Current coronavirus restrictions mean that consumers are in a strange hybrid situation, where they are being encouraged to support in-person businesses, via schemes like Eat Out to Help Out, but they are being discouraged from travelling much further than their town or city to visit these businesses. This paradigm means that local marketing has never been more important.
There are lots of businesses who still think local marketing still means dropping flyers down a few selected streets and hiring a schoolgoer for one Saturday morning holding a sandwich board outside the store. In the age of the digital consumer, this couldn’t be further from the truth. Though it may be the World Wide Web, there has never been a more effective vehicle for local marketing than the internet.
88% of mobile searches for local businesses result in a call or a visit in less than 24 hours
97% of people learn more about a local company online than via any other method
How Can You Do Local Marketing Online?
Get Local On Social
Claim Your Local Listings
Know The Website That Knows Your Town (And Everywhere)
Localise Your Paid Advertising
Get Local On Social
Social media gives you a huge range of tools to let people know exactly where you are.
On Instagram, your location tags appear underneath your account username, appearing even higher than your picture. Instagram cares about where you are, and users can search by locations as well as keywords and hashtags; meaning that local marketing is a route to huge success on the platform.
On Facebook, not only do users have similar searching options to the Instagram product, but users can also ask for local recommendations. Ensuring that your profile – particularly your address – is up to date can open your business up to being suggested to new customers. Moreover, the power of a personal recommendation by a friend can never be overestimated in business – don’t miss out because your local marketing strategy isn’t up to scratch
Claim Your Local Listings
Decades ago, it was The Yellow Pages.
Before that, it was the phonebook.
Today, it’s tripadvisor & yelp.
Local directories, whilst they’re not so popular in hard copy nowadays, have never had more readers or viewers. In 2018, TripAdvisor generated more than 730 million user reviews.
On many of these sites – and be aware, there are often much smaller local directories that exist too – you can claim your business listing and modify it to be as useful as possible. By updating your opening hours, services provided and even pictures of your storefront as often as they change, you can ensure that users know you’re there and that their experience lines up with expectation. A good local marketing strategy means that you control as many facets as possible. If there’s an online local community, however small, you need to be a part of it
Know The Website That Knows Your Town (And Everywhere)
Google is the world’s most visited website. It’s used by basically everybody and everywhere. It’s search engine blends seamlessly with it’s map functionality to provide a local service, globally. On Google, you are not only able to claim listings for your business but you are also able to claim map listings. Here, people only looking at the area, and not for a service, will be able to see your business. Local marketing can also help you to pique customer’s interest in you before your service, snatching them from the pool of business as early as possible.
The other element of local marketing which goes hand-in hand with Google is Local SEO. Setting your pages up to be easily recognised as about a specific place means that Google’s algorithms can pick up more easily when a user in your area is searching for your service, and show your site. Some studies have shown that users are up to 70% more likely to make contact with a business they find on Google if that business is within a 20 minute drive of their searching location.
Localise Your Paid Advertising
It’s not just search listings that you can set up for local marketing. Paid advertising on search engines & social media that includes local references can both lower your cost per click and increase your interaction rate. This could mean simplifying adding localised keywords into your PPC campaigns or ad copy, including phone numbers with local area codes or reference to events happening in your area. In any case, including a local area makes people feel familiar with your business – and breeding familiarity is at the foundation of any successful local marketing strategy.
Local marketing is a commitment, and for businesses prepared to put in the work, is an avenue towards great success. To speak to an expert about your business today, call us now.
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