How much can a city directory make from self-serve business listings?
Short answer
My planning math: with a $150 minimum purchase billed quarterly, 100 businesses is $15,000 a quarter, and even with 30% drop-off you'd still bring in about $12,000 the next quarter with no new sales. If a city brand reached $3,000 to $4,000 a month, 20 cities would be about $60,000 a month. Targets, not results.
Here's the math I worked through for WilCo Guide. These are planning numbers. I'm sharing them because the structure is the useful part.
What does one city look like?
| Line | Number |
|---|---|
| Minimum purchase | $150, quarterly or annual |
| Paying businesses | 100 |
| Revenue per quarter | $15,000 |
| Next quarter with 30% drop-off and zero new sales | About $12,000 |
The $150 minimum is the $50-a-month profile, billed by the quarter. Quarterly billing means each sale is a meaningful amount, and renewals carry you even in a quarter where you sell nothing new.
What does it look like across cities?
"Each brand brings in three to four thousand dollars a month. 20 locations times three is $60,000 a month. Self-service website plus social plus newsletter."
That's the target, with no person on the ground in each city. It only works because the website, the social posts and the newsletter run on software. The model breaks the moment someone has to do manual work for each listing.
How many businesses should you aim for?
More than you'd think. An AI advisor pushed me to aim for 100 to 200 paying businesses per city, not 25 to 50. At $50 a month, small numbers don't add up to a business.
Is there demand before you sell anything?
Early signs say yes. About a month after launch, with no promotion at all, WilCo Guide was getting roughly two business submissions a day, plus event submissions. Before I'd announced the directory, 14 business owners had filled out the interview form. An AI research audit told me Google was already citing the site.
Submissions aren't payments. They are a pipeline of business owners who raised their hand.
What about selling the software instead?
That's the other side of the same math. If a local site owner can earn from $50-a-month business profiles, paid content and $100 to $200 obituary posts, then a tool priced at $1,500 a month pays for itself. If you're making $5,000 or $10,000 a month from it, you don't care what it costs. After one demo, six or seven people, including two multi-million-dollar companies, wanted it on the spot. That's how I think about pricing larkfeed.
What has to be true for this to work?
- Self-serve everything. Businesses sign up, edit and pay without you.
- Give them a real reason to renew. Customers who don't win stop paying.
- Bundle the media. Newsletter and social exposure are what a pure directory can't offer.
- Keep it on one domain so every city builds the same site's authority. See subdomain vs. root domain.
The full funnel is in how to monetize a local business directory.
Answered by TJ Larkin. From team and partner calls between August and September 2026. Last updated .