7 Local Online Marketing Tips to Help You Get Started
On this page, we’ll provide you with seven local online marketing tips to help you get started with your strategy. If you need help when it comes to online marketing for your business, call us today at 888-601-5359 to speak with a strategist.
1. Optimize for local search
Local search engine optimization (SEO) is an excellent local online marketing service your business can use to reach more leads. Local SEO solutions help connect you with people who are searching for your business.
Most people conduct local searches through Google to find a nearby business. These searches are accompanied by phrases like “near me” or “in [city]” to help leads get the most relevant and accurate results.
Did you know that 85 percent of brand engagement from customers goes to local listings?
People conduct local searches to find relevant businesses and learn about that company’s brand to see if they are a good fit. If you want to reach these local customers with your local online marketing strategy, you must optimize your local listings.
Optimizing your Google Business Profile listing
Optimize your Google Business Profile listing to ensure your business appears in locally relevant search results. When users conduct local searches, it generally triggers a box to appear at the top of the search results.
This box lists local businesses that fit the user’s search query. It features three companies that are the most relevant to the user’s search but also gives users the option to see more companies and expand their options.
Your Google Business Profile listing is valuable for your local online marketing strategy. If you want to appear in the box in the search results, also known as the local SEO 3-pack, you must optimize your listing.
Start by filling out your profile completely. You want to add your hours of operation, address, and contact information. It’s important to add all the valuable information your audience needs when looking at your Google Business Profile listing.
In addition to information, you’ll also want to add photos. Photos give your audience insight into your company, as well as your products and services. You can add pictures of products or people doing services to give your audience a visual representation of your business.
Completing your Google Business Profile listing will help you appear in more locally relevant search results.
Optimizing your website
Aside from Google Business Profile, optimize your site to appear in local searches. You want your business to appear in the search results when someone conducts a local search. Optimizing for local search helps more leads find your page.
One of the most common ways to optimize for local search is integrating keywords. Keywords trigger your website to appear in relevant search results. If you want to show in front of relevant leads, you must choose the right keywords.
To find relevant keywords, conduct keyword research. Focus on keywords that contain three or more words. These keywords, known as long-tail keywords, are best for your campaign because they drive the most valuable results and reach more relevant leads.
Aside from keyword selection, there are other ways to optimize your website for local searches. Improving site speed and cleaning up code are additional ways you can improve your ranking in the search results.
By optimizing for local SEO, you’ll help your business reach more leads.
2. Invest in your website’s design
Your site is the heart of your local online marketing campaign. Whenever you run a campaign, you direct people to your website. If you want to make a positive impact on your audience, you must invest in your website’s design.
When people visit your site, the design will impact how they view your business. You want to make a positive first impression of your company. The design can determine if people stay on your page or choose another local shop.
If you’re a hardscaping company doing digital marketing, for example, it’s crucial that your website’s design reflects your brand. You want people to get familiar with your brand when they’re on your site. Brand familiarity results in more conversions for your local business.
Ensure that your design makes it easy for your audience to use your site. Your design should flow smoothly and enable your audience to have a positive experience.
You’ll also want to include visual elements in your web design, too. Users don’t just want to see blocks of text with colors. Visual elements make your website’s design more appealing and get your audience to engage on your page longer.
By investing time in your website’s design, you’ll reach more valuable local leads interested in your business.
3. Reach local customers with pay-per-click (PPC) ads
Pay-per-click (PPC) ads are a great addition to your local online marketing campaign. These ads help you reach leads that are more interested in your business, which leads to more conversions. In fact, PPC leads are 50 percent more likely to convert than organic visitors.
To get started with PPC ads, you’ll want to select your keywords. Similar to SEO, keywords trigger your ad to appear in the search results. You want to ensure that you choose the most relevant, local keywords so you can reach valuable leads.
Once you have your keywords selected, you’ll bid for your ad’s placement. You’ll set your maximum bid, which is the amount you are willing to pay each time someone clicks on your ad. This amount is flexible and you can change it at any time.
Your maximum bid and quality score will determine your ad’s placement. It’s best to have a better quality score than a higher maximum bid because Google wants to put quality ads first. They want to serve their audience with the most relevant PPC ads, so it’s best to create an ad with quality content.
Once you have your placement, you’ll launch your PPC campaign.
PPC ads are a great way to reach local customers. These ads appear at the top of the search results, so your audience is very likely to see them. It’s a great way to drive local customers to your business’s page.
When you run a PPC campaign, you direct your audience to a landing page.
If you want to see the best results with your campaign, use an individual landing page for each PPC campaign you run. This ensures that your audience will be focused on one product or service each time, which makes them more likely to convert.
Investing in PPC ads for your local business’s online marketing strategy will help you reach more interested leads for your business.
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4. Manage your customer reviews
Reviews are crucial to your local business. People rely on reviews to help them determine if they should choose your company.
When users research a business, they look at the reviews to garner if your business is a good option. If users see an abundance of positive reviews, they are more likely to choose your business. Likewise, an excess of negative reviews can drive people away from your company.
If you want your reviews to work for your business instead of against it, make review management part of your local online marketing plan. Investing in local online marketing services will help you streamline the process of managing your reviews.
You want to thank people for taking the time to leave positive feedback. It makes them feel that their feedback was valued and welcomed. This also strengthens your relationship with these customers to keep them coming back.
As for negative reviews, it’s vital that you take time to address the issues in them. Reach out to these reviewers and try to solve their problems. Future customers expect to see negative reviews; what matters to them is how you handle that feedback.
By monitoring reviews, you’ll help your local business obtain and reach new leads.
5. Utilize social media
When you’re shaping your online marketing plan for your local business, ensure that social media marketing is a part of it. Social media marketing helps you obtain new leads and nurture leads already following your page.
There are many social media sites you can join to reach leads. These include Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Pinterest. Your audience will determine which social media site is right for your business.
Social media offers organic and paid opportunities. It doesn’t cost anything to make a social media account and post content. You can post organic content, like status updates, photos, and videos, to get your audience to engage on your page.
You can also run ads on social media, too. Each social media site has a paid advertising program. You can use these programs to reach new leads that haven’t found your local business yet.
When you use social media ads, you can target your audience better. You can set specific audience parameters to ensure that you’re reaching the most relevant leads.
Social media is a great tool to help you reach more pertinent leads interested in your business.
6. Focus on mobile-friendliness
Mobile-friendliness is crucial to your local business’s online marketing campaign. If you want leads to remain on your site, you must ensure that it’s mobile-friendly. Mobile-friendliness is a critical factor in whether your leads engage with your business.
This is pertinent to many types of strategies. First, it’s essential that you focus on making your website mobile-friendly. With mobile searches becoming more popular, it’s becoming increasingly important that your site works well on mobile.
To ensure your site works well on mobile, integrate responsive design. Responsive design allows your website to adapt to whatever device a user is using. They will have a positive experience on your site, regardless of the device.
You’ll also want to adapt your PPC landing page for mobile, too. People will click on PPC ads when on their mobile devices, so it’s crucial that your landing pages adapt to those devices.
By ensuring your content is mobile-friendly, you’ll get more leads to engage with your content.
7. Create localized content
Many local businesses forego creating content because they don’t have the time to put into creating it. The truth, however, is that content creation is extremely valuable to your local business.
If you want to see success with your local online marketing campaign, you must invest in content marketing.
Content comes in many forms, including blogs, videos, infographics, and ebooks. The point of content is to provide your audience with valuable knowledge they seek. You serve as the solution for what they need.
To start creating content, you must decide on topics. Keyword research will help you find good topics to write. When you conduct a search on Google, you can see different questions about keywords that your audience is already searching.
In this example, searching the long-tail keyword, “best flowers for weddings,” generates questions such as “what is the most expensive flower for weddings?” or “what are the best flowers for weddings?”
You can use questions like these to come up with content. These questions can also help you outline your content and know what topics to cover.
Creating localized content can help you drive more traffic to your page. You can focus on topics that matter to your audience and provide them with the valuable information they need.
Content is great for your business because it exposes your audience to your brand. If they check out your content and like what they see, they’ll check out your business. This helps them build brand familiarity, which makes them more likely to choose your business when they convert.
By adding content marketing to your local online marketing plan, you’ll drive better results for your business.
WebFX will help you launch your local online marketing plan
Local online marketing is valuable to your business because it helps you reach leads interested in your products or services. You’ll obtain leads that turn into conversions for your business. At WebFX, we have over 28 years of experience creating local online marketing plans.
We’re a full-service digital marketing company that specializes in local marketing along with a wide range of other digital marketing services. In the past five years, we’ve driven over $6 billion in sales and over 24 million leads for our clients. We focus on creating campaigns that help our clients grow their business.
If you’re ready to start reaching more local customers interested in your business, contact us online or call us today at 888-601-5359 to speak with a strategist.
We look forward to helping your business grow!