Are you on the Google Local Business Listing?
Posted in Marketing, SEO on April 8th, 2009 by mauriceIf not, you are missing out on some great SEO
Most Business owners market their products to a specific geographic market / location. This can be done in a number of ways; direct marketing, snail-mail, coupons, word of mouth etc. Depending on the business you may even create TV ads, buy radio time, hand out flyers, or pay for billboard space. If you are doing 1 or a number of these things, that’s great, you’re probably doing more than most do to market their business. More and more people are using the internet as their main source of advertising, and consumers are using the internet to search for and evaluate local businesses.
Studies show that most people under the age of 40 (and of course many over 40 years old), never use the yellow or white pages anymore (or any kind of book based directory). Google has stated that 73% of all online activity is related to local content. Also, according to a study done by TMP Directional Marketing, 61% of the local searches are resulting in purchases.
So what does this mean for your business?
Basically, it means you need to develop a quality web presence. This means a nice, functional, straight forward website. You have to remember that people who do use the internet to browse businesses will judge your business from their first impression: Your Website!
Another great thing to have is customer testimonials. Consumers want to know how reliable your business is, so testimonials that speak about the quality, services, and the products you have to offer are great. Obviously if you have such testimonials you should be showing them off everywhere you can!
Great photos are a must. Think of it this way; when you walk into a food court, there are always a few dodgy looking places with iffy pictures of food, so you are usually drawn to the nice classy, professional looking photos. Well the same goes for websites. People browsing will remember a nice professional shot of your products, as apposed to a digital camera shot in poor light. The “Before and After” shots are always a great touch!
Another thing to remember is when you have a website, you want to get inbound* links to your website. Local search is a good way to do this. Also, when you search a search engine for your business, even if your actual website doesn’t show up on the first page, the local business listing might, and that counts for a lot!
If you need help setting up your Google local business listing, contact us for a quote!
* = Inbound links are websites that link to your website. The opposite to an Inbound is an Outbound link; which is when your website link’s to a page outside of your website
