Call-centers of 2GIS compile information about businesses from publicly available sources such as local phone books, advertisement and local trade shows. To expand the database coverage, “walking operators” walk through the city and register businesses on their routes. Validation is made by phone — EVERY business in the database is called at least once in 4 months.

Phone validation helps us with such aspects as:

• collecting consumer facing information as opposed to legal entity information;
• completion of name, address, categories, hours of operation;
• removal of duplicates;
• standardization of common terms in names and addresses;
• removal of out-of-business listings.

Very thorough approach to gathering and validation of business information results in the unprecedented database quality and accuracy valued so much by our users.