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eDirectory Tips

The Online Directory Business Model (and how to succeed)

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The online directory business modelStarting a new business with an online directory is a very attractive option for several reasons. Online directories are one of the most effective business models within the online media space and can be used by agencies to grow revenue or by entrepreneurs to launch a new digital company.

Some advantages of the online directory business model:

  • Easy and affordable to setup;
  • Provides a valuable service for people making purchase decisions;
  • Much of the content is user-produced, meaning the business can be run with a small team;
  • Low ongoing maintenance;
  • Generates high-margin, recurring revenue.

In this article, we’ll cover the foundation of the online directory business model, as well as learn how to monetize the business and get the first customers.

What is an online directory?

An online directory is a guide that assists people in making a purchase decision, whether it’s a local guide for restaurants and hotels, a niche product, such as a guide to help set up a wedding, or a business-to-business guide for buying factory equipment or enterprise services.

Online directories provide information about specific businesses including their names, addresses, contact details, associations, services, and products offered in the form of listings. Businesses are typically categorized based on their location, activity, or rating, and the directory must ensure that all the information in its listings is accurate.

In this business model, there are several niches to be explored and each one of them generates value differently for users and clients (which we will discuss in the next chapters).

How does the basic business model work

The basic business model is creating a site that has a list of all the relevant suppliers, which includes detailed information about what they offer, photos and videos, ratings, and reviews.  The model originally was used by yellow page companies, which in the US was a 20+ billion-dollar-a-year industry globally.  Also, niche B2B media companies often published vendor and supplier directories.

The online directory business model has been in use since the late nineties. Did you know that Elon Musk himself, when starting his climb in the business world, created an online city guide with maps and yellow pages, founding Zip2?

Back then, the company’s strategy was to create a physical database to promote this service to major newspapers and media publishers. He managed to close deals with major publishing houses like the New York Times, Chicago Tribune, and others.

In short, in February 1999, he sold the company to Compaq for $307 million. With the $22 million he received for his 7% stake in Zip2, he next launched an online bank called X.com, which merged with Confinity to form PayPal in 2000.

Interestingly, since then, the online business directory model has grown more and more, attracting the attention of different brands, products, competitors, etc.

eDirectory Business Listing Online DirectoryBusiness listing information example and how the information is displayed in an online directory.

The power of curation

Online information is everywhere these days – you can find information about a business on Google, Facebook, and many other sites. So why would people need a directory? The value is in the curation. The directory shows all the suppliers, ratings and reviews, and other information making it the authority to help make the purchase decision. There is so much information out there that curation is especially valuable, filtering out the noise and delivering only what’s really valuable.

By exploring the best content available in a certain niche, your online directory will be recognized. Customers value the diverse perspectives offer about the topics and interests that interest them. So get to know your audience, what are your customers looking for? What are their pains and needs?

Pay extra attention to the following points in order to have an effective curation process:

  • The kind of audience you are trying to build
  • The segment of customers you are trying to attract

Knowing your audience (and your niche) is key. Remember this.

As a source of curated content, your online directory’s purpose is to share listings, events, deals, and classifieds that your audience wants. It acts as a funnel. It is one of the most important ways to build trust between you and your audience. The better the content you provide, the more likely you are to receive clicks and referrals.

Get to know the types of online business directories

There are several types of online business directories to meet the most diverse interests and segments you could think of. Here are the most commonly used today:

  • Online local businesses;
  • Classifieds;
  • Real estate classifieds;
  • Job boards;
  • Freelancers;
  • Domestic services;
  • Events;
  • Weddings;
  • Doctors;
  • Travel, hotels, and food,
  • Softwares and apps;
  • Auto sales.

The key elements to having a good online business directory

For your online directory to be of higher quality, it must consider the following parameters:

  1. Breadth and depth of data for the categories the directory covers, so it has all the relevant listings and all the relevant information about each listing.  We have an entire Webinar dedicated to this topic.
  2. Provide relevant related content to attract more traffic (blogs, videos, social media);
  3. Present advertiser listings in an attractive and organized, with good descriptions and images;
  4. It is essential to have integrations with providers for online payment, allowing sales through this channel (check your local and major gateways);
  5. An online sponsor dashboard would allow sponsors to fully manage their listings. This saves time and allows greater flexibility for advertisers;
  6. To ensure a higher position in the search rankings of your listings and websites, it is essential to have content optimized for SEO;
  7. By providing maps and information related to the locations of listed companies, the directory site becomes much more useful to users.
  8. Reviews are important to make other users from your audience to have based purchase decisions.
  9. Invest in good quality photos and videos, hire a photographer or an image specialist. Good photos make your online directory look and feel more professional, and also make the sponsors sell more.
  10. And curation, as we mentioned before. Stay in your niche, promote an Editor’s Choice Award and other creative contests to engage with your audience.

How to get the first customers for your online directory?

To get started, you need to develop some marketing strategies to promote your online directory and attract your first customers. It is a job that requires a certain amount of patience to take the right steps and achieve the desired results.

Next, we will present some tips to attract the first customers to your online directory site, which are:

  1. Build listings on your site to grab users’ attention as an empty business directory doesn’t grab anyone’s attention. You can scrape listings and start filling your website by yourself.
  2. Use social media to promote your online directory, as your target audience is in these spaces and willing to interact with brands;
  3. Take advantage of the opportunity to establish a relationship with your audience by electing your visitors’ favorites in a certain niche;
  4. It is interesting to start using paid advertising, such as Google Ads, to increase traffic to your online directory quickly. Bing ads are also an option;
  5. Drive traffic to your directory site and build authority for your brand by writing relevant content and using guest blogging. Organic strategies typically require a longer time to work;

These are just a few suggestions to get you started in making your online directory popular and profitable.

How to monetize your online directory?

Certainly, most online business directory sites make money by providing visibility to their partners. This happens both with the dissemination of products and services and with the use of spaces for advertisements.

Additionally, some websites offer premium advertising and spaces. Once you have your online directory, it’s time to monetize it. It’s what generates business and profits.

Other forms of monetization can also be found in niches and differentiated business models, for example:

  • Affiliate Marketing;
  • Sales of leads;
  • Sponsored newsletters;
  • Disclosure on social networks.

Edirectory Free guided demoPaid advertisement inside the online directory business model

The option of paid advertisements to earn income in the online directory business model is the most used and applies to several types of online commercial guides, such as:

  • Stores;
  • Restaurants;
  • Subscriptions to scientific articles or videos;
  • Job vacancies, among others.

In this type of monetization, businesses pay to have their brand appear at the top of search results in their category. This is certainly an effective method of gaining visibility.

In addition, this type of listing generates recurring revenue, as the company can pay a monthly membership fee to have your name displayed throughout the month at certain times.

The listing is displayed on the first page of its categories, depending on the type of plan that is chosen by the companies. For example, a plan might offer three levels of memberships, such as:

  • Bronze ($30/month): Featured listing in a category and 2 photos to upload;
  • Silver ($50/month): Featured listings in 3 categories, 5 photos to upload and 1 social media account link;
  • Gold ($100/mo): Featured listings in 5 categories and 1 rotating ad slot, 10 upload photos, and linking 5 social media accounts with active feed updates.

In this example, it is clear how the advantages of each plan are increasing and how you can choose the one that best fits your budget.

Interestingly, the amount charged by companies to advertise their services and products directly relates to the quality of the directory site. Thus, the better your online directory, with a lot of good listings, the more you can charge for these plans.

As well, the more traffic your site has, the more opportunities you have to attract advertisers.

Ad spaces available

You can also monetize your online business directory by selling ad spaces, i.e. banners. Initially, you can offer free advertising space to encourage sponsors to start using your online directory.

You can also use the rotating banner to sell the same space to different companies. This requires defining a marketing plan that can be weekly, biweekly as well as other options.

One way to charge for ad slots can be Cost per 1000 impressions (CPM) or cost per click (CPC), or by setting a monthly fee for a certain space in a specific location on the page.

Take advantage of every opportunity to advertise your online directory. Some ideas can generate good results, such as promoting events related to the niche market in which it operates. Or even promoting articles, classifieds, and everything else that may be related to your business and generate an audience.

How to get started?

This is a critical step in getting your business directory started and on its way to success.

With the tools available today such as directory templates, themes, or online directory scripts, it can be overwhelming to build and update your online directory yourself or have to rely on a developer.

A company that specializes in online directory site software has a lot to offer for your online business model. For example, eDirectory is an extremely complete and commercially available directory website builder.

It offers its users all the tools to create, manage and promote a successful directory site. It also offers a robust list of resources, including some essential tools to help you market your directory online, such as:

  1. Ability to create professional directory listings with images, videos, social media feed, and coupons within an intuitive and beginner-friendly interface;
  2. Customize your pages to fit your needs, using a visual editor to create different categories for each listing you create;
  3. Seamless integration with the most popular social media platforms and encouraging advertisers to promote their own listings with social sharing links;
  4. Automatically integrate with Google Maps as new listings are added;
  5. Providing automatic payment reminders to listing owners as their payment due dates approach;
  6. You can generate business for your advertisers by allowing them to create their own coupons and offers directly from their listings. Additionally, you can sell them banners ad space;

To get a better idea of all these eDirectory benefits, go to edirectory.com and schedule a free guided demo. You will be surprised!

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eDirectory vs WordPress Directory Plugins

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eDirectory vs wordpress directory plugins

eDirectory vs WordPress Directory Plugins & Themes: what is the best solution?

As you begin to plan and research creating and building a profitable online directory-based website, you will find that there are a few options for you and may wonder – ‘what is the best solution for me?’

If you are contemplating using WordPress directory plugins and themes, there are some pros and cons to consider.

eDirectory Wedding business directory Theme

You can use WordPress for an institutional brochure-type of website, your personal blog, e-commerce, and of course, for directory-based websites such as Yellow Pages, Local Search Site, Classified Ads Portals, and more. If you are not minimum skilled in Webdesign, it can be a daunting task.

eDirectory is a platform specifically designed for building and managing directory-based websites. The skilled development team has thought through all of the details needed to build a fully-functional website. Once you sign-up for eDirectory, your new website is ready for you to configure according to your business model. No coding or design knowledge is required.

To create a good-looking and reliable directory-based website using WordPress directory plugins, there’s a lot more than just starting adding content to it.

If you are new to using WordPress, there may be a bit of a learning curve. Although getting started with WordPress has a relatively low cost as an open-source code, building on the website begins to add up and create a lot of moving parts. Many of the reliable WordPress themes are offered at a premium price – the same is to be said for plug-ins.

eDirectory VS WordPress

Here are the basic steps to creating a WordPress-powered Online Directory

Hosting

What an easy start! There are several companies out there providing low-cost hosting for WordPress websites. Pricing will vary according to the resources offered by each company/plan.

Server Configuration

Not all companies will deliver the server ready to host your project, in many cases you’ll need to do it yourself. Some important things to consider in this step:

  • Will you need Cpanel or WHM to manage the server?
  • Can you scale storage, bandwidth, and performance?
  • Is it ready for email services?
  • Can it handle safety backups?
  • How many security levels does it have to protect your data?
  • Does it provide an SSL security certificate?
  • What’s the system library version recommended?
  • What is the policy to update the library for PHP, Java, and other modules?

WordPress Installation

As an open-source simply head to their official website and with a few clicks you can download their code. Assuming you have your server already configured, there are plenty of tutorials available to guide you with this installation.

Directory Theme/Template/Plugin research

Here’s what you need to look for when choosing the right WordPress directory plugins/template/theme:

  • Is it compatible with the core version of WordPress?
  • When was the last update?
  • Is there any support or guidance?
  • Is it for Business Listing only?
  • Can you create custom fields for Listings?
  • Does it include Classifieds too?
  • Does it include Events and Recurring Events?
  • Does it come with its own Banner Ads manager?
  • Can business/members post deals and offers?
  • Does it support online recurring payments?
  • Does it automate the billing procedures?
  • Does it include a portal for the advertiser to post and manage their content?
  • How many pre-built pages come ready?
  • Is it drag-and-drop?
  • What is the page builder? Elementor, Gutenberg or Divi?
  • Can users bookmark their favorites and have a public profile?
  • Can you create discount codes and free trials?
  • Does it have a Claim This Listing feature?
  • Does it come with pre-built email templates?
  • How does it handle the Categories Tree?
  • Does it allow for subcategories?

Additional Plugins

As WordPress is just the core application, many of the basic features for directory-based websites are achieved by adding plugins developed by the community. The Plugins will vary according to the needs you already know (and some will rise along the way). Don’t forget to check on each Plugin if they are compatible with the version of WordPress and with the version of the theme – these issues can break your site. The most common WordPress Directory Plugins sites are:

  • Yoast SEO
  • Google Analytics
  • Google Tag Manager
  • Google Maps
  • Google Recaptcha
  • Payment Gateways (Paypal, Stripe, etc)
  • Contact Forms
  • Dynamic Calendar Widgets
  • Bulk Importing tool
  • Exporting tool
  • Image sliders and Carousel
  • Rating and Reviews
  • Newsletter widget
  • GDPR active consent
  • Facebook comments
  • Social Login by Facebook, Gmail, and Apple ID

Installation and Setup

Once you have the site, the theme, and the plugins installed. It’s time to activate everything and start configuring the basics to be sure the plugins won’t conflict with each other and won’t break your site.

eDirectory vs wordpress directory plugins

While you are still considering what theme to use and the collection of Plugins you’ll need to start your idea, an average eDirectory user is already working on the new site and will be launching it soon.

Top 5 reasons to consider eDirectory over WordPress Directory Plugins

1. Support

With eDirectory, you have a TEAM of over 50 techs, reps, and customer success agents to make sure you have the greatest opportunities for success – whether that means scheduling a training session or getting some help with how it all works. No need to chase down a developer or have staff on payroll for basic maintenance or consultation.

2. Product

With WordPress, you may end up with a sort of Frankenstein website with lots of controlled moving parts by various 3rd party developers that may or may not keep current with the constant security updates of an open-source platform like WordPress, meaning you could go weeks with broken items on the page with no sign of help in sight. So in the end, just to make things work, you may bog down your site and find yourself trying to piece things together with bandaids, duct tape, and hot glue.

3. Scalability

Many people launch with WordPress for the low sticker price, but once your clients start gaining traction with WordPress and eventually grow out of it, clients experience high-switching costs to a platform better suited for growth and scalability like eDirectory.com. Many clients experience extended delays and issues with migrating data, service interruptions, customer dissatisfaction from a broken site, and overall growing pains that can easily be avoided by launching with eDirectory from the get-go. So, for clients with serious revenue goals and long-term growth plans, and fewer headaches so they can focus on activities that add value rather than operational development, clients choose eDirectory.

4. Credibility

Visitors can spot a WordPress site from a mile away. There’s nothing special about a $99 theme that makes your brand look credible. With eDirectory.com, our clients LOVE the integrated app builder, all the essentials under one roof like payment processing, hosting, and member management. And your online community will appreciate all of the features you’re able to provide with our fully-integrated online directory solution to provide a one-stop shop for growing your revenue goals. When people see you have an unbranded mobile app, they know you’ve invested and are serious.

5. Growth & Custom Development

As your online community grows and you start to receive actionable feedback, you might find there are features or functionalities unique to your community that you need to keep growing and adding value to your brand. With WordPress, you may encounter the same Frankenstein scenario that makes it more difficult to keep it all together without a full-time developer at an average hourly rate of $100 per hour. We have an entire department of custom development services to add what’s most important to your expansion plans.

Wrapping up

eDirectory offers a stable, secure hosted solution so you can rest assured your investment is in good hands. With so many built-in features and functionality, the website need not get ‘bloated’ with additional plug-ins and scripts.

By choosing eDirectory as your directory platform, you can be up and running AND generate revenue quickly and easily.

To help you get started, contact an account executive to discuss your needs and ask about our onboarding plans to help you get the jump on your new venture!

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Content Marketing Strategies For Online Business Directories

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content marketing strategies for online directories

If you are launching an online directory there are a number of content marketing strategies to help you attract an audience and build engagement.  Content marketing is part of a larger marketing category called Inbound Marketing and is designed to attract your business’ target audience by building content pieces that provide information and reinforce authority on the subject matter.

In this article, we’ve outlined some of the key content marketing strategies that are most effective for building an audience.

  • Why is content marketing important for an online business directory?
  • How to get started with a content marketing strategy
  • 7 content formats to explore in your online strategy

Copyright: (c) Bakhtiarzein | Dreamstime.com

Why is it important to use content marketing strategies for online business directories?

Content marketing is part of a bigger category of marketing activities called inbound marketing, or attraction marketing as it is also known.  This is different from outbound marketing which takes the value proposition to the customers.

Content marketing offers several benefits such as:

  • Educate your audience about your niche;
  • Promote your business’ authority;
  • Generate engagement from your target audience;
  • Take a softer approach to convert users into customers;
  • Reduce your business marketing costs;
  • Expand your site’s organic traffic and visibility.

How to start a content marketing strategy for online business directories?

Now that you know the importance of utilizing content marketing strategies for your classifieds website, you might be wondering how to get started, right?

Well, contrary to what many people think, a content marketing strategy does not simply involve posting blog posts on your website at random but rather, researching, planning, executing, and measuring the results (and the use of different content formats).

So, before thinking about creating content for your online business directory, you should consider all the steps in this process and think about aspects such as:

  • Who are you creating content for?
  • What are the goals of your strategy?
  • How do you plan to promote them (channels and formats)?
  • How will you fit content into your business’s sales funnel strategy?
  • How will you measure your results (KPIs)?

All of these are critical to achieving successful results in your content strategy for online business directories.

Once you plan, execute and evaluate the results, you can make the necessary adjustments to the strategy to improve it further.

7 Content Formats to Explore in Your Trade Guide Strategy

A content marketing strategy is not based on just producing content sporadically and only in one setting (people often associate with blog posts). On the contrary, there are several formats that you can adopt, mix and reframe in your planning.  Here is an overview of a few successful formats.

1. Interview with Advertisers (video, podcast or text)

Create a sense of importance in your advertisers by inviting them to an interview by telling their story, and sharing their knowledge. Invite a prominent sponsor and record an interview in webinar format, highlighting their background, strategy and successes (as well as their mistakes).

To save time this can also be done via email, where you regularly send a set of questions to directory listing owners or other people in the industry, edit them and post as articles or blogs.

The goal here is to generate more engagement with your audience, creating identification with real people, so that other users can connect and interact through your platform. We recommend that you hold webinars or do a written email interview with a guest once a month and then feature it in your directory site and other channels such as social media or newsletters.

2. Create Local Itineraries

For local search directories, a great way to drive readership is by creating a virtual itinerary of good options for businesses and services offered in your guide. Contact advertisers and offer space within your itinerary, but be sure to curate it to give your audience a good experience. It can be regional food restaurants, craft and arts stores, street food vendors and other attractions that might be of interest.

You can structure the itinerary into a blog post, or article, including mentions of listings and advertisers, as well as videos and photos to enrich the material and rank higher on Google. You can create thematic itineraries based around holidays and events (watch the calendar). Renewing annually to update with new tips and content.

3. Create Top 10 Lists

Another great opportunity to generate engagement with your advertisers and visitors is to create Top 10 or Best of lists, with the best picks from your online business directory. Use “editor’s choice” badges to value the top-rated advertisers and offer this premium space in a top 10 of the year in key categories in your business directory, such as best restaurants, best dental clinics, best car dealerships, accounting offices, lawyers and others.

Top 10 lists are usually run annually, selecting the best services, products and advertisers. Send an email to selected candidates informing them that they are participating in the selection for the best of the year in their category. Define how the choice will be made and reward the winners with a special badge for that year and promote the result on social networks and groups of your online directory.

4. Create Infographics

Infographics about different subjects relevant to your directory can help capture attention by telling a story with information and images.

This format increases engagement and traffic to your site on search engines. First, think of a narrative (a story) that you want to include and what main data you should gather, for example: an infographic that shows the main attractions in your city center on a map, or an infographic that shows the reviews and prices for services (choose a category) in a particular neighborhood.

As a lead-gathering strategy, you can start off by offering some of the content for free in your business guide, and a more complete version accessible by subscribing to a newsletter, where the visitor leaves their name and email to access the material.

5. Create a Fun Contest

Here’s a fun tip to generate more likes and comments on your social media: a contest is always a good way to generate some buzz on your online directory! Host a photo contest of the best dishes from advertised restaurants in your online business directory. Is your location a coastal city? Even better! Award the best photos of the beaches in your region. Create polls open to the public to choose the best services, food and stores in the region.

Offer prizes to winning advertisers such as upgrades to your ads or free plugins. The better the offer, the more people will engage and participate in the contest.

6. Create Memes

According to scientist Richard Dawkins, “a meme is an idea or information that is propagated and multiplied among individuals, similarly to what happens with the gene in genetics”. This may seem far from the concept of memes we see on the internet every day, but it’s exactly the same concept.

The power of Memes comes from the fact they are meant to be shared – it’s a content format with potential to reach thousands of people. You can take advantage of this format by creating fun images that fit your niche. Believe me, there is a whole audience of the most diverse segments that consume memes produced specifically for them such as pet owners, cooks, nutritionists, lawyers, dentists… In short, look for your niche and pay attention to internet trends.

7. Ebooks, Templates, and Podcasts

Other informative content formats that draw attention and build authority are ebooks, templates, and podcasts.

Ebooks can further deepen a topic and still explain clearly and objectively the topics covered, in addition to serving as a tool for capturing leads. Try to create different ebooks in pdf format of various topics around your niche. Pay attention to what your users are looking for and create files to address their pain points and collect more leads.

Document Templates, which help businesses save time and create a professional image, are great for attracting leads to your business directory. Create ready-made templates of customer engagement emails your advertisers might use, or landing pages, or other things that might help their business like spreadsheets to plan or budget.  Businesses will download and customize them to fit their needs, and along the way they learn about your site and may sign up to become a paying member.

Podcasts are also great for attracting an audience.  You can plan, record and distribute audio content on subject matters that may be of interest to your audience.

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How to Distribute Created Content

Create an email marketing strategy

Email marketing is one of the most effective inbound marketing strategies.

A survey showed that for every $1 you spend, you can expect a return on your investment of $51. It is said that the ROI for email marketing is a whopping 4400%, that’s just amazing and shows how well email marketing strategies can perform. Make sure to customize your emails to your user base (this is key), keep your audience engaged with news and deals when it is relevant. Be sure not to spam your sponsors with too many blasts per week.

Content Marketing Strategies For Online Business DirectoriesSource: sendinblue

Do you want to build loyalty with your audience and establish a connection with your online business directory? An email marketing strategy can help you.

After defining the aspects mentioned in the previous topic, think of ways to build your email list with the contacts of potential customers who might be interested in your listing.

For example, invite your readers to subscribe to a newsletter where you will share valuable content and practical tips to your customers, free of charge and with the frequency defined in your planning (weekly, fortnightly, monthly).

Use Social Media

Social media is an extremely powerful tool in marketing campaigns for one reason: your potential customers are there on a daily basis.

Therefore, using them as one of the means of distribution in your content marketing strategy for trade guides is indispensable.

The great benefit of this means of distribution is that you can be present in the channels that make the most sense for your strategy and you can develop content that will really connect and create valuable relationships between your online business directory and your audience, all of it in a more present and frequent way.

Then, analyze which channels make the most sense for your strategy, according to your persona and objectives defined in the planning phase, and thus start thinking about ways you can engage your audience in these media through content production.

As you may already know, you can create a presence on social networks such as:

  • LinkedIn;
  • Facebook;
  • Instagram;
  • Twitter;
  • Pinterest, among others.

Reuse your content across different channels and formats

Who says content has to have the same format forever? A great way to put content marketing for online business directories into practice is to reuse your content across different configurations and channels.

How does it work? Well, blog content can become a more detailed ebook that you will make available to your audience and in return, you will get a contact that can be reused at another time; a live broadcast can become a longer blog post; a video can become a dynamic and useful infographic, among others. You just need to know how to fit the content to another purpose!

Use the video content format in your strategies

Videos, as well as blog posts, are excellent content formats to explore. This becomes more relevant every day as users consume more and more audiovisual content.

Also, producing content in video format is a way to make your content more shareable and thus reach more people. You can even embed videos in some blog articles and further optimize their content.

Videos also appear in search results, such as on Google, and therefore, can be optimized to better rank your portal in the most used search platform in the world.

Make your content relevant to Google – Write with a focus on SEO

One of the pillars of content marketing is blog content written with SEO (Search Engine Optimization) in mind.   Understand which keywords groups are relevant to the topics you are targeting, and write with them in mind.  This will help you become an authority in search engine result pages for those topics.

A great way to do this in 2021, according to Neil Patel’s website, is to produce smaller, niched content and use long-tail keywords to occupy the more specific search positions on Google.

Also, doing keyword research work in your niche and developing content around those terms remains extremely important to getting good results.

Conclusion

Content marketing is a great way to attract an audience to your directory site and make your site the authority on the subject matter, and with the techniques from this article it’s not difficult to get started.  Make a plan and a schedule to try different strategies, and build on the ones that are most successful.

And if you’re still looking for a platform that integrates everything you need to successfully launch your trading guide, schedule a free demo with us today and see how eDirectory can help you!

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How to Start A Yellow Pages Directory Website

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How to Start A Yellow Pages WebsiteYellow pages are some of the most useful online directory websites, both for your visitors and local businesses. They’re also beneficial for you as the directory website owner. But what exactly is a yellow pages directory website? What are the advantages of creating one and, most importantly, what does it take to build one? Those are the questions we’ll answer in this article. We’ll also explain how to get started building a yellow pages directory site.

What is a Yellow Pages Directory Website?

A yellow pages site is an online business directory that helps visitors discover local businesses. Typically, a yellow pages directory consists of location-based listings that include businesses, service providers, organizations, and similar. If a visitor is looking for a restaurant or a doctor in their area, a yellow pages directory can point them in the right direction.

This type of listing can provide them with all the necessary information they need to know about a particular business: address, hours of operation, contact information, website address, and more. They can even show reviews and ratings of any individual business.

In other words, online users benefit from a yellow pages directory because it’s an easy way to find the information they need when they need it. Businesses and organizations benefit from being listed on yellow pages because the listing can bring them more customers and clients.

Why Build a Yellow Pages Directory?

A yellow pages directory website is useful for both online users as well as businesses. But what about you, the person behind the yellow pages directory? Why should you bother building a yellow pages directory website?

There are a few reasons. For starters, it’s a good way to make money online. You can sell listings as well as advertising spots. On top of regular listings, you can also sell enhanced listings and allow businesses to claim a listing for a fee.

Secondly, it allows you to create a business without having to worry about creating a product or gaining skills to provide a specific service.

Lastly, it’s a low-risk and low-cost business idea as you don’t need a huge investment to get started. Another benefit is that you also don’t have to worry about renting an office space and paying associated bills and other fees.

What Does It Take to Create a Yellow Pages Directory Website?

The first thing you’ll need to build a yellow pages website is a dedicated yellow pages directory software like eDirectory. Using eDirectory is the fastest and most affordable way to launch a directory website in any niche without the need to hire a developer.

eDirectory Notable Features

eDirectory has a plethora of features that make it a great choice for building a yellow pages directory:

  • Build a small directory with several thousand listings or a whole network of sites with millions of listings
  • Easily create and sell listings, classifieds, events, deals, articles, blog and banner ads
  • Price listings by category, sell enhanced listings, and offer the ability to claim listings
  • Users can create detailed listings with descriptions, photos, maps, video, categories, keywords, downloadable files, and more
  • Automated listing renewal reminders
  • SEO-optimized platform
  • The ability for users to leave ratings and reviews
  • Integration with multiple payment providers
  • And more

Yellow Pages Directory Template

How to Get Started With Your Yellow Pages Directory Site

Now that you know what it takes to build a yellow pages directory site as well as what features to look for in a yellow pages directory software, it’s time to take the next step. Here are the steps to get started with your yellow pages website.

1. Decide On Monetization Method

Before you start building your yellow pages directory website, it’s important to decide how you’ll monetize it. As mentioned earlier, you can charge for listings, sell advertising space, as well as charge an additional fee for claiming a listing or selling enhanced listings.

If you’re just getting started, focus on one or two monetization methods and expand from there.

2. Get a Domain

The next step is to decide on a domain name for your yellow pages directory. There is no shortage of domain registrars where you can purchase a domain name. A few tips to keep in mind when it comes to domain names are:

  • Keep the name short and simple
  • Try to include your main keywords
  • Opt for a name that is easy to spell and remember

3. Build Your Directory

Once you have a domain name and you know how you’ll monetize the directory, it’s time to build it. As mentioned earlier, you’ll need a dedicated yellow pages directory software like eDirectory to facilitate the process. Packed with the features mentioned above, eDirectory makes it easy to launch a yellow pages site in no time.

Start Your Online Directory 4. Get Listings

A directory is nothing without listings. But it’s hard to get people to create a listing if nobody knows your directory exists. A good starting point for getting the initial listings is to reach out to local businesses and offer them a reduced rate for their first term.

5. Drive Traffic

Once your directory is live and you have the initial listings, the main task is to drive traffic to your directory. A few ideas include:

  • Being active on social media where your target audience spends time
  • Creating quality content around topics that interest your audience
  • Optimizing your directory for search engines

Conclusion

Building a yellow pages directory website might seem daunting. But once you know what’s involved, what features you need to include, and how to get started building a yellow pages directory, the task becomes easier.

Get started on your yellow pages directory website with eDirectory and see how easy it is to build one using our platform. Sign up for a free demo and explore all the features eDirectory has to offer.

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15 Ways To Drive Traffic To Your Online Directory

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15 Ways To Drive Traffic To Your Online Directory

Getting traffic is the backbone of all websites. The same is true for online directory websites, specifically. The more traffic your online directory gets, the higher your conversion rate will be. In other words, more traffic means getting more listings which means more revenue down the line. As such, driving traffic to your online directory should be one of your main goals. The task may seem daunting, especially if your directory is brand new. However, there are quite a few ways to drive traffic to your online directory website and we’ll cover them in this article.

15 Ways To Drive Traffic To Your Online Directory

Below, you’ll find various tactics and methods for increasing the traffic to your online directory website. The good news is that most of them are free and require only your time.

1. Content Marketing

One of the easiest ways to market an online directory is through content marketing. According to HubSpot, businesses that blog get 55% more website visitors than businesses that don’t.

Focus on creating content that would be relevant and helpful to your target audience. In other words, create content that solves their problems, educates them about your offer, and answers questions they have that are related to your online website directory.

Once you’ve started creating content, it will be indexed by the search engines which means it can appear as a search result when your audience searches for relevant keywords.

In short, creating content not only boosts your website traffic but it also allows you to appear as a search result for both potential customers and people looking for the best resources or specific businesses in their area.

2. Make Use Of Social Media

Aside from content marketing, social media is another easy way to promote your directory. Facebook is one of the most popular platforms out there but don’t forget that there are many other social media platforms including:

  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Pinterest
  • Youtube
  • And others.

Remember, you don’t have to be active on all of these. Rather, the key here is to focus on one or two platforms where your target audience likes to spend time. Then, post relevant and engaging content. You can also repurpose content from your website’s blog instead of creating all the content from scratch.

Engage in a conversation with your followers, ask questions, and reply to comments. This will boost your engagement which will increase the chances of your content being shown to people who aren’t yet following you.

Link to your directory website in your profile’s bio and point people to helpful resources on your website as well as share about the benefits of being listed in the directory. You can also create promotional posts or a special offer such as a reduced listing price for your social media followers.

3. Use Video

Video marketing has been gaining in popularity for the past few years and it shows no signs of slowing down. Video marketing is great not only for increasing conversions but also building trust and establishing a more personal relationship with your audience.

Similar to content marketing, you can use video marketing to create helpful and educational content that your audience would benefit from.

When it comes to video marketing, YouTube is your best choice for long-form educational videos. Posting content on YouTube has another benefit: it allows your videos to show up in search results and you can embed them onto your website along with a transcript as a blog post.

If you prefer shorter video content, platforms like TikTok and Instagram Reels are great for showing your brand’s personality and making a connection with your audience.

4. Optimize Your Site

In 2021, nobody likes a slow-loading website. It hurts your user experience and search engines typically favor websites that load fast. That’s why it’s crucial to optimize your site as higher rank in search engines leads to more traffic. Not to mention, your existing users and visitors will be more inclined to recommend and share your online directory website if it loads fast.

Start by running a speed test with a tool such as Pingdom Tools to determine how fast or how slow your website loads. Then, work on getting the load time to 2 seconds or less. A few recommendations include:

  • Using a Content Delivery Network to serve static content such as script and style files
  • Optimizing images and compressing their file size
  • Making use of caching techniques

5. Work On Your SEO 

Search Engine Optimization is one of the best ways to drive traffic to your website. When you optimize your site for SEO, you’ll get organic traffic — visitors who are already interested in what you have to offer and are actively looking for it.

In addition to that, having an SEO-optimized site means you don’t have to rely on the ever-changing social media algorithms and you don’t have to pay for ads.

The downside of using SEO is that it’s a long-term strategy. However, once you start ranking for your desired keywords, you’ll reap the benefits for years to come. The first step in optimizing your online website directory is to use an SEO-friendly directory platform. Aside from that, here are a few more tips for optimizing your site for search engines:

  • Publish relevant, quality content on a regular basis
  • Link to other pages and resources on your site
  • Optimize your site to load fast
  • Use keywords naturally
  • Optimize page titles
  • Optimize images with SEO-friendly titles and alt tags

Start Your Online Directory6. Comment On Relevant Sites

Most websites that allow commenting have a field where you can enter your website. By leaving comments and contributing to a discussion on relevant websites in your industry, you can get people to click through to your website.

This not only helps you build relationships but it also puts your online directory in front of new audiences that might be interested in creating a listing for their business and website.

7. Be Active On Forums Or Communities In Your Niche

Similar to leaving comments on websites in your industry, you should get involved in forums in your niche. This gives you an opportunity not only to reply to others but also to start topics and become one of the top contributors in the specific forum which is bound to get your profile viewed by other users.

However, don’t make the mistake of joining a forum and then posting a link to your online directory every chance you get. Instead, focus on providing value first. You can include a link to your directory as a helpful resource or when someone asks for it directly.

Another way to point users to your online directory is to include it in the forum signature. That way, it’s always present but it’s not obtrusive.

If you can’t find a forum that’s related to your industry, try finding a community in Facebook or LinkedIn groups. With Facebook and LinkedIn groups, you’ll want to make sure that your profile is optimized and links to your online directory or to your Facebook business page.

8. Take Advantage Of OTHER Directories

Another way to market your online directory is to put it in another directory. Places like Google My Business and Bing Places For Business make it easy to get started and list your directory.

In addition to that, getting listed in either Google My Business or Bing Places For Business can also help improve your SEO. Once you list your directory, it can show up as a relevant local search result when people enter keywords and topics that are related to your directory.

9. Paid Advertising

If you have a marketing budget, you could consider investing in paid advertising. Both Google Ads and Facebook Ads are a great way to expose your directory to new audiences and gain visibility.

Facebook ads are a great choice if you want to get really detailed with your audience targeting. They also allow you to use images, video, and text ads so you have more choices when it comes to creating a compelling ad for your business directory.

If you want to keep it simple, you can opt for Google Ads as they make it easy to create text ads that drive traffic to your directory.

10. Post On LinkedIn, Medium, And Similar Sites

We’ve mentioned earlier that content marketing is a great way to drive traffic to your online directory website. Another benefit of content marketing is that it gives you plenty of material to repurpose as social media content or to repost on other websites.

LinkedIn and Medium are great places to repost your blog posts without having to pitch your article idea and go through the approval process.

There are a few ways to approach this:

  • You can repost the article in its entirety and say it was originally published on your website
  • Repost a part of the article and encourage readers to go read the rest over on your website
  • Expand on the original article and end with a call to action that points them to a landing page on your site where they can explore all the features your online directory has to offer

11. Use Guest Blogging

Guest blogging is a common marketing practice where you submit a blog post or an article to another relevant website in your niche. This method works really well for driving traffic to your website, especially if you link to a landing page with a special offer.

Once you submit a guest post, you’ll get a link back to your website through your byline that appears at the bottom of the article. As a result, you get traffic to your website and you build authority and brand awareness at the same time.

When it comes to guest blogging, the biggest challenge is finding websites that accept guest posts and making sure they’re relevant to your industry. It does you no good to publish a guest post on a popular site with millions of readers if that website has nothing to do with your niche.

Instead, you need to focus on websites that your target audience would visit as this will result in getting visitors that are interested in getting listed in your directory. Luckily, you can find plenty of suitable websites where you can submit a guest post with a quick Google search.

All you have to do is type in a keyword related to your industry along with a few search operators to find guest posting opportunities. A few examples include:

  • KEYWORD intitle:”write for us”
  • KEYWORD “submit a guest post”
  • KEYWORD inurl:/guest-post/
  • KEYWORD “accepting guest posts”
  • KEYWORD “guest post guidelines”
  • KEYWORD “become a contributor”

Keep in mind the list above is not exhaustive but it should serve as a good starting point.

12. Invite Others To Guest Blog For You

Speaking of guest blogging, it’s a two-way street. Just like you can write content for others, they can write content for you too. Consider inviting your directory members to write a blog post for you that would be interesting and relevant to your audience. Or, create a page on your site that outlines the guest post submission process.

This is another method that has a twofold benefit. For starters, it gives you fresh content for your site and takes content creation off your plate. Secondly, the guest blogger will more than likely promote the article they’ve written which brings in more traffic to your site.

13. Provide Your Customers With A Badge That Links To Your Directory

When someone signs up to be listed in your directory, give them a code for a badge they can embed on their website. The badge should link back to your directory. The benefit of this approach is two-fold. For one, your customers can use the badge to boost their credibility and showcase where their website or business has been featured.

Secondly, it allows you to get a backlink from another, relevant website which can boost your SEO authority. Lastly, since the website will feature a badge with a link to your directory, every visitor who lands on the website can click through to visit your online directory which results in more traffic.

14. Make Use Of Ratings, Reviews, And Testimonials

People buy from businesses and people they trust. Nothing builds trust faster than ratings and reviews from other people. According to research, 87% of consumers read online reviews for local businesses. As such, your directory should make it easy for others to leave reviews and share their experiences.

Another way to build trust is to showcase testimonials throughout your directory website. Featuring testimonials will increase the trust potential customers have in your directory. You can invite your users to send you a testimonial or leave a review on Google My Business or even your Facebook business page if you have one.

Once you start getting testimonials and reviews, you can add them to your homepage as well as the main sales page. Don’t forget to make the most of your testimonials by also sharing them on social media profiles.

15. Invest In Email Marketing

Don’t wait to build your email list. Email marketing has one of the best returns on investment, with several sources citing that for every dollar spent on email marketing, you’ll get $42 in return. Email marketing gives you direct access to your audience where you can establish a relationship with them and educate them on all the benefits of being listed in your online directory.

It allows you to build trust and reach them without the fear of social media algorithms burying your posts.

To start building your list, include sign-up forms on your website. Consider offering an incentive such as a discount for their first listing or a special bonus such as a top spot in the corresponding category for the first month.

Final Thoughts

Like with any other website, driving traffic is crucial if you want to generate income with your online directory business. With the tips laid out in this article, you’ll be able to get more traffic to your website.

Keep in mind that you don’t need to use all of these tactics at the same time. Start with one or two and then slowly introduce other methods and keep experimenting. By doing so, you’ll be able to understand which traffic-generating method works best for your online directory website and double down your efforts. Good luck!

 

How to build a 50.000 business listings online directory

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How to build a 50.000 business listings online directory

How to build a 50.000 business listings online directory

Your online directory is already up and running, which is fantastic! However, an empty directory will not bring you any clients. We’ll explain how and where to find your first business listings for your online directory in this article.

As an online directory owner, you probably have a clear idea of what you want to offer your clients. Regardless if it is a job advert wall where companies can advertise their vacancies, or a pet guide with redeemable deals and listings for the best pet shops, veterinarians, and various service providers, the main thing you will always have in common is the business listings. Without business listings, an online directory is pretty much good for nothing.

For a moment, let me put myself in your shoes. Surely, you’re wondering where and how to find quality business listings for your new directory, and this is indeed important for many reasons. The main ones being SEO (search engine optimization), because you want Google to index your online directory and show it in SERP (search engine results page), generating revenue, as this might be the key reason why you sent time building an online directory in the first place but, also, to attract more clients. Think about it, as customers ourselves, we want to go to places where other people are going, making recommendations, hiring services from other people.

In this article, you will learn about three different ways to earn your initial business listings, which will set you off on the road to reaching 50.000 listings within a few months of starting your business. Continue reading this post for more information about improving your online directory.

Table of contents

  • Building your business listings online directory database from scratch
  • Buying business listings from vendors
  • Scrape business listings with a scraping tool
  • Conclusion

Building your business listings online directory database from scratch

At first glance, this might look intimidating, but it is the safest way to post your first business listing online. By doing research and checking the accuracy or updated status of all the information there, you can ensure the quality of the information there. You will see more success if you are supported by a team, as that will increase the speed at which you populate your database.

If you are working alone and have a budget to invest in this task, don’t be afraid to hire help to grow your database. Set quality standards for your listings, remember that every bit of information counts, especially the description (put some effort into it) and contact information. Also, focus on creating and promoting features your clients might find valuable to attract more leads right away. Be creative with the titles in order to drive more clicks to your listings, be clear with every bit of information you put there. Also, be sure to make your images and photos as eye-catching as possible. Aim for professional photos (hire a photographer if possible).

Buying business listings from vendors

You might find that this is the most direct and reliable way of populating your online directory. You can streamline the process of expanding your directory in a few steps by purchasing directory listings from a reputable vendor, in addition to ensuring high-quality content.

As a downside, you could find those trustworthy vendors are not always the cheapest option. To help you further on your research for business listings, we’ve selected the top data vendors on the internet. Take a look:

The top tier business listings online directory database vendors

Acxiom

Acxiom, pronounced “a-xee-um”, is a database marketing company based in Conway, Arkansas. A reliable source for consumer and market data, this organization ranks among the best in the business. In addition, you will have access to a wide range of additional services such as customer segmentation, analysis of market trends (in several countries), and a Global Data Navigator service, which allows agencies to choose global data elements by country. Prices are subject to quotation.

Data Axle USA

Data Axle USA previously known as InfoUSA, Data Axle has been in business since 1972, making it one of the leading database providers in the United States. In 1986, they became the first company to digitize all Yellow Pages listings on floppy disks and CD-ROMs, so customers could consult information easily. Providing reliable databases on customer and marketing information, they are today able to help small and big businesses across the country. Prices are subject to quotation.

Dun & Bradstreet

Another database provider in the USA, DnB offers B2B contact data, leads data, business and company data, as well as corporate credit ratings. Get in touch with them via LiveChat to request a quote on their services. A distinctive feature of Dun & Bradstreet is its Data Universal Numbering System (DUNS numbers); these are used to generate business information reports for more than 100 million companies around the world. Prices are subject to quotation.

Datarade

Think of Datarade as an aggregator of database solution providers. With only a few clicks, you’ll be able to compare several data vendors worldwide and save yourself months of searching. It allows you to compare different suppliers side by side, even showing you the competitors.

Other vendors you should consider are Hoovers, Citygrid and Yelp.

Start Your Online Directory

Scrape business listings with a scraping tool

The term scraping data refers to an easy and fast way to gather database information from an existing website. What they do, in summary, is crawl other directories and deliver the data collected in an Excel file, therefore, you could upload that database to your online directory. There are other formats available such as JSON and CSV.

How does a web data scraper tool work?

  • As soon as the URLs are loaded into the application, the tool begins scraping.
  • In the next step, the scraper loads the full HTML code from the destination page.
  • The web scraper will then either extract all the data from the page or select the specific data the user desires.
  • In the end, the scraping app outputs all of the data it has collected into a usable file format chosen by the user.

Consider this before going this route

Before doing this, we strongly recommend that you check your country’s copyright laws regarding what information is considered royalty-free and what is not. Business listings usually include custom descriptions and images, which can be protected by copyrights.

Let’s get to know 3 data scraping tools you can use to add more depth to your online directory:

OctoParse

Octoparse allows people without any programming knowledge to extract data from websites. By simply following the steps on their website, you will be able to collect the information you need from any directory, in a highly efficient way.

It has an easy user interface, and you can begin downloading databases within minutes. It allows you to schedule tasks based on a specific date and time when you want to scrape data.

OctoParse pricing

  • Free plan: you can use Octoparse right now for free! These are the features you can enjoy; unlimited pages per crawl, unlimited computers, 10,000 records per export, 2 concurrent local runs, 10 Crawlers, community, lazy support.
  • Standard – $75/month: This plan offers unlimited data export,100 crawlers, scheduled extractions, Average speed extraction, auto IP rotation, task Templates, API access, and email support. This plan is mainly designed for small teams.
  • Professional -$209/month: This plan offers 250 crawlers, Scheduled extractions,20 concurrent cloud extractions, High-speed extraction, Auto IP rotation, Task Templates, and Advanced API.
  • Enterprise plan: You will need to contact a sales agent for a quotation.

Mozenda

Mozenda targets enterprises looking for a simple, fast, and all-in-one solution to scrape data from the web, and is trusted by CISCO, Tesla, Oracle, IBM… The list goes on, and as with OctoParse, you do not need any coding skills to boost your online directory’s business listing.

Mozenda has an easy-to-use “click-and-advance” interface, making your job a whole lot easier. With a free 30 day trial and one of the best customer service experiences in the segment, you can test it out and see if it’s right for you. The company offers four types of plans covering small projects and enterprise levels, and you can request a quote from the company’s website.

Webhose.io

Webhose is ideal for platforms or services that require a fully customized web scraper and data provider for use in marketing, sharing, etc. Growing companies can avail themselves of the platform at an affordable price. Uncover hidden insights with NLP, machine learning, and sentiment analysis. You can easily build and train machine models based on extensive data dating back to 2008.

Webhose’s database offers a huge collection of resources including blogs, forums, and news. You can create datasets based on particular topics, organizations, and time periods. Webhose lets you run a search query, and you’ll get JSON or XML results.

Regarding the prices, Webhose offers a 10-day free trial and 3 different plans:

  • Open Web Data Feeds: Provides enterprise-level coverage, real-time monitoring, engagement metrics, and clean  JSON/XML formats.
  • Cyber Data Feed: Includes Real-Time Monitoring, Entity and Threat Recognition, Image Analytics, and Geolocation as well as access to TOR, ZeroNet, I2P, Telegram, etc.
  • Archived Web Data: This plan offers a 10-year archive of web data, Sentiment and Entity Recognition, and Engagement Metrics. The pricing model shown here relates to prepaid credit accounts.

Conclusion

We already know the importance of a well-populated online directory for a myriad of reasons. If the data is already alive and moving, it is easier to convince more clients to join. However, the quality of the data is crucial. Invest time in finding eye-catching professional pictures (look for stock images) or hire a photographer to help you out, this will make your website look more professional and attractive to users. Also, do not copy and paste a standard piece of text into your descriptions. Make your descriptions as concise and informative as you can, and consider SEO strategies (search for keywords that apply to your business listings).

eDirectory’s services will help your business create, manage and monetize your own online directory. If you need more information, please contact us for more information. With an intuitive user interface, best-in-class resources, and robust customer support, you can start a free trial today.

* We are not affiliated, associated, authorized, endorsed by, or in any way officially connected to the tools and sites mentioned in this article.
* Before using Octoparse, please read the terms and conditions and privacy policy carefully. Do not use it to scrape data from social media and password-protected websites.

More Income: offer multiple Ads and Classifieds to your listings

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More Income: offer multiple Ads and Classifieds to your listings

Increase your income by offering multiple banner advertisements or adding classified ads to your listing levels and plans creating high value plans for your members. This is a great way to upsell premium plans that includes these additional opportunities for members to maximize exposure and branding across your website. (now available in v 11.1)

Revenue-Generating Online Directories

Banner Ads

When getting started with a new website, publishers can use the banner ad space to place affiliate links, sell your own products/services or add google Adsense to generate revenue. Website publishers can also sell banner ads at 80% off to get started, upgrade members for free so they can add offers which will allow you to then charge them for leads. eDirectory has all the banner tools that you’ll need to turn a profit from your advertisers.

By allowing your best customers to take advantage of the opportunity to proudly fly their banner ad atop the category they best represent, adds credibility and brand exposure reserved for premium members. This will quickly prompt your member’s competitors to also want to gain access to premium real estate on your website and sign up for paid advertising.

Displayed banners ads can be created to link to outside URLs such as your member’s website or link to internal listings, deals, classifieds or events in the directory website. eDirectory’s built in banner ad manager makes it super easy to upload banner ad images, manage and track click-through traffic. Banners can be images, flash, or even script from a third-party banner system.

Classified Ads

Another awesome built-in tool is the Classified Ad module. This allows members to advertise jobs, show items for sale or customize the Classifieds Module to display whatever is best for your community and includes descriptions, photos, pricing and contact information. Whether it’s advertisements or sales, it’s a one-stop shop for getting your Classifieds on your directory. Let your site customers sell anything they wish in the an expertly categorized, well-organized, and beautifully presented Classifieds section

A link to the classified ad will also be displayed in the member’s listings, same goes for the classified listing linking back to the member’s.

By offering these additional ads it’s not only beneficial for your members, but also helps site publishers to further populate their website with quality content.

Creating The Plans

Offer at least three and up to four plans displaying tiered pricing plans that are easy to compare and the pricing page that is easy to understand. Create a perceived appearance that by upgrading to a premium plan that includes banner and classified ads, they are able to receive far more value for their advertising dollar.

Creating listings and levels is easy in the eDirectory site manager dashboard which allows up to 4 listing levels and will display what is included (and what is not) great for displaying that all important comparison chart.

directory website advertisingCreate packages and promo codes to further customize your plans and pricing with value-add incentives.

So get started adding multiple banner ad and classifieds with your listings and start and watch your website start to rapidly develop into a thriving community.

(Stripe) How to get new Members Offering Trials

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Stripe – How to get new Members Offering Trials

Stripe is one of the most powerful payment processors on the planet and was added as a payment gateway option for our global user base during the newest v11.1 release. What clients love about Stripe is that it processes payments in over 100 different currencies, allows our clients to manage all of their own finances within the site manager, and also provides for free trials… which are a great marketing tool for growing your online community.

advertise-trial

Once you have set up your Stripe account in the eDirectory dashboard, you will be able to set up your free trial options in your levels and plans. Set number of days, weeks or months under free trial giving members enough time to use the system, and begin to reap the benefits of becoming a member of your community.

But I want to monetize my site. Why would I want to offer free trials?

By offering free trials – this helps to quickly populate your new directory website with member listings and content. A more populated website with quality content will help build credibility, add value and begin to drive traffic to your site. By populating your site with useful information and displaying an active, popular website, this will help to boost user engagement which naturally leads to paid membership subscriptions and website monetization opportunities.

Once your site becomes established, you can then begin to monetize (link to monetizing your website blog) your website and reap the sweet rewards of your investment and hard work.

The most important steps to achieving your online revenue goals all start with growing your online directory community. Seeing is believing! With free trials, members can see how it all works, how easy it will be to add great content and get new leads for business.

You can even offer special upgrade deals to convert them into paying customers. Once they see how you curate your brand, content, and marketing, they will be more so enticed to stick around and grow with you!

3 Benefits of offering Free Trial Sign Ups:

1. Start Free and Encourage Paid Upgrade at a Later Date

By offering a free trial, sign up new members or allow for on-site sign ups via eDirectory’s built in self-service sign up system. Once trial members are given the opportunity to ‘test out’ the functionality of your directory, view the site report activity and see the number of leads coming in or coupons being redeemed, it’s hard to argue the value of the listing and much easier to close the sale or even upsell to a larger plan.

2. Free Trials help to Populate Your Directory With Quality Listings

When new browsers visit your directory and place a search for data, they expect to find results. Having your free members create listings and contribute content will show that your directory is active and successful. This is also where the FOMO (fear of missing out) factor comes in to play. If a business owner sees their competitor listed on your directory, they too will want to be listed and become a member of your community to remain competitive.

3. Free Members Create Quality Content and Add Value to Your Website

You want your directory to have the inherent appearance of a healthy and thriving website community – a site that provides educational and helpful information. Each member of your community will have the opportunity to add this type of content via listings, articles, events and blog postings. This is not only helpful to visitors, but it’s also great for SEO.

So, if you are an existing client and would like the Stripe feature added to your site, simply request an upgrade here, contact your account executive, or chat with us anytime as www.eDirectory.com ! Thank you and happy hunting with free trials for your site!

Creates a dialogue – once the free trial has been created, it will create a dialogue between you and your members… you can reach out to collect any feedback or make them a special offer. Once the free trial is over, it also creates the same dialogue allowing directory owners to have a meaningful conversation or learn more about their customer needs.

If you’re an active client and would like Stripe added to your site, please click the upgrade request form link to get that started, contact your assigned account executive or create a support ticket. New clients may request a demo call or pick the plan that works best for you and then select LAUNCH right from the pricing page.

How To Leverage Your Community to Create Content for You

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Content is King! Keep in mind that directory websites are unique from other types of online enterprises. With online directory websites clients have an amazing opportunity to leverage the power of dozens, hundreds, and even thousands of members (depending on your target market) to achieve their recurring online revenue goals.

EventsContent

At eDirectory.com, we help clients leverage this powerful concept to create recurring revenue that grows with time, knowing that each new member represents more opportunity for growth.

Given the exponential power of social media, globalization, and multiple revenue streams, eDirectory.com will show you to turn this latent opportunity into active and passive revenue, so long as you understand how to leverage your community to create content for you with these 3 simple steps:

Offer incentives for clients to share valuable content

  • Feature them on your social media after sharing content
  • Give free banner ads or months of service for contributions
  • Upgrade their listing to your premium membership level for free and turn value-adding clients into brand ambassadors

Stay in touch with your community to create more opportunities

  • Send out newsletters with the integrated email system to encourage activity
  • Create online groups and communities on popular social media platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, and Google+. Share what you see here to other platforms to grow your presence and attract industry-specific contributors
  • Create a referral program that invites your first members to mention your site

Be active in monitoring what your competitors and prospects are doing

  • Your community exists outside of your directory site, so stay in touch with what is going on in your industry or target market to be at the forefront. The more people you attract with authenticity the faster you will achieve critical mass and have numerous members adding content to your site
  •  Talk to your prospects about how they would best like to participate. Identify patterns and try to replicate this across your various methods of outreach. The more people you attract with similar needs, the faster you find your niche and get more clients onboarded that will help you grow by adding and sharing.
  • Early on, make your key goal to have your members and visitors “share”. A conservative measure of unique active social media accounts can have hundreds of followers, if you get shares you create the opportunity of impressions across thousands of possiblevisitors and members. The more times your community members “share” items across social media, the more likely you are to achieve your idea of “critical mass” with your online directory revenue goals.

Tapping into your community of experts to add content to your website creates lasting relationships, offers additional exposure for your advertisers and adds value to your website. Reach out today and start adding valuable content to your website.

3 Tips on Getting Your First 25 Paying Members

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Paying Members are a great way to generate recurring revenue to your online business. Every journey begins with a first step…and every business starts with its first clients.  The most important thing you can do when getting started is to focus on growth in the most cost-effective manner.

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Apply a little growth hacking and know that every hour counts in a start up and your directory site is no different.  Directory sites are unique in that you only need a small number of paying monthly or annual members to achieve profitability.  As your community grows so will your brand.  Use these proven tactics to focus on what is most important early on which is growth and proof of concept.  Forget the minutiae for now and focus your efforts with a bulls-eye.

The eDirectory platform offers plenty of value right out-of-the box to handle your day-to-day operations while you focus on doing what you’re good at – adding value where needed most.  Here are the 3 best tips you can use to get your first 25 paying members:

Start with your personal and professional network

  • Offer free premium listings to your network for 3 months with no strings attached
  • Create special offers with promo codes (free banner ads, social media mentions, and free leads)
  • Post on your social media to invite people to join and contribute to your community

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Make your first members your greatest priority and learn everything you can from them

  • Treat each new lead as your most important client and offer assistance with set up from the start, show them how easy it is to claim their listing and get started on adding valuable content to your community
  • Reach out to them regularly to learn about any other opportunities that may exist like partnerships, sponsorship opportunities, and cross promotions. You may be surprised!
  • Be flexible with the feedback you receive. Learn what you can and adapt as needed. What you originally thought was important may not be the case once you begin to gain traction. Use the data to make informed decisions that will grow your original concept into what works for the most important stakeholders – your first clients!

Define your brand characteristics, value proposition, and organize yourself for success

  • Get started on creating valuable content for your site. Members love to see directory owners active and contributing to the growth of their community. Share knowledge, provide valuable insight, and respond regularly. You will set the foundation for trust and credibility.
  • Create social media profiles on the platforms that compliment your brand best. Don’t try to be everything to be everybody, instead, focus on a niche and learn as you grow. Master your local market and make your mistakes while you’re small so you can get organized and poised for growth.
  • Visualize how you see your site adding value to its members. Understand that you are offering an additional opportunity to advertise, be a part of a growing/curated community, and that the members on your site have been vetted and approved by you…. That you are available to weigh in on important matters to your community and that their interests