According to Google, 20% of searches are related to location. As a small business owner, you cannot ignore this fact. I am sure some of you business owners made taking your online presence more seriously your New Year’s resolution, but now 4 months later you still have not followed through! Well it’s time to shift into high gear and start taking advantage of local search.
Below are 5 quick tips for local business owners.
- Claim your Google Local Business Account ( Google Places )
In order for Google to have results in their map section they populate it with data from 3rd party providers. So, most likely your business information is already floating around in Google maps, but that is not good enough! Find your business listing and claim it. This will give your business more trust in the eyes of Google. More trust equals more visibility. To find your business, search your domain name or brand name in Google Maps.
You will know if your listing can be claimed because you will see the following:
Simply click “Business Owner” and you will be taken through the confirmation process. (Now beware, sometimes the confirmation process can be a bit tricky because of duplicate addresses, etc. If you run into this I suggest you seek help here.)
- Place your main keywords into the title tag of your home page.
The title tag of your home page could be considered one of the most critical elements when it comes to ranking your website. So, make sure to include your main keyword in your home page’s title tag.
Example:
Now, I could go on for ten more pages about choosing the correct keyword(s) with keyword research, and discussing meta descriptions and your call to action, but I am keeping this simple. If you want more information, just contact us, we are more than willing to help!
- Add your local address and phone number on every page of your website.
To help send Google and the other search engines another signal of trust about your local business, simply add your full address and phone number to every page of the website. This can be done by placing it in the footer or header of your website. PLEASE PLEASE do not make this an image, because Google cannot read image text! (They might be able to, but that is another story where we all have to wear tin foil hats.)
Example:
- Buy a keyword rich domain
Google loves keyword rich domains; it’s that simple. Do not even try to argue against it! As a small business owner you could always buy your local keyword rich domain: keywordinlocation.com
Below is a quick and easy way to do this.
Search your keyword in Google Adword Tool using exact match and then export the data to excel:
Scrub the list down to the keywords without spaces:
Finally, go search each keyword’s availability through a bulk domain checker:
If you place your company website on one of these domains, it should rank for your target term relativity easily. (This is not a guarantee, and I advise you to do some more SEO than just this.) Now, I know what you are all thinking, “I’m just going to buy all these domains and set up sites.” However, Google frowns upon the practice of using many keyword rich domain names, so I advise against using more than one.
- Create a Twitter account and search daily for customers!
Believe it or not, small business owners can utilize the power of twitter. There are many different tactics, but the following is the most relevant at this point in time.
Search Twitter for customers:
Go to Twitter Advance Search. Choose your keyword (for this example, I own an auto detailing shop and I want to find people that are talking about washing their cars)
DON’T HIT SEARCH YET! Make sure you go down to “Places” and enter your local city + search radius. (In this example, I am target the area around San Diego)
Hit Search and view the results and respond accordingly! (Below are some example tweets)
@kendallshaw, I love car washes too! Next time you need your car detailed we can hook you up with 10% off!
@minhsanity, I feel your pain! It happens. Hey, next time you need your car detailed we can give you up to 10% off!
@adamwillis, We cry over here when we see dirty cars. Why don’t you swing by and we can give you 10% off!
Now, I suggest you get creative on the searches you perform on Twitter to find your target market. Make sure the messages you send to them do not sound like spam. Remember, people love deals, so hook it up for your twitter users; they will feel special and tell other people.
Now it is time to take action on these 5 quick tips! I’m serious; don’t put it off till tomorrow. I challenge you to do one of these items each week, after 5 weeks you will see positive return for your efforts. Feel free to share you own tips in comments section below.
Nice article. It really gave us a lot of information. We were trying to get information on some subject which is related to this to an extent for last couple of days and this article really helped us. Good job !
Excellent idea. Some people completely ignore the importance of a domain name in order to get branding in there. Great if you’re a multinational, not so great if nobody’s ever heard of you.
Nice points and all actionable stuff that small business owners can do on their own.
What do you think of the recent re-branding of the GLBC to Google Places? To me it looks pretty much the same with the same functionality that GLBC had, but with the addition of possibly a few new features that were previously being beta tested in select areas and are not available to all.
One thing that I did find interesting was the idea that if you pay Google more money that they will add "tags" (Keywords) to your listing with the idea that these "tags" will help you rank for more relevant terms organically.
Is this the first foray into paid organic listings by Google, in the spirit of Yahoo’s paid inclusion program????
Thanks for the complement!
Yes you are correct the newly branded Google Places is pretty much the same as the old GLBC. I feel Google is moving in this direction to highlight their new paid "tag" feature. Google is always looking to make more money. I believe they are charging around $25 / month for that feature which I think could be worth wild to a small business owner.
This is very different from the cpc Yahoo inclusion model. Google is going to kill it with this low monthly reoccurring revenue! $25 / month times thousands of small business owners equals great passive revenue!