Merchant Circle is more expansive than many of the other options for listing your business in Local Search. Listings can include coupons, add photos, other Merchant Circle users can add reviews of your business, and you can create blog posts within your Merchant Circle account. If you have your own blog you could use posts in your Merchant Circle blog to drive traffic to different posts in your own.
It is not always obvious what features at Merchant Circle are free and which incur additional charges so do read the fine print. To get started simply enter your primary business phone number on the Merchant Circle Submission page and click submit. This is a screen capture of that page:
Merchant Circle Add Your Business
If your business is not already listed you will get the form below with text reading “The phone number you entered does not match any business in our system.” Fill out this information and click Submit.
Submit Business Listings at Merchant Circle
Merchant Circle will send a confirmation link to the email address you used. Click on that link to continue the process. If you want to start out with just the free Merchant Circle account, click on the link in the top right corner of the Merchant Circle Pricing page that says No, thanks. Set up my profile as shown in the screen capture below:
Process to Submit Business to Merchant Circle
If you want to start out with just the free Merchant Circle account, click on the light gray link in the top right corner of the Merchant Circle Pricing page that says No, thanks. Set up my profile as shown in the screen capture below:
Fees for Merchant Circle Accounts
You will see references to verifying your Merchant Circle listing. There is more than one process for Merchant Circle Account Verification for doing so:
- Pay $2.99 per month, billed in one year payment of $35.88
- Free if you can to provide two out of these three: Sellers Permit Number, Business License Number, or DUNS Number
- Although it first appears that supplying the business name and email of five businesses that will verify yours would allow you to verify your account without charge, going through that process brings you to a checkout page asking for the $35.88 annual fee.
It appears that unless you provide two of the three numbers mentioned above that if you want your business verified you will have to pay the annual fee.
Merchant Circle is one of the most ambitious of the Local Search Directory sites. You may want to spend some time getting familiar with what they offer and then decide which of the directories with advanced functions is the best fit for your business. You may want to keep notes on your activities and measure the amount of traffic you receive when you are active and when you are not. Let your results determine how much time to spend on each site.
Not convinced yet? Watch the video or read how one business made $15,000 with their Merchant Circle listing. He says “Merchant Circle is like a MySpace for business owners plus a lot more.” He also said “I started to show up on the first page of Google for specific keywords about my business and yes all for free.” and “My phone started ringing.”
{ 3 trackbacks }
{ 20 comments… read them below or add one }
Merchant Circle hasn’t been as effective or search-worthy, since IAC -CitySearch bought the site, about two years ago.
Note that I’m considered a “Top Merchant” despite the fact that I have NOT submitted the verification nonsense.
My Merchant Circle page still gets a handful of hits, but the links are “no follow” so I don’t spend very much time updating as much as I should.
The more you post to the Free Blog (provided as part of the free Merchant Circle account), the more times your MC page is “crawled” by Google or Yahoo.
I cannot stress enough about NOT paying for the Upgrades, because they’re worthless!
Twitter: @GrowMap
Hi Matt,
Thanks for the input. Most major sites make all links nofollow so when we use them we need to focus on sending real readers from that site to ours. Have you checked ALL the links from MC to your site? I would think at least one of the links is dofollow. If not we should recommend MC consider providing at least one to make their listings more valuable to businesses.
Internet Strategist’s last blog post..Be Pro-Active and Take Calculated Risks
Twitter: @marketseeker
I’m going to see if I can’t generate some traffic but really the only reason I would use MC is for a citation. I’m trying to get a better position in google local which will give any site a run for it’s money in generating traffic in the niche I’m working on.
Al + Las Vegas SEO Company´s last blog ..las-vegas-advertising-solution
Twitter: @GrowMap
Hi Al,
Every business including blogs should strive to have both incoming links for better search engine placement and listings in sites with large amounts of traffic. Both bring far more visitors than just about any other source.
You might also test using Tweets at Twitter to get fast new listings. I am still researching how long they stay after the day tweeted.
Did you check out the organic search and ppc related posts here? They stay in the Recently Popular section in the right sidebar.
Internet Strategist @GrowMap´s last blog ..How Much Is A Memorable Logo Worth?
Twitter: @joolwe
IMO, this is much better than yellow pages.com. I hope merchant circle doesn’t cold call you to buy ads after signing up like ATT yellow pages does.
Twitter: @GrowMap
Hi Ryan,
They haven’t called any business I have listed there so I don’t believe they do. I suspect they rely on visits to their site to offer advertising and paid options. How is your online jewelry business going? How often do you post your “Jewelry Steal of the Day”? I was going to share it at Twitter today but wasn’t sure the last one you posted was still in effect.
Internet Strategist @GrowMap´s last blog ..How to Get Your Free Business Listing in Yelp
How’s the community? Because with the stuff like that the community is everything – if it sucks and everyone acts selfish the whole thing’s pointless. But with right people it might be pretty great!
Twitter: @GrowMap
Hello Copart,
I have spent more time assisting businesses in getting their listings and not nearly as much participating in the community. They do have a lot of active reviewers there and reviews are very important to getting the most from the time and money we spend.
Internet Strategist @GrowMap´s last blog ..How to Add Your Free Business Listing to infoUSA
I am freelance copywriter and that would be very great if I could accept money online. That will make relations with my partners more convenient and attract more customers who want to have no problems with payments.
Twitter: @GrowMap
This is an example of comment spam at the expense of the business paying someone to get them incoming links. I will delete it later but wanted the site owner to see it first. I may put up a post letting businesses know that this is a very bad idea.
Internet Strategist @GrowMap´s last blog ..How Much Is A Memorable Logo Worth?
Well, merchant circle is certainly a worthwhile organisation to join – so I thankyou for writing this quick and easy guide.
Si@Leadership´s last blog ..Leadership Development Training
Twitter: @GrowMap
Welcome Si,
Some businesses have been very successful at using traffic and reviews at Merchant Circle to increase their business. Did you see the new post on how to write reviews at Merchant Circle?
Internet Strategist @GrowMap´s last blog ..How to Write a Review at Merchant Circle
i’m a big believer in the power of customer reviews for ecommerce sites. i definitely saw an increase in conversion rates when i added reviews to my site. this looks worth considering.
Twitter: @GrowMap
Hi Tim,
Every business needs to pay attention to reviews and get them as many places as possible. Great reviews greatly increase sales and bad reviews can temporarily damage sales. The challenge is that annoyed people are more likely to write reviews so a business needs to encourage reviews in the right way.
Do read the fine print (or subscribe here) as I am currently researching the review policies of sites for a future post. I know that Yelp specifically prohibits incentivizing reviews while other sites that have reviews hold contests to increase their numbers. You don’t want to run afoul of the rules anywhere.
You may want to also read The Importance of Online Reviews – How the Public Finds Trustworthy Businesses
Internet Strategist @GrowMap´s last blog ..Did You See Our Guest Post at Merchant Circle?
thank you so much for this informations !
I’m not a fan of merchant circle but I do come across their listings in search quite often so they must be doing something right or they are giving google some cash on the back end to appear.
Conversion Vans´s last blog ..Conversion Van | Ford Van | Chevy Van | Used Vans | Sprinter Van | Custom Vans | Camper Van | Class B
I am listed in Merchant Circle and have greatly benefited from it both in traffic and future clients.
ivy@small business resources´s last blog ..Dec 2, Small Business Grants Alabama
Twitter: @muqtada123
Its a great way to boost up your products and services.
Twitter: @muqtada123
The date is expired, what is the next coming date to add up the business name in merchant circle.
Twitter: @paydayloansaus
Thanks for sharing . i am having blog i will definitely go for it to drag more traffic in my blog.