What a paid plan buys
Both paid plans buy space, not ranking. A paid listing appears in a block of its own, above the ordinary results, under a heading that says what the block is, and each card carries its own label as well. Nothing about a payment changes where a business appears in the ordinary results below.
Plus, £5 a month places a listing in the Featured block on its own category page and its own area page, and puts it in line for one of the two saleable slots in the featured strip on the home page. An electrician on Plus is featured on Electricians, on the Home services section it sits in, on their own town page, and in that strip when a slot is free.
Pro, £20 a month adds the Sponsored block at the top of directory search results, which holds up to three listings and is matched to the words, category and area the visitor searched on.
A listing can also hold a boost, which is a placement that runs between two dates rather than by the month. While it runs it counts wherever a plan counts, and it carries the same Sponsored label.
Where several businesses hold the same placement, the order inside a block changes daily, so the same listing is not always first. A Featured or Sponsored block holds three listings at most.
The featured strip on the home page
The home page opens with three featured listings above the directory grid, and that strip is the only paid space on the page. The three slots are not the same kind of thing. A card holding a paid listing says “Sponsored”; the two that nobody pays for say “Featured”, and what each of those slots is, is set out below and in the note under the strip itself.
The first slot is our own listing, and it is not for sale. Sandbanks Digital builds and runs BCP Directory, and its listing is pinned there for that reason alone. The card is labelled “Featured”, which says the directory put it there and nothing more. Nobody bought that slot and nothing judged it the best of anything, so calling it sponsored would be untrue, and the note under the strip names the slot as ours.
The second and third slots go to paid listings first. Any listing on Plus or Pro, or holding a boost, is eligible; those cards are labelled “Sponsored”. Where more than one business is waiting, which of them appears changes daily.
When no paid listing is waiting, a slot carries an editor’s pick, and nobody has paid for it. The pick is drawn only from listings on no paid plan at all. The directory takes those whose details clear a completeness bar, puts a listing with a photo, a verified owner or an owner’s claim ahead of one without, then takes the most complete, and rotates daily between listings that are level. Those cards are labelled “Featured”, the same as the first slot, because neither was paid for. The slot cannot be bought, and asking for it is not a way into it.
Nothing in the strip is repeated in the ordinary results underneath it, and the listing count above the grid comes down by whatever the strip is holding. Holding a slot changes nothing about the ordinary ranking, on the home page or anywhere else.
How ordinary results are ranked
Relevance to the words searched for, how complete the listing is, whether an owner or an administrator has verified it, distance when the visitor searches from a place, and whichever sort they chose: best match, highest rated or name. Payment is not one of the inputs. A free claimed listing with good, current details will outrank a paid listing with poor ones.
Claiming stays free
Claiming a listing and correcting it costs nothing, and always will. That covers contact details, opening hours, description, services, photos and replies to reviews. Factual corrections are free for everyone, including people who do not own the business. See the plan comparison.
Third-party adverts
Third-party advertising is switched off until the site has enough original content and production consent controls. When it is switched on, adverts will be kept away from sign-in, claims, administration and checkout. Plus and Pro profiles will not carry them.
Disclosure
Affiliate links, paid placements and commercial partnerships are labelled next to the thing they apply to. If a label is unclear or you think something is placed without one, tell us and we will fix it.