Local Business Marketing — “more customers and more sales” as we like to call it here at TruBlu — is unique to each business case. No two businesses are the same, and how we go about marketing a local business varies in the nuances necessary to achieve the results, and local business marketing in Santa Clarita, California relies on the same proven strategies as local business marketing in Sydney, Australia. That statement is based on our experience in both markets; TruBlu Web Consulting works with local business owners worldwide every day, so we are experts in local business marketing. There are several basic methods to do local business marketing, and several benchmarks to determine if the campaign is effectively reaching its goals.
We currently service over 3,400 different small business categories in our local business marketing efforts. We have provided information videos on several key areas of local business marketing that you may find very useful: Chirorpractor marketing, Marketing for Attorneys specializing in Personal Injury and Bankruptcy, online marketing strategies for Real Estate Professionals and Mortgage Professionals, internet marketing for Accountants and CPA’s, Podiatrists, Optometrists and Opthalmologists, plus internet marketing for contractors such as AC Repair, Plumbers, Electricians and Professional Movers. The local business marketing videos we have prepared cover a small fraction of the business owners, entrepreneurs, solopreneurs, authors, speakers and mom & pop’s we support worldwide.
Effective Local Business Marketing
Local Business Marketing - proven strategies that work in any local business market, worldwide
For your local business marketing to be effective, you must dominate local search. Most businesses understand that being on the first page of Google, Bing and Yahoo! is important and benefits them directly in terms of their bottom line. But really, why is that? It has been estimated that 98% of search ends on page 1, meaning that only two percent of your market bothers to go to the second page of a search engine when they are looking for something. This number diminishes sharply for page 3, page 4, and so on. If you are not on page one of search, then you are (at best) communicating with only two percent of your market.
Google has different search indexes built into its overall search platform — images, videos, Google Places, shopping, etc. It is possible — and recommended — for a business to rank highly in each of these indexes, and TruBlu’s local business marketing methods work to achieve that. It is also possible (and preferred) for a business to appear in multiple places in the Google search index — for example, in multiple places on page one.
Google Places and Local Business Marketing
We who use Google every day for local business marketing and more casual searching are familiar with the Google “blended search.” This is where you type in a search phrase and receive natural search results, paid search results, local search results, images and perhaps even videos. This gives local businesses a unique opportunity to rank on page one; Google automatically serves results from their Google Places index when searching for local businesses. They do this automatically for certain phrases such as “car repair” or “hair salon” as well as when any local identifier is used, such as “internet consultant Santa Clarita.” Google “knows” your location based either on the IP address of your computer or the GPS of your phone; a little spooky but much appreciated when you’re trying to quickly find what you need.
[youtube-white-label id="vUzMu8GXNUM" height="340" width="600" autohide="1" autoplay="0" controls="0" branding="1" hd="1" rel="0" showinfo="0" thanks="1" autosize="1" border="0" cc="0" colorone="" colortwo="" disablekb="1" fullscreen="1" /]
When a local business gets placed in Google Places, there are certain key factors that Google wants to see in the listing for it to “count” in Google’s search index. There are also key factors that must be present on the local business website and additional factors that must be present outside of the website in terms of the social citation websites like Yelp and who is linking to the local business website. In other words, how Google ranks a local business website is a very complex formula (Google calls it their algorithm) that is more secret than Coca Cola or Colonel Sanders’ fried chicken recipe. None of us are Google so we don’t know for certain what is in the algorithm, but based on our experience of marketing hundreds of local business websites, we have a better idea than the newbie marketer who read a book yesterday while they were waiting for their 1-hour business cards order. In addition to that, we are in the local community and we value what Google values — quality content, professional websites and contributing to the Google index.
Local Business Marketing Blended Search Method
Local business marketing becomes a combination of many different forms of marketing — on-page Search Engine Optimization, off-page optimization in the form of authoritative linkbuilding, optimization of the Google Places page (itself a topic worthy of a book), video marketing, article writing, press releases, citations from respected sources and more. In other words, it requires expertise. While it’s possible to attain temporary results with sheer luck or by “tricking” Google, those types of strategies will have perilous results for your business. We have seen business owners whose website have been de-indexed by Google and the negative impact it causes… If today you refused entry to 70 percent of the customers who called on your business, you can imagine the consequences that would have for your bottom line.
You may be wondering why we limit our discussion of local search marketing to Google when there are hundreds of other search engines out there. What about Bing and Yahoo for example…? Google dominates search with about 70 percent of search volume, and many of the strategies for local business marketing that are successful in Google also work well in Bing and Yahoo. There are some nuances as well, and we make sure to have you well covered if you select one of our premium local business marketing packages.
In the subsequent pages, we’ll present some videos on local business marketing in various niches. There are hundreds of business niches or classifications and it would be impossible to create a separate video for each one — we would rather invest our time in promoting your business and attracting more customers for you — so even if your market is not represented in our videos, rest assured we know how to rank your local business successfully. No one can “guarantee” a placement in Google because, again, no one is Google. But as we mentioned, knowing what to do for local business marketing is a matter of experience and subtle nuance. We look forward to working with you on your local business marketing.
