Local Business Directory Strategy (Your Input!)

Hey BHW,

I have decided to start a local business directory. I have seen it successfully done in the past and wanted to give it a shot. Here's what I have done so far:

1. Domain - I was hoping to find a somewhat aged domain but for my city (population 140,000~) was a long shot. I checked out GoDaddy Auctions and struck gold! Found CITY.biz aged 9 Years and Pagerank of 4 with over 90 domains linking to it. Turns out it used to be a business directory as well. I checked them out on archive.org and its a no brainer towards why they shut down. I ended up paying $200 for the domain as a bidding war struck out. Unfortunately I need to wait until the 15th for the domain to be released to me.

2. Purchased GeoTheme, seems like it will do the job just fine.

3. The Strategy.

Your input is very much appreciated and other can definitely use this information to their advantage as well.

I plan on going into businesses personally and offering a spot for 30 days which would normally cost X amount of dollars per month. It's free and no credit card required so I assume everyone will be on board. Once they see how many visitors I have sent to their website I feel that most will sign up after the 30 days which I will then contact them again and try selling it. I am going to try selling for $19 per month which will attract many people.

Of course later on I'll use this connection to push other services.

What do you think? How would you approach this?

Man you hit the jackpot with that domain!

Really like the 30 day trial offer, genius idea imo. Especially when starting out, any business will go for something that is free.

Can work but $19/month? Far to steep IMO. I charge that for a clients own website with first page rankings. People don't use directory sites anymore they use Google. Unless you're badass and offer some sort of SEO ranking so they'll be found then I don't think people will do it IMO.

I'm doing something similar for quick $$. I just charge a one off fee for life; and even then it's very low but they jump on it.

Don't want to be a downer on it.

What's different about your directory to the likes of your competition?
Why should I pay a monthly fee?
Do I get to manage the reviews?
Will my business listing get ranked on Google?
Can you provide the analytics of how many visitors land on that listing page?
How much traffic does your site get each month?
Can you track how much traffic the site gets per industry category?
What kind of payments do I setup? Is it a contract?
30 days trial is a good idea; but I'd opt for 60.
How will I know customers have came from your listing? Specific discount code from the listing; e.g quote 'directoryname' for 10% off?
How will you approach customers who are in the same niche? e.g both selling tyres is it exclusive to the one guy or do you list both of them?
How much is it to be featured? Can I upgrade to being featured at any time? Do I get discount if I pay in advance?

Just a few ideas/questions you should ask and get solutions for; sorry to be annoying lol.


Not being negative; just my 2 cents.

I tend to agree that this will be a tough sell, because there are so many free directories. Of course in time your PR would go up, and your links would be much more valuable.

I tried it in Houston and gave up, far too much work to get off the ground, but I couldn't pursue it properly.

My plan was to offer banner adverising on the category tops,and a custom page for the business owner instead of a just fill out your own page. Even thought about iframing their site into my pages.

Would still like to, maybe later.