Pick the wrong Facebook categories or not enough of them and your local-search visibility will suffer. Not only in Facebook, but also likely in Google (because Facebook results are often all over page 1).
The trouble is once you’ve picked the basic “Local Business” category, you can’t see all the subcategories available to you. You have to type in a category you think Facebook has, and see if you’re lucky.
With almost 800 categories to choose from, you probably won’t pick the 3 best ones for your business.
Problem solved. Here is a Big Ugly List of all the subcategories you can choose for your “Local Business” Facebook page:
Best way to use it? Skim through the list and find the 3 categories you think would be the best to list your page under.
If that sounds tedious, may I suggest the Laphroaig Triple Wood.
Huge thanks to Alex Deckard of CAKE Websites for doing most of the research. He’s a smart SEO and a good guy.
Some related resources:
Facebook Reviews Now Get You Rich-Snippet “Review Stars” in the Local Search Results
Mike Blumenthal’s Google Places Category Tool
Apple Maps Local Business Category List
Business Categories Lists for Major Local Search Sites
—
Any category-related tips on Facebook?
Are there any categories that Facebook should have but doesn’t seem to?
Any categories I’m missing?
Leave a comment!
Hi Phil,
Facebook categories have and are a pain in the “you know what”. It’s a challenge at times to find any related categories to the business. This list is helpful!
Thanks,
Susan
Glad you like it, Susan!
Very helpful thank you. Facebook appears more and more complicated the further I go into setting it up for our business.
has this been changed? I;m a caterer and can’t find the listing… I”m currently listed as a event planner but I’m not seeing subcategories at all
If you type caterer within the sub-category box it should show. Typing “ca” shows a few more options i.e. cabins, etc.
I also would like my page categorised as Alternate & Holistic Health as I see other pages have used, however I cannot find this option in any of the sub-categories. Has Facebook changed this? Is there any way around it that you know? Thanks.
This doesn’t work anymore. The list of “local business” options are much shorter now.
For example, I can’t select “Solar Energy Services” anymore
We have a recreated 19th century Millinery shop, and Mercantile Emporium and a 19th century recreated living history town. Finding categories that fits these is a joke, I looked at the list, but neither Hats, nor Millinery is there. Our town is on the ground of a museum, but I try to run the page with a voice of the 19th century.
I’d be astounded if Facebook had a category for that. Sounds like “Museum” would be the least-inaccurate choice.
Phil, I am getting lots of requests from Facebook to change the category of my local business pages to what the page currently says with the addition of local service. Eg it was Engineering Service and Facebook want to change it to Engineering Service – Local Service.
Any thoughts on whether we should approve or reject these requests? I can’t see anyone else talking about it!
I found my way here for exactly the same reason as Joe Shaer above. I run a web design business that was listed as a local business, but I logged into Facebook this morning and somebody wants me to list it instead as a local service, however I am wondering if there are any implications in this change.
You can always get the current list via the Graph API – this requires a Facebook Developers token. Run the following query:
https://developers.facebook.com/tools/explorer/145634995501895/?method=GET&path=search%3Ftype%3Dplacetopic%26topic_filter%3Dall%26limit%3D10000
For those without the Developer token – I generated this list here – https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1lk7BEseXi6hcPu6IHg9C-bPT5VL-dZyW8iSLDzH0S7I/edit?usp=sharing
Hi Phil
I see the subcategory i want (Printing Services) when i select it all is good, it is there on my edit page but once i leave the edit page and go back to check it, that one subcategory is gone (??). Local Business is my Business and Sub Business. Can you help!!?
I’d probably have to log in to see what’s going on.