How to Audit Local Citations

A citation audit answers four questions: where is the business listed, is the core information correct, are there duplicates, and which listings are worth fixing first?

Build the audit sheet

Use columns for platform, listing URL, business name, address, phone, website, status, ownership/login access, issue type, and next action.

Add a priority column so high-visibility or high-risk errors are handled first.

Search for old data

Look up old phone numbers, previous addresses, former brand names, practitioner names, and common misspellings. These searches often reveal duplicate or stale profiles that a simple brand-name search misses.

Record evidence instead of relying on memory.

Classify every finding

Mark each result as correct, incorrect, duplicate, missing, unverifiable, or not relevant. This makes the cleanup workload measurable.

Do not create a new listing until you know whether one already exists.

Choose DIY or outsourced cleanup

A small audit may be easy to resolve manually. Larger portfolios, agencies, or businesses with many historical variants may benefit from tools or professional help.

If you outsource new submissions, give the provider a clean source-of-truth sheet and your audit findings.