January 19, 2010
OPEN Forum Message
Business Forecasting 2012
Our special feature on forecasting sheds light on how to choose the right model, offers advice from Jack Stack and more.
Get started
Featured Response
“”
Drew Knapp
The growth of search as a primary driver of buying decisions in some local market segments has significantly increased the need for small business owners to master this thing called local search. To state this a bit more plainly – if your business doesn’t show up on page one or in the first handful of local results delivered when people type “city name something I want” into their chosen search engine you may as well not exist.
To be fair this is not 100% true for every category and market, but it’s growing rapidly for anyone, say, under 30. Here’s how a twenty something finds a plumber, dentist, or flower shop. They pull out their phone, type in a category and drive the nearest pin drop.
Getting listed, and then rising to the top when people look online locally, is one way to create a significant strategic marketing advantage. On the other hand, if you can’t get your business to show in what some call the “Google 7 box” shown in the image above, then you’re at a significant disadvantage when some percentage of your target market goes searching.
Below are fives areas that you should address to increase your chances of winning in the local search game. (Do it now, before your competitors do)
1) Optimize your web pages for local
There are many ways to make your web site pages much more localized.
- Add your address to every page
- Add city names in navigation: Omaha Kitchen remodeling showcase
- Add suburb and neighborhood names in natural ways
- Add a local event blog and list festivals and non-profit events
- Find relevant local bloggers to exchange links with
- Do keyword research with local terms to find the best phrases to add to your pages (wordtracker.com)
- Explore hcard microformats to mark-up HTML for address data
2) Optimize local search profiles
The local search directories at Google Maps, Yahoo Local and Bing Local want you to claim and build very information rich local profiles. This makes their job easier when people search for local businesses.
If you haven’t done it yet go here right now:
One super secret tip for Google Maps – when you create your profile you can add up to five categories of business. The first must match a suggested one on Google’s list, but you get add four more as you like. So, instead of “plumbing contractor” use “your city name plumbing contractor” and do that three more times for other terms with local add on and watch what happens to the listing in Google Local.
3) Get proactive in ratings and reviews
Lots of services have cropped up as directories for local businesses with the added feature of user ratings and reviews. If you’re not paying attention to the major sites and monitoring what’s being said, you may be losing business because of one poor review.
Here are the primary review sites to check out first, although many industries also feature rating and review sites.
The local search directories listed in the previous point also aggregate and show reviews from some of these sites and allow readers to add reviews directly.
My advice is to get very proactive about getting those positive reviews going. You should be collecting testimonials and success stories as part of your overall marketing activity anyway, so why not add teaching people how to do these reviews on sites like Yelp!
While the search directories won’t confirm this there does seem to be a correlation to sites that rank high on local search and those that have lots of reviews. There are other factors, but this is a big one.
4) Get listings and mentions
Again, another one that’s hard to quantify in the world of search engines but, it appears that having more natural listings in directories can help you compete in the battle for top local placements.
Get those association, alumni, and trade group listings filled out and up to date.
Visit Universal Business Listing – This site offers a service that will get you listed in numerous online directories and portals that are used by many applications and tools. It might be the best $30 a year you spend.
5) Spread the local social love
One powerful local play, and perhaps a good strategy to get some extra local links, is to start a local niche group and build a community of users around the local theme on social media sites such as Flickr, Facebook, LinkedIn, MeetUp or Biznik.
If you can find an area of interest to others you might be able to build a useful and vibrant local tool while greatly enhancing your own local presence.
I’ve cited this example before, but it’s a good one: This Boston Networking Group on LinkedIn was founded by Jeff Popin, owner of BostonEventGuide.com. With over 3,000 members, there’s a pretty good bet this group serves as a conduit for Popin’s main business locally.
And lastly, don’t forget to locally optimize all those YouTube profiles and videos, and any other social networking profiles and point those profiles back to you main web site. Every little bit counts in this very important and increasingly competitive world of local search.
John Jantsch is a marketing and digital technology coach, award winning social media publisher and author of Duct Tape Marketing.
Check your balance, review recent transactions and pay your bill on the go.
Drew Knapp 9 months ago
Excellent article, thank you!