I recommend only listing around 20 - 30 citations a month so it doesn't come off as spam.
Umm, no. There's a lot of trash that ignorant and/or dishonest SEOs CALL "citations" and they ARE spam, but the idea that you can't list your business on legitimate, local directories yp.cm, superpages, kudzu, etc... "too fast" is just stupid. If you could (you can't) you could do them all in an hour, and Google wouldn't care. Why would Google care? The idea is just stupid. Also in terms of scale the statement is also wrong because there is a hierarchy of citations, and some are critically important and others are a complete waste of time, while others aren't even citations. And there are only 30 to 50 citations that are worth doing anyways and at some point you get "diminishing returns" and should be spending your local SEO time on something else.
I think what's happened here (to Local SEO) is dishonest, uninformed scammers from "real" SEO have moved over into Local SEO with the same stupidity and lack of integrity that they used when selling weight loss pills, and they are applying the same stupid and dishonest optimization methods to plumbers that they used to use on sites to make one's weiner get bigger. They were stupid and dishonest then, and they are stupid and dishonest now.
Hence the promotion of "citations" as the end-all, be-all and if 30 is good, then 3,000 is better because stupid people can't imagine different, they can only imagine MORE. So this is where the idea that "More citations are always better" comes from, and it's wrong. More citations than is necessary and useful is NOT better, it's at best a waste of time and at worst a bunch of spam that might get punished.
If *I* were Google and I wanted to get rid of spammy local businesses that were hiring stupid and dishonest Local SEO's to try to game the local algorithm, I would have a list of local citations that I considered to be "legitimate" and another list of local citations that I would label "scammers only", and any local business that got listed on the 2nd type of citation sites would get a penalty, since normal businesses do not show up on those lists, only those businesses that hire professional, dishonest and stupid Local SEO's to game the algorithm appear there. Heck, I might even MAKE a few of those directories as a honeypot. Because stupid and dishonest SEOs are by definition stupid enough to fall for it, and drag their paying customers into the poop.
Don't believe me? Take a canvas of the top 5 businesses of any city in any solid, legitimate local business niche, and see which citations have them listed (Kudzu, Judy's Book, etc...) Then take some of these "oddball" citations that no one but stupid and dishonest SEOs get their clients listed on, and see how many of the top-listed companies show up on the oddball citations. Here's what you won't find: The top 5 listings for "Alamogordo Locksmith" all appear on "Bun Wai's Local Citation and Directory". They're all on Superpages, they're all on Merchant Circle, but NONE of them show up on Bun Wai. Hmm. I wonder why, since my Local SEO says "Bun Wai" is a citation, and all citations are good, and more citations are better and I'm paying this idiot $500 a month, so he MUST know what he's talking about, otherwise, well, er, um, uh, I guess otherwise that makes ME the idiot... durh..."
Hint: Don't pay someone in order to be "the Idiot". Make them pay YOU, so that THEY are "the Idiot".
Get my point? So sure, doing too many of those "each month" is a bad thing. Doing ANY of those is a bad thing. Bottom line: Do those 30 to 50 local citations that are legit and "everyone else" is on, and move on to something else, since anything more than that is a complete waste of time at best, and could get your site penalized at worst.
Pro Tip: The Better Business Bureau is a $350 backlink and makes the difference between page 1 and page 2 in the local SERPs. Money well spent. Take my word for this; do your own research, I'm right, don't let anyone tell you different, they are wrong, that is all and have a nice day.