Local Search Marketing, Justin From Local Launch - SES San Jose 2007
Google thinks Local / Mobile is a huge opportunity going forward. There are 2.2 Billion Searches with some form of local intent. In addition, 82% contacted a local business and 61% actually went on to make a purchase.
Justin @ Local Launch shared the number that 93% of all conversions related to local search activity take place offline. Note: There is a 50 / 50 split between explicit and implicit local search, meaning that people actually typed the geographic modifier.
For SEM, local search has been challenging as local advertisers are confused and slow to adopt. And companies like Google, Yahoo, MSN, Infospace, AOL, IAC, YellowPages.com, etc have really fragmented the market.
Here are the recommendations to affect change for local search marketing:
1. Content Control and Dispersion
2. Empower Ratings and Review Channel
3. Ride the Coattails of Authorities
4. Understand the Google Reference
5. Simple and Structured Pages
6. Local Link Building and Strategies
A big point was that local search is definitely a small business product. Traditional SEO and well-monetized link building campaigns will help to improve these results.
Also mentioned was that Content Control should be done through all of the the media and local sites. This can involve thinking past your site on web sites like:
- Kudzu.com
- InsiderPages.com
- SuperPages.com
- Ask City
- City Search
- MOjo Pages
- Local Launch
- Google Local
Every piece of incremental content is a new opportunity to be found. Move to optimize profile base content in the core profiles, then optimize profile meta data. Make sure that all of these sites have the right information.
Then hopefully, your customers, friends, and families can add reviews for your site, leading to the opportunity to move into social network opportunities.
Another tip - ride the coattails on authorities and try to grab local long tails. For shorter terms, realize that the SERP’s contain the local sites… you may have to join the big sites to win the ‘money’ terms.
Also, empower the ratings and review. Go online, talk about a business, and you can improve a business reputation. Reviews can get pulled from sites like InsiderPages by Google. Note: Make sure you are monitoring your business reputation.
Don’t forget to study the Google References. Try to figure out why Google is putting someone at the top of SERP’s. Check out the numbers and where they get their links from.
Finally, Structured Optimized Web Pages are important. Use complete address and make sure to use single line and multiple pages. Use internal pages and global footers to optimize for geographic modifiers.
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