Data Aggregators are companies which collect data on local businesses such as their name, address, phone number, opening hours etc. in order to present it elsewhere online.
These companies verify and clean the data to ensure it is accurate, and then they sell it (lease it) to other companies that need data about local businesses.
The companies that typically buy this data are online directories (e.g. YP.com), local-mobile applications, and mapping and GPS companies (e.g. TomTom). Even search engines like Google might buy this data to compare it against their own databases, in order to make them as complete as possible.
There are four main Data Aggregators in the USA:
- Neustar-Localeze
- Infogroup
- Acxiom
- Factual
Factual is the only one that operates outside of the USA and maintains a database of businesses in other countries.
Using BrightLocal, you can update and submit business data to these aggregators. Find out more here.