re gonna do today. we’re gonna talk about reviews and why these are so important for businesses and what you need to know to make sure that your business is showing up correctly. Melissa, let’s start off by just talking very broadly.

Melissa Weirick: What exactly is a business listing and where do they live online? so it’s a really basic thing. It’s name, address, phone number, you can call it NAP for Short. And it’s just the foundation of what your business is.

And it shows up in over 200 places across the internet. And a lot of businesses, they think about Google. Some people might think about Yelp, some people might think about Facebook. But those are just three of the huge landscape that we have to deal with.

And the thing is, you don’t think about these listings because you’re not going across all these publishers and creating your listing there. The data aggregators doing that for you and you might not know they exist, but AI search engines know they exist. Google knows they exist. And when people search for you, Google and AI search engines are combing those listings and seeing how accurate your information is across the board.

Krystal Vivian: Well, and it’s so important that these aggregators or these listings also feed into other data aggregators.

Like I always think of Foursquare, right?

Melissa Weirick: Yeah.

Krystal Vivian: that used to be a social networking site that was huge. And they closed down the social aspect of it. But all of that data was still there. And so what Foursquare now is, all of that data now they sell their information to. Another third party source that consumers are using. And as a consumer, they’re not going, well, I’m gonna go to Foursquare to get this information

They’re just like, I’m a Hilton Rewards member. That’s where I stay all the time. So now that I’m here on vacation, I’m gonna look in their concierge app for their recommendations.

Melissa Weirick: Right?

Krystal Vivian: That’s why, even if you have never heard of it, or if it’s one that you thought.

Died 10 years ago.

Melissa Weirick: it may have died for consumers, but it didn’t die for the aggregators who can still use that information. So we still need to make sure it’s accurate.

Krystal Vivian: So let’s talk about what actually happens if that information isn’t accurate. if a consumer finds inaccurate information about a business online.

Melissa Weirick: So the first thing that happens is usually anger, frustration. I actually have a personal story where I had a foot doctor appointment. I had never been to this foot doctor before, and the day I was supposed to go, I looked online, which was not smart to look on the day I was supposed to go because they had bad reviews.

And we can talk about those bad reviews in just a little bit. But when I looked online, I saw their listing and it was. I don’t know, 10:00 AM on a Thursday and it said that they were closed and they opened at 8:00 AM on Monday. And in my head I thought, well, they scheduled me for this appointment. Surely they’re open.

So I could use common sense in that instance, but if I didn’t wanna waste a 25 mile trip. Or call, maybe I just wouldn’t have shown up. And I did show up and they were open. But what if you flipped that script? I looked online and I saw, oh, yay. Blank blank. Podiatrist is open. I’m gonna drive 25 miles, and then I go to the door and it’s locked.

I would be really mad. Yeah, because I took time out of my workday. To go get my foot looked at and the place is closed and they didn’t let me know and their listing was wrong online, and they might not even know that their listing was wrong, is the thing. And I’m not gonna get mad at the, at the

directory. Like as a consumer, like let’s say I didn’t work in the job that I work at. I think it’s all the business’s job to update everything, which when you don’t have a location concierge doing the work for you, it is your job.

As a consumer, I would think, oh my gosh, I hate this foot doctor. I’m gonna leave a bad review and never come back here. And I’m not the only one because 71% of consumers have experienced the same thing of the details being. wrong number, wrong hours, wrong address. And a lot of those people, 76% of them actually are not gonna give that business a second chance because why would they, like they took time out of their day and it’s wrong and it’s annoying,

Krystal Vivian: let’s pause there though for a second. Okay? I just wanna highlight that stat. ’cause I think that’s powerful.

Melissa Weirick: It’s a lot of people,

Krystal Vivian: three quarters of the people who encounter wrong information about your business listing online.

They’re not gonna give you a second chance.

Melissa Weirick: Nope,

Krystal Vivian: And it’s lot. Something simple as your hour not being accurate,

Melissa Weirick: right? Because let’s say your hour said. Eight to six and you really close at five and somebody gets off work, they’re gonna go to the bank. They’re looking forward to depositing their check.

Now they can’t. They’re mad.

Krystal Vivian: Yeah.

Melissa Weirick: And it’s important to people that you fit into their day, how they think you’re gonna fit into their day. And we all know that a lot of the time, happy people aren’t the first ones to leave reviews. It’s usually the frustrated people who want to leave reviews because we need an outlet and we want other people to not experience the same negative experience that we’ve experienced.

Then those unhappy people leave reviews, then your potential customers read those reviews and trust is lost for customers in your business.

Krystal Vivian: it’s so incredible how quickly that can happen. And I wanna talk about reviews in a couple of minutes, but I wanna first talk about, you said that there’s 200 plus different business listings.

Mm-hmm. So it’s not just about having accurate information on Google business, even though your Google business profile might be correct. Right. But having correct information on other listings is important too. Why does consistency across all of those publishers actually matter to Google, and especially with ai?

Melissa Weirick: So Google is the king or queen, however you wanna look at it, and they’re gonna cross reference all of these little publishers to see what kind of information is out there and see what’s accurate and what’s not. Even a detail as small as street, S-T-R-E-E-T and Street ST, period. Can count as an inaccuracy and an inconsistency between those two things, even though us humans know that they mean the same thing.

Google doesn’t always know that, and it just looks like two different value fields to Google.

And like when, when a Google sees two things that don’t match. It can’t know which one is accurate, like, let’s say, worse than the street versus st.

you moved locations and you updated your Google business profile to reflect your changed location and didn’t know to update it anywhere else. Google sees two different addresses. It can’t know which one is the right one, so then it just deprioritizes your listing because it thinks that it has no idea what to think, really.

It’s like, well, I don’t know which one is the actual thing. They’re different from each other, so. This person must not have their information correct, so I’m not gonna rank them high in search. So when customers look for you, they can’t find you.

Krystal Vivian: Does it matter how often you are updating these business listings?

Melissa Weirick: I’d say a good frequency to just take a peek at your Google business profile is once a month, you wanna make sure that all your information looks good, and across the calendar year, a lot of holidays happen, whether they’re minor or major, and you wanna update your holiday hours like Memorial Day or Labor Day.

A lot of businesses have varying hours, and you want your business listening to reflect the accurate hours that you’re open. And once a quarter you could look at your profile and add new photos that you’ve taken, update your FAQs, all of these updates, tell Google that you are keeping up on your information.

It’s all accurate. And listen to this stat ev. For every 1% increase in how often a business updates listing data. We see approximately 2.23% more Google clicks. So that tells us that Google loves updated accurate information. Well, the more you update information, Google knows that it’s accurate because you’re keeping up on it and not letting it go stale.

Krystal Vivian: Yes. And so it sees that as being more valuable And also updating the other publishers as well. Right,

Melissa Weirick: Because they look to Google for that and accurate information and AI tools cite those smaller, platforms and publishers for information. And when people do a search on Google, it’s AI overview is scanning those smaller publishers for that information.

So you wanna make sure it’s accurate. At least once a month is a good frequency to check that everything looks good.

Krystal Vivian: Okay, fantastic. So you talked a little bit about reviews earlier, so let’s dive deep into that. Overall, how much do online reviews actually influence consumers’ decisions over which businesses they’re gonna choose to work with or choose to Patronize?

Melissa Weirick: So the crazy stat is that 99% of consumers read reviews before they make a purchase. And honestly, it does make sense because I can’t remember the last time I made a purchase without at least just peeking at the reviews, especially if it’s something I’ve never bought before. Like I recently bought Bedhead hair products and I’ve bought them in a physical store, but I still looked at the reviews when I bought them on Amazon just because that social proof matters.

Krystal Vivian: Yeah, well, if I’m gonna buy something new, especially something like a personal care item, even if I’m in the store, sometimes I will look on Amazon. Mm-hmm. At the reviews, that’s a big deal. And if it’s a business that I’m going to, just speaking from a consumer perspective that I’ve never been to before, I do look it up.

On, well, first of all, if it’s someplace I’m driving to, like, I’m looking it up on maps because I am not, you’ve gotta find parking out here, and I’ve got why, you know me, I’ve got, what is the parking situation? I have to know,

Melissa Weirick: sometimes I won’t go to a place if it has bad parking,

Krystal Vivian: straight up 100% not

Melissa Weirick: doing it.

Krystal Vivian: If I have to parallel park, it’s a game over. It’s not happening. But, Reading the reviews of those places. Yeah. And especially like if you think of like an emergency services like a plumber. Yeah. Or an hvac, you know, if your air conditioner goes out this summer, you, the reviews of those places matters a lot.

 

Melissa Weirick: because those are people, are people in your home fixing your do or die appliances.

Krystal Vivian: Mm-hmm.

Melissa Weirick: Yeah. Reviews are huge and like we are not unique in that reviews influence our decision because 93% of people say that that is the case for them as well. And here’s the thing though, you might think, well, reviews aren’t really that important.

At least I don’t have a negative review if my business has no reviews. That can’t be that bad. Well, 92% of customers may not use your business if you don’t have any reviews at all, because it’s like, is this business real? Have people ever gone here? Nobody’s saying anything about this business.

It’s a little weird to people. You know what I mean?

Krystal Vivian: It’s like there’s no social proof, and so it’s like, is this a business that Google just made up?

Melissa Weirick: Right, or is like, did they just start out like it? It’s weird to people if you don’t have reviews, so. And what is also joining the conversation are AI tools, because when you search up something on chat GPT, they’re looking at reviews.

When you type in something, let’s just say. You type in chat, find me the best Mexican restaurants within a 10 mile radius of me. I don’t know how many Mexican restaurants are in a 10 mile radius of me. I think two.

Chad’s gonna take that word best and it’s gonna find listings that have 3.5 or higher star ratings to find you the best rated.

Restaurants that you want to go to. So that’s why reviews matter. You need them for that social proof and you need them for the AI tools and Google to give you the search results that you’re looking for.

Krystal Vivian: As you talked about earlier, it’s really easy for people who have had a bad experience to leave a bad review. How do you get people to leave a good review?

Melissa Weirick: All you need to do is ask people, because so many people are willing to share their good experiences they’ve had with you. If you just send them an email with a link to write a review, they’re gonna leave a good review. If they had a good experience with you, all they need to do is be prompted. A lot of people, if they had a good experience and they don’t get asked to leave a review, they just leave, get in the car and think.

Yay. They don’t think to write a review, but if you ask them, they might just do it. And actually 83% of customers who are asked to leave a review go and leave one. So all it is is sending an email to ask.

Krystal Vivian: Yeah, or I think if you are in person with them, talking to you about it in person, because like there’s a local car wash here that.

When you’re getting your car washed, they ask you to leave a Google Review. and they just say like, Hey, while we’re washing your car, can you leave us a Google review and tell us about your experience? And the first time I was like, well no, ’cause I’ve not gotten my car washed yet, so I wanna give an accurate review. But then the second time I went back and I was like, Hey, I had a great experience. I brought my car back but I did not remember to do it.

Melissa Weirick: Oh,

Krystal Vivian: for that first time, it was when I came back that second time.

Mm-hmm. When they prompted me again and I was a repeat customer. So I think the prompting is really big.

Melissa Weirick: Oh, one more thing. You could have a QR code on your front desk so people could scan it and that’s interviews that way.

Krystal Vivian: Yeah, that’s a good idea too. Yeah. If you have like a lobby waiting area.

Does recency matter at all when it comes to reviews?

Melissa Weirick: Recency definitely matters. So people usually look at reviews left in the last two weeks. And another thing along with recency is that your response to reviews, whether the review is positive or negative, really matters because we’re looking at the stats and 88% of consumers would use a business that responds to all its reviews.

And the thing is, it’s really not very hard to do. All you have to do is respond within a week and if it’s a good review, say Hey, thanks for stepping in. We’re really glad that you’re happy. It was our pleasure. And if it was a bad review, you say, we’re so sorry you had this experience, and offer a reasonable way to help fix it for them.

People who are looking at your business to see if they wanna patronize, you may see that negative review, but they also see your response to the negative review is proactive and wants to make the best experience possible for the customer. So they might just see you in a better light than if they had just seen the negative review.

So your response really matters.

Krystal Vivian: Hmm. I think that’s really important too, because like bad experiences happen, Right. We’re all human. Nobody, is perfect and , maybe an employee had a bad day, or maybe that person just had a bad day. Right.

Melissa Weirick: And they misinterpreted things.

Krystal Vivian: Yeah. But making sure that you have that genuine response is just gonna build that trust and repair any damage that that bad review did.

Melissa Weirick: Yes. So for the potential customers and also for the customer who did have a bad review, their mind could totally be changed about you with just a simple, you reaching out.

Krystal Vivian: I think that’s awesome.

Melissa Weirick: Yeah.

Krystal Vivian: So what does a business actually need to do when it comes to their business listings and their review generation?

Melissa Weirick: So here’s what we need to do. You have to audit every directory and yes, even the ones that you think don’t matter, such as Hotfrog, which is a crazy name, Silex Brown book.net.

But they are important because AI search engines really look at them. Claim the listings you didn’t create. So your business can have all of its eggs in one basket. Correct the inconsistencies, because like we talked about, even S-T-R-E-E-T versus St. Period. The counts as an inaccuracy monitor for changes.

So we’re talking that once a month, going through your profiles and seeing if anything changed, if Google absorbed anything that wasn’t right. So we wanna check for that. Once a month you can request reviews from your customers for the last. 30 or 60 days. So you wanna send out those review generation emails and get people to send their reviews in.

Then you wanna respond to those reviews within a week to keep everything just up to date, keep those customers seeing the reviews that you got and that you’re responding to ’em. So. Yes. It does sound like a lot, but the good part is that we can do all that for you.

It is a lot to think about as a business owner. You’re doing 10 billion other different things. You don’t have time to do all of that stuff, When you don’t have time for it, it falls to the wayside. It gathers dust, and then your listings are 99% inaccurate across the web. And when people search you, they can’t find you.

So depending on us to keep all of your information up to date and accurate, generate reviews with your help. If you send us the customer’s names and emails and respond to those reviews, it just takes a whole load off your plate.

Krystal Vivian: Especially if you’re talking about, 200 plus potential different publishers that you have to go through.

 

Melissa Weirick: it’s a lot.

Krystal Vivian: And find all of that information and update it and make sure that it’s accurate.

Melissa Weirick: and the good thing is when you have managed listings, like all your listings look good, you’re gonna see 45, 40 9% more profile views and 153% higher click through rates. Like that’s everything.

Krystal Vivian: That’s incredible.

Well, I think that it’s obviously very valuable to make sure that this is taken care of. and we should be clear that this is not something that you do as part of your advertising. This is like the basics of how you show up online. Think of it as like the 2026 version of being in the Yellow Pages in 1993.

Melissa Weirick: Yes. Just like Yellow Pages. Times 10 or times 200.

Krystal Vivian: Times 200. Yes.

Melissa Weirick: Yeah.

Krystal Vivian: We always like to end the podcast with talking about ROI. So we’ve talked about how important the business listings are and the review generation is, but what’s the actual ROI of getting accurate listings and a strong review profile and getting this right for business?

Melissa Weirick: So if you have inaccurate listings, if you’re not generating reviews, if you’re not responding to reviews. You could lose up to $21,000 per year. And for small businesses, that is huge and that’s not doable. So keeping these listings accurate, You need it to keep from losing that money.

if you’re a business that has multiple locations. That’s not just $21,000, that’s $42,000. That’s whatever, 21,000 plus $42,000 is

Krystal Vivian: 63,000.

Melissa Weirick: But what I’m saying is. some businesses out here have 10 listings that are inaccurate, and that’s that loss of money for every single one of those locations.

And it’s gonna add up fast.

The best thing is you can keep all of these listings accurate, and you don’t have to spend a single dollar on your ads. It’s not about advertising, like you said, it’s like Oz behind the curtain. We’re keeping everything, everything straight behind the scenes.

So it can all look good for the people in front of the curtain when they’re searching you and when Google is finding you. And when AI search engines are finding you, if everything looks accurate across the board.

Businesses that have accurate listings are gonna receive 40% more same day visits. Those are people who are ready to buy, like right now, right this minute, that’s 40% more people.

If your listings are accurate, that’s awesome. And when your listings are managed, so managed listings, they drive 49% more profile views. And 153% higher click through rates, So that’s great. And businesses that have higher Google reviews, more positive Google reviews see an 18% increase in revenue from search results.

And without spending a dollar on advertising. So that’s amazing.

Krystal Vivian: That can really make your adver like the money that you, sorry to interrupt you.

Melissa Weirick: No, no,

Krystal Vivian: but to me, like the money that you are spending on your paid ads, especially paid search ads, right. we’ve talked about in previous episodes on the podcast, your paid search ads are your lead generators, right?

Melissa Weirick: Mm-hmm.

Krystal Vivian: that is what’s gonna drive the most traffic to your website, and it’s incredibly powerful for business. We see the biggest ROI at FDS for our clients through paid search ads. But imagine how much more powerful those page search ads are when it’s backed up by a strong. Google business profile.

With positive reviews, like

Melissa Weirick: Right.

Krystal Vivian: It works. this what you’re talking about, review generation and managing your business listings. It’s not advertising, but it does increase the power of your advertising too.

Melissa Weirick: Right? They work hand in hand.

Krystal Vivian: Yeah,

Melissa Weirick: and like what you said about going to that Google business profile and seeing those positive reviews, it’s as small as a 0.1 star increase in your average rating.

That could increase conversions by 25%. Like that’s such, it’s very incremental, but it can make such a big difference. And along those same lines, when a business has five or more reviews, conversion rates increase by 270%. That’s crazy.

And finally, about the review response. 88% of consumers are gonna use a business that responds to all of its reviews, versus 47% who will use one that doesn’t respond. That’s a big difference.

Krystal Vivian: That’s a huge difference.

Melissa Weirick: People are looking for your response in how you reply to happy people and not so happy people. Just to see what kind of business you are and how you respond to all sorts of situations. And responding doesn’t cost you a dime, but not responding can cost you customers, which sucks.

Krystal Vivian: This is incredibly important. And I love that you’re throwing out all of those stats too, because it’s not just this is what we think. This is the hard data of why this is really incredible.

This is your digital storefront, right? This is your, if people are searching online, whether they’re on their computer or on their phone, how you show up to them is as important as how your physical location shows up to them. And if you have the wrong address on your physical location,

Melissa Weirick: nobody’s coming.

Krystal Vivian: Nobody’s coming. Having the wrong address on your digital storefront is. just as detrimental. And like going back to if you show up at the bank and it’s closed when you thought it was going to be open.

Melissa Weirick: Mm-hmm.

That’s a huge problem. And as a business owner, you would fix that immediately on your physical storefront. You have to do it the same thing, it’s the same problem. It’s just happening online It’s not just about the annoyance or frustration either.

When it comes down to it, it’s about how much trust you have in that business that you’re using. And when they have inaccurate information, that trust gets lost

Krystal Vivian: And I think now more than ever consumers want to have that trust in the businesses that they’re working with, that they’re buying from.

Melissa Weirick: Yes. It’s everything.

Krystal Vivian: Well, Melissa, this was an incredible conversation. I know you’ve enlightened me and I think that our audience has a lot to take away from this. Thank you, Melissa, for joining us today and sharing your expertise.

Melissa Weirick: Thank you for having me.

Krystal Vivian: Absolutely. And thank you to our listeners for joining us today for this episode.

We will talk to you next time on Digital Marketing ROWhy?.

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