Tracking the Status of Local Citations
Last updated on September 15th, 2025
Local citations play a crucial role in local search visibility. They can make your business more discoverable to local consumers, direct traffic to your business website, and increase footfall to your brick-and-mortar location.
Once a citation has been created and optimized, it should be maintained appropriately. If this doesn’t happen, the SEO and consumer benefit could be lost.
Having a structured system to track the status of your citations is an easy way to always see the complete picture. Additionally, this allows you to quickly remedy any issues before they take root and replace citations that are lost for any reason.
Manually Tracking Citation Status
If you don’t mind manually checking listing information, you can track the status of your citations using a spreadsheet.
Your spreadsheet should list each citation along with information such as the date it was created, the date it was last checked, the listing URL, and whether the citation is confirmed as accurate. It’s also a good idea to have a column to track if and when citations are lost and a note of the remedial action taken.
How often you’re able to check the status of your citations will depend on how many you have and how much time you can assign to the process. However, it’s a good idea to check at least once a month.
How to Manually Track Citations
Create a Tracking Spreadsheet
First, you’re going to need the ‘dashboard’ to keep all of your findings, refer back to, and log any changes. The easiest way to do this is to create a spreadsheet that contains all of the pertinent information. You can find a citation tracking template here.
Make a List of Directories and Sites
First, you should add any and all directories and sites on which you know for certain that your business has been listed; this typically includes big names like Google Business Profile and Yelp—citations that you actively remember building.
Once you’ve logged those, it’s time to research what the other top directories for your business would be. This can include general directories (like Yell and HotFrog), industry-specific directories (like Zocdoc and HealthDirect for doctors), and location-specific directories.
As you find relevant directories, add them to your spreadsheet in the ‘Site/Directory’ section. Once you have your list, you’re ready to start filling in the rest of the spreadsheet.
This step is especially useful as it also allows you to see any future citation-building opportunities.
Search for Your Business Across Directories
Now, it’s time to start finding your business’s listing across directories. Some directories may have existing citations that need claiming and updating. Some may just need claiming. No matter what, all citations for your business that you come across should be logged.
Others may need you to create a listing from scratch, which you can do now or make a note to come back and build later—after all, citation building is another key part of your local SEO strategy.
At this point, you should determine what each directory on your list needs to ensure that your business’s information is listed accurately.
This is also the time to start doing additional searches across Google and other search engines to see if your business is already listed on any other directories that didn’t appear in your initial research.
Every time you claim, update, or upload a listing, make sure to log it in your spreadsheet!
Check Back on Your Listings
Now that you control your listings, it’s time to monitor them consistently. Make a note to check in on them regularly—once a month is a good baseline—to ensure that no vital business information has been changed. If you have to make any updates, log them.
It is also important to remember that any time a key piece of information about your business changes, you must update it across directories. The last thing you want is conflicting information about your business online.
Keeping on Top of Tracking
Manual revisions can be quite time-consuming, especially if you have thousands of citations to keep track of. A tool can make life much easier and save hours of effort by automating the process.
Using a Tool
A tool like Citation Tracker can automate the review process for you and this is more efficient than conducting manual checks. The software can flag up inconsistencies in name, address, and phone number (NAP) data, compare your profile with competitors, and keep close tabs on whether your total citation count has gone up or down.
Using a tool also means you can scale the frequency with which your listings are status-checked without needing to hire an extra pair of hands.
How to Use BrightLocal’s Citation Tracker
Creating Your Citation Tracker Report
To get started with using BrightLocal’s Citation Tracker, you need to create a report within the tool. How you do this varies based on whether you currently have an existing Location within the BrightLocal platform or not.
Existing Location
If you have an existing Location, you can navigate to the ‘All Locations’ section of the platform (found in the Top Menu), which will bring up a list of Locations. You must then hit the ‘view’ button to be brought to a Location Summary. From there, you simply hit ‘Citation Tracker’ on the left side of the screen and then ‘Monitor Citations’. You will be asked if you want to monitor all of your SEO data versus your citations only. Select your preference. This will create a Citation Tracker Report.
No Existing Location
If you do not currently have an existing Location in the BrightLocal platform, you should navigate to ‘Local SEO Tools’ in the top menu and then Citation Tracker. Then, you simply click on ‘New Citations Report’ in the top right, and follow the instructions to create a new Location report.
Tip! You can find a more detailed walk-through of how to set up these reports in the BrightLocal Help Center.
Choosing Report Frequency
Once the base report has been set up, it’s time to fine-tune the general settings. Here, you select which Location the report is for (this field will autopopulate if you are working from a pre-existing Location) and how often you want the report to run.
You can choose to run your reports monthly on a day of your choosing, weekly on a day of your choosing, or ad hoc (which will need to be manually triggered).
Adding Business Details
You will then be asked to enter your business details—specifically, your type of business and primary location.
For your type of business, it is important to enter a specific business type as opposed to a broad business category so that competitors can be accurately identified (think ‘Personal Injury Attorney’ instead of ‘Lawyer’).
For the primary location, you should use your town/city name or zip code/postcode. For US-based businesses, only use your five-digit zip code.
When you enter your business details, it is vital to ensure that the information you enter is accurate so that the system has the correct data to base its search on.
Tip! Double-check your information before submitting to ensure that the tool pulls up the correct citations.
Notifications & Alerts
You will then need to set up what notifications you would like to receive regarding your Citation Tracker reports. You can enter up to five emails to receive notifications for completed reports.
Saving and Updating the Report
You will need to click the button at the bottom of the page that says ‘Run Citation Search’ or ‘ Update Report’ in order for your changes to be saved. You will then need to re-run the report (navigate to the ‘Actions’ dropdown in the upper right corner to find this) to see any changes reflected.
