This is possibly an interesting question. We have a client who is a a sort of trade association for local businesses. One of the features they want on the site is a publicly accessible members directory.
Sooooo in an absolutely ideal world, how would you make a good local web directory work from an SEO perspective?
A tiny bit of background info.
It is a super local based site(just town centre, no surrounding areas)
businesses have to pay to be part of the association(its mandatory if you are in the catchment area), but will not be paying to be part of the directory.
Everything will be manually looked over(hopefully not be me)
Any functionality could be added, Static maps, Google maps, Street view of the area, ummm anything anyone thinks of that is a good idea really!
Businesses range from the biggest multi-nationals to the smallest one man bands.
I have no idea how co-operative business will be, or what information other than basic contact stuff, the association has on record.
We have COMPLETE control over the code and hosting and err everything.
No body outside the catchment area or not part of the association will be allowed onto the directory.
If people have some truly great example of brilliant web directories(looks & functionality) that would be useful as well!
