Yahoo Local Basic Listing Verifications Failing
-
Hey everyone,
Over the last few weeks Yahoo Local's Basic Listings have been failing left and right for me. When working to verify a business listing, I have been trying the phone, snail mail and email verifications specifically, and am 100% sure I've been inputting the correct code, yet no matter how many attempts I make, I get the following error:
http://i.imgur.com/pJ7ggBx.jpg
This is for multiple accounts, not just a single instance. Seems Yahoo's just got an unfixed, prevalent bug. I've reached out to their Support for information, but they have been unresponsive.
Anyone else running into this issue?
-
We're actually in the middle of this problem and found a work around. If you get the invalid pin message:
- Login to your Yahoo biz dashboard, navigate to your client's listing and click edit.
- Make a quick edit (doesn't matter if you change it back before hitting submit).
- After hitting submit, it should take you right to the verification screen to either a) send a new pin, or b) enter your pin.
- Use the PIN you already received to verify the listing.
We've done this a couple times already, and it seems to be working.
-
I have been trying also to verify a business. I have had the give me a PIN 3 times to no avail. Each time I recieve a "The verification code you submitted was incorrect. Please enter the correct verification code." message. I have tried to copy and paste the pin as well as manually enter it. I have also tried logging out and back in. Nothing works and I'm getting frustrated as heck with their obvious glitches. To make things worse I read that yahoo won't provide support to their free listing service. What a scam.
-
Have only tried phone call verification, but experiencing same issue and error message. This happened on 6/11/14. Several clients, different accounts, same error message that the verification code is incorrect. Opted to use postcard method. Not expecting different results but wanted to at least try.
This has happened in the past with Yahoo. We've had postcard PINs repeatedly declined as "incorrect." This was around the time they were making changes to the Local Directory. Another problem we experienced during this time was that listings were not being saved under the dashboard. So every time we tried to claim a listing we had to go through the process of identifying and editing it.
There is definitely a strong correlation between Yahoo updates and Yahoo services being inoperable during these times.
-
Hi Jackson,
Glad to hear that. I do hope others will comment if they're having problems with Yahoo Local verification. Posts like yours make we wonder about bugs.
-
Thank you for the response, Miriam, that's very helpful!
-
Hi Jackson,
While I do see people reporting recent verification problems (https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20130519195150AAFcNr8) I don't see anything about your specific error message anyplace I would normally look.
If you can't get the phone support to help you, a possible workaround is to ensure that you clients are listed on Yelp as Yelp is now distributing listings and reviews to Yahoo! Local. Here's more on this:
http://searchengineland.com/yahoo-goes-live-yelp-local-reviews-186354
I wonder if Yahoo is having wonky issues as of this new deal with Yelp. I haven't had a chance to test this, but I believe it should work out if the client is listed on Yelp that they will eventually appear on Yahoo! Kind of early days on this.
If anyone else in the community is experiencing the problem Jackson is describing, please chime in!
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Local SEO: How to get local business showing up in Google Local
Hello, We moved to a small town in Council, ID. It's interesting. None of the businesses around here are showing up in Google Local - map, phone number, hours, etc. Nothing. It's all Yelp and stuff. Is there some sort of collective local SEO that has to be done to get Council, ID on the map? It's kind of strange that no businesses show up. I want to help local businesses, but I don't know if Google will even register them. We can get a group of local businesses together if we have to. Let me know what we can do. Thanks.
Local Listings | | BobGW0 -
LOCAL (city of 500k) Keyword Research - am I just wasting my time?
I have tried numerous tools, my team of freelancers, (fiver I admit) and a couple people from Upwork and still not getting a GOOD response to - How much search volume is there for "home builders" JUST in WIchita, KS (for example) I get local results like that are challenging because a lot of them show no search volume. Am I missing something? Can recommend a resource? I would be really grateful! 🙂 I am trying to figure out a nice long (ideally) list of keywords for 'plumbers, wichita ks', 'dentist, wichita ks' - Local service businesses and everything I try shows next to nothing. Thanks for ANY advice! 🙂 Matthew
Local Listings | | Mrupp441 -
Consistant citations for Local SEO
Hi Guys - Ive got a tricky question. I want to create correct and consistent citations for this business http://www.singlewellcarsales.co.uk/ However theres a twist, the website is called ‘Singlewell Car Sales Ltd’ but they also have a service centre called ‘Singlewell Service Centre Ltd’ so in theory two business names under one website. We want to treat them as two separate businesses when adding to local directories. We also want to create two local Google pages. Both divisions share the same website, and address but include a different telephone number and business name. I want to use Schema mark up on the website to reference both business names so that Google can make a link between the name and various local citations NAP. My main questions is, can you use Schema two mark up two business names under one website? or will Google get confused and regard it as duplicate or inconsistent citations? Many Thanks Jon Rayner
Local Listings | | NaughtyChilli0 -
How Far is Too Far to Show Up in Local Results
Hi everyone, I have one client that is located about 45 minutes (25 miles) outside of a large city and I can't seem to help them rank within that large city. They're a relatively new business in the service industry (meaning they'll travel to an individual's residence) and in the surrounding cities closer to their physical location, they rank extremely well. In this large city, they have 3 keywords in the top 10, 2 snack pack rankings and then everything else is below 51! I have a feeling that distance depends on many things, but I am wondering if anyone has ever figured out how far away is **too far **to be considered local by Google. My feeling is that sure it would be nice to rank locally for this large city as it would open them up to a really large customer pool, but that maybe 45 minutes away is just not local (I know I personally don't consider that "local"). Again, I understand that ranking locally depends on a really wide range of factors, but I'm considering only distance in this question. Thanks so much!
Local Listings | | KaitlinNS0 -
How to create a 2nd Google listing for the same brand
Hi All, We have an office in Berkeley CA which has a Google listing. Now we have launched a new office in Hayward CA and we're thinking of how exactly we should create the new Google listing for the office: Create a new google account and submit the page URL in it? Create a new Google account under our Berkeley google account. i.e. to have both under the same account in Google Thanks, Tomer
Local Listings | | OrendaLtd0 -
Local Link Building Question: High DA Chambers vs Low PA Trade Groups
Hi all, We've been researching relevant, real organizations in our area that allow members to link their websites from the directory. I've basically got two buckets of prospects: Chambers of commerce type sites with more authority (DA ~40+) but less relevance to our niche (injury law) Bar associations with less authority (DA ~20) but super relevant. Assuming that they cost the same and covered the same geographic area, which links would you go after if you had to choose one or the other? Thanks in advance.
Local Listings | | LeeAbrahamson0 -
Local Citation with multiple offices
We have 5 different offices and each has its own google+ page and yell page. At first they were ranking poorly and the wrong offices were coming up for searches in that town so we change the name to :
Local Listings | | EJmoz
BusinessName (Location1)
BusinessName (Location2) Etc. those listing all starting to rank top for searches in Location1 and Location2. We have now been told that it is bad for our overall SEO to have the business name appearing differently in different listings and this led me to look at Moz Local. My question is should I remove the (Location1) from the Google+ business listing so that all our offices have the same name (but obviously different addresses) even though it appears to have a negative impact on rankings? Any help would be appreciated. Thanks0 -
Organic and Local ranking changes UK
Hi, Has anyone seen any major fluctuations in local and organic rankings over the last week? I'm recording some significant changes, cannot fathom why at the moment other than Pigeon is still maybe rolling out... Dan
Local Listings | | SEOBirmingham810