If You're a Saucon Valley Business Owner, Read This!

When Hellertown-Lower Saucon Patch launched more than a year ago, editors and contributors ventured to local businesses to collect information for our directory. The result was Patch Places.

If you haven't explored it yet, Patch Places is the spot to find descriptions, hours, accepted payment methods and more for businesses around town. You can also see what your neighbors think of a business before you try it, or write your own review.

CLICK THE PDF ON THE RIGHT TO PRINT OUT EASY INSTRUCTIONS ON HOW TO CLAIM YOUR LISTING -->

But local businesses get extra benefits when they claim their listings on Patch Places.

Owners or managers can sign in and search for their business. Underneath the photos, there is a box with the question: "Do you own or manage this location? Claim it!" Just click "Claim it!" and a form will pop up asking for contact information and authorization to claim it.

Within a few days, someone from Patch will contact you to verify your ownership or management of the business. You'll then be approved as the business owner and will see a "Manage Your Listing" button when you view your listing.

From there, you'll have lots of options, including the ability to upload photos, view statistics and edit the listing. Here are the tools you'll see and what they mean:

Your Stats:

Here you can see how many users have rated, reviewed or follow your listing. You can e-mail your customers to seek out more reviews, and link the Patch Place listing to your Facebook and Twitter accounts.

Edit Listing:

If you decide to edit your listing--under the Basic Info tab--you can add photos, update website information, change hours of operation or contact information and do other cool stuff. Some information cannot be changed, but you can request a new description if you think your business is inaccurately described.

Choose "Extra Info" to add information such as the founding date of your business, what kinds of payments you accept, parking availability and more.

Manage Photos & Media:

Here you can add and edit photos and choose which image is featured. If you have a video or PDFs, you can add them here.

Reviews:

You can see what people have to say about your business and respond to reviews.

Free Tools:

This is an easy way to post events and add job openings to our classifieds section, also known as the Marketplace.

Paid Tools:

You can upgrade your listing with a video profile, add a personal message and become a featured business on the Places page for a fee. You can learn more about these options and see how to get in touch with a sales team member.

Claim your listing today to help keep Patch users up to date with your company and keep your listing looking fresh.

Questions? Contact editor Josh Popichak at 610-216-6043 or via email at Josh.Popichak@patch.com.