Are you a small business owner? Do you want to see a lot more customers coming to you in 2011? Certainly, every business owner I’ve met answers these in the affirmative! What’s your plan to grow your business with great new customers?
Clearly, every new customer is a function of new leads in your sales funnel — we know this as conversion. And, every new sales lead is a subset of the number of eager buyers shopping for what you offer who are exposed to your business — we know this as marketing. Admit it, the numbers of people exposed to your business depends on marketing strategy, tactics, advertising, etc. Times change and so has effectiveness of traditional marketing tactics and offline advertising. Whereas, telemarketing, yellow pages, newspaper ads and other previously effective tactics are seriously lame today, online marketing for small business produces more targeted sales leads everyday.
Don’t Ignore Online Marketing For Small Business
Most small business owners ignore online marketing, because they don’t understand how the Internet has dramatically changed consumers. Furthermore, many unwary businesses have been duped into costly schemes to fool Google and other search engines. Have you been duped into believing that #1 on Google first page or a million website visitors in a month are ends in themselves? How do they add to your bottom line? Here’s a clue: work both of them into a business plan, pass it on to your banker and ask for a business loan. Point is, show your banker a plan to get more targeted sales leads calling you on the phone and then they’ll talk money. Google itself and random website visitors do absolutely nothing to grow your business.
Fortunately for you, this Internet thingy has totally changed the way we consume! No longer flipping through yellow pages or browsing the Sunday Trib classifieds, eager buyers shopping for what you offer are on the Internet right this second searching for you. Every time they search they receive a search results page. If you’re not on that page, they will buy from somebody else. Online marketing for small business has one goal: everywhere they search they find you there.
Affordable Online Marketing For Small Business
Fact is, effectively marketing your business is now possible with any realistic budget:
Email marketing has long been the favorite of Internet marketers, perhaps because it’s the online equivalent to direct marketing. Done right, instead of intruding in the Inbox, you ask and they grant you permission to nurture them and keep them informed with current and relevant information. Keeping permission marketing foremost in your mind, think of events, specials and successes that you’d appreciate knowing about your favorite vendors. Your customers and prospects will appreciate the same about you.
Online articles are another great way to increase awareness of you, your business and, especially, those special things you do that benefit your customers. Do you remember fondly thumbing through a magazine, reading interesting articles and clipping some articles so you can refer back to them later? The Internet is several magnitudes greater than any paper magazine. This very minute somebody is reading an article about your product and service and today she’ll bookmark it and maybe tell her friends about it. Have you ever tried to find a article in a magazine you threw out a long time ago? That won’t happen online, because it’s always available to be found, 24/7, 365 days a year.
Social media is all about family, friends and vacation pictures — right? No. It, too, can be tremendously effective in putting your business in front of eager buyers. Facebook membership alone is the third largest country in the world: China, India, Facebook, USA … In 2010 it’s been reported that the largest growing Facebook demographic is middle aged women. Again, keep in mind how online marketing for small business is primarily about developing relationships with your marketplace. What better way to start a conversation with a new prospect than at a huge party? Facebook, for example, is a neverending party of friends, family and coworkers, and they’re all talking about what’s on their minds. Strike a positive chord with just one, and they’ll tell somebody about you, and on and on.
Follow Online Marketing For Small Business To Success
Online marketing is about branding. The more people recognize your personal name, your business name and your place in the community, the more likely that one of them converts into a customer. Notice how we haven’t mentioned traditional advertising agencies and TV commercial production crews — the prohibitive prices of traditional marketing simply are not necessary online. It’s more about leaving thousands and thousands of bread crumbs from your business throughout the Internet. Whenever some eager buyer happens on one crumb while shopping for what you offer, Hansel and Gretel will follow the trail to your door. Like all marketing, the only goal of online marketing for small business is to create customers.
Call Now Answer Your Online Marketing For Small Business Question: 612-235-6060
Marketing local business is not as simple today as it was in the past. A long time ago, it seems marketers promoted local business by putting ads in the yellow pages and buying ad space in the local newspaper. Business has gotten very hard in The Twin Cities. Eager buyers no longer look at the newspaper ads to shop for products and services. Today most consumers start by doing an Internet search before they buy. What will happen when you anticipate eager buyers shopping for what you offer? Knowing what they type into the search box, what’s keeping you from appearing everywhere they look?
Marketing Local Business Online
Take roofing for example. Drop by Google.com and search for the following:
twin cities roofing
minneapolis roofing
saint paul roofing
As I write this, the search engine results pages all show one thing in common: that gorgeous map! Local business results are your key to marketing local business successfully.
There are three sections to each Google search results page:
Pay-per-click advertisements at the top and down the right side;
Local business results and that gorgeous map above the fold; and
Organic or natural search results everywhere else.
So, each roofing company has at least three (3) chances to show on each page. And, take note, this is only Google! We’re not looking at Yahoo!, Bing, Facebook or any other search results. Is Your Website Marketing Local Business?
Consider your own company website. You may have paid big bucks to publish your online business card — did you? Did you pay for pretty? Or, did you intend to pay to produce more customers? How many new customers did you get last month because of your pretty website? What is your return on that investment?
What about your website content? Is it relevant to your visitors? Is it compelling them to take action and buy from you once they’re on your pages? What would persuade you to buy from you? Are you calling them to action on each page? If you don’t ask them to call you, what do you expect them to do? Not calling you, not buying from you and going away may be exactly the message they’re getting from you.
As a local business, what are you doing to make sure that eager local buyers know that you exist? How would you find your company if you didn’t know about it? Remember that cool map? Google will only place you in the local business results after they recognize that your business is local to that search. What is your service area? As a Minneapolis roofer, how interested are you in Duluth business? Or, business in Fort Lauderdale? The best marketing local business strategy pulls customers directly from your local community. Even if business thousands of miles away can be good, won’t local business be better?
Marketing Local Business Has Changed
Marketing local business online is not that different from marketing offline. Eager buyers want to taste, hear, smell and feel your products and services. Give them a great reason to walk through your front door and they’ll come to check you out. There are rating and review sites providing places for your customers to express their feelings about your business. Claim your business listing on social rating and review sites like Google Places, MerchantCircle, Yelp, Angie’s List, etc. With half a reason to stand up in public and tell the world about your remarkable work, many customers will do just that.
How much of that do you want?
Community involvement will certainly build your brand quickly. The more your neighbors talk about your business, the sooner marketing local business brings them to you. Marketing local business is different today than in the past. Today most consumers start by doing an Internet search before they buy. Anticipate eager buyers shopping for what you offer and, of a sudden, everywhere they look you are there. In fact, marketing local business online is different: it is effective.
Marketing Local Business 90 Day Challenge
Give me ninety days and you will be successfully marketing local business throughout the Twin Cities.
If local small business marketing is unfamiliar to you, look at it this way. The target of every business is to get the word out to the maximum number of people to maximize marketplace exposure. In business, market exposure correlates with sales.
Go Online With Local Small Business Marketing
Today in our cyber era, having an effective online presence is of utmost importance. As people spend more and more time in front of the computer, chances are better and better that they will search online for the products and services that they will buy. The Internet allows small business owners to display your expertise directly to eager buyers. Unlike traditional media like billboards, television advertising and Yellow Pages, with online media local small business marketing no longer requires huge amounts of money.
Local Small Business Marketing Is Affordable
It’s true! There are some really cool ways to promote your local business, many of which are free, to attract the targeted leads you desire. Here are some of the methods:
Create web pages that feature keywords specific to your particular products and services. What do we mean by “keyword?” Anticipate what eager buyers type into the search engine box before they click [Search]. Savvy buyers are getting savvier. With local small business marketing you want to attract local customers.
Make sure to choose terms that people will look for to find local products and services. For example, if you own a Detroit furniture business, you don’t want to target phrase “furniture.” It’s too generic. Google it yourself and see 257 MILLION web pages containing that word. Instead, Detroit buyers will type the phrase “detroit office furniture” and search. Now I find 700 thousand competitive web pages and also that local map featuring local furniture merchants.
Build a blog and they will come. Your blog is the ideal way to tell your story and interact with an interested audience. You know? I know you’re great telling your story and persuading prospects sitting across the table from you. Write each blog post that way, as if you’re eyeball-to-eyeball with the largest possible audience. And they will hear your story today, tomorrow and next year — when they’re ready to hear it. Once you’re done writing your post, bookmark it in social book marking sites like Digg.com and StumbleUpon.com to promote even more traffic.
Last but not least, don’t forget a Facebook fan page. Now that Facebook is the third largest country in the world (China, India, Facebook, United States …) your Fan page facilitates keeping up with your customers regardless where they are. Local small business marketing benefits from Facebook patrons Like-ing your page and telling the world how great you are. Local patrons frequenting Facebook are more likely to pay attention to your local business when privy to your popularity. Additionally, Facebook facilitates instant communication with your audience whenever you do something noteworthy, like a special event or a special promotion.
Dream Big With Local Small Business Marketing
As local business marketing becomes easier and more familiar to you, eager buyers will notice. To maximize marketplace exposure your local business must be found. In business, market exposure correlates with sales. What do you have to lose by dreaming big and making local small business marketing an overnight sensation?
Why are new sales leads getting to be increasingly rare for so many businesses in America today? If you have a small to medium sized business, don’t you know exactly what I mean? Its not that you’re doing anything wrong to complain that new sales leads are getting harder and harder to find. It’s partly the economic situation that we find ourselves immersed in.
New Sales Leads Succeed
We’re all suffering in similar ways. Everyday you open up the news paper, turn on the radio and TV only to find that yet another company has gone bust. There is no doubt that this global recession has really taken its toll on small business. If you were to ask them, most business owners would tell you that the one thing that they long for right now is a reliable source of new sales leads that convert into high quality repeat business. This source of new sales leads would make the difference between thriving and going under.
Many businesses are failing today. Yet some small businesses are surviving, even growing, in the middle of our current financial crisis. The difference is new sales leads and today great leads are found online. The Internet is a goldmine for new sales leads. No matter whether you are looking for local, national or international leads, look for sales leads online.
New Sales Leads Are Online
Almost every American has access to the Internet these days — whether it be online through a standard computer or through their cell phone. The Internet will soon be the only method anyone in the US uses to find business products and services. In order to secure for your business new sales leads that convert into repeat business, you need to learn how to use the Internet for effective marketing purposes. Failure to utilize the Internet in this way will result in losing out on all of those new sales leads your business so badly need.
The bottom line is that all of those customers are still out here. They’re everywhere. They’re just not thumbing through Yellow Pages, not answering telemarketing calls and not responding to newspaper ads. Eager buyers are shopping on the Internet for what you offer. If they don’t find you, they will buy elsewhere.
Eager Buyers Are New Sales Leads
Consumers are using different sources to find the products and services that they need. Anticipate your buyers, where they shop, what they type into search engines, which websites and social media they frequent — anticipate eager buyers and everywhere they look you will be there. Once you position your business directly in front of all of your best customers you are found. Otherwise, you’re going to continue to hemorrhage customers and revenue and success.
New Sales Leads Will Buy From Somebody
Remember, too, that these eager buyers searching online for the products and services that they need will find businesses with which to consummate business. The question is, Are you happy allowing your competition to profit from your new sales leads? Your best customers are having their needs met. Every day you are not marketing yourself online, you are losing out on the opportunity to convert these leads to your customers. In effect, you are allowing your competition to grow.
New sales leads are the seeds of serious business growth.
All small businesses catering to the real world ought to get started by focusing within a local area on a small niche market. There is a continuous demand around the world for effective strategies for marketing local business to the community. Regardless of this large number of businesses searching for ways to market within their local area, most end up failing. Why is this happening? How is it that so many well intentioned business people fail marketing their local business?
Are these indications that local business marketing is not effective? Is it because business people, although qualified professionals, are not capable of carrying out local marketing tasks successfully? Local marketing is really about establishing your business presence within a specific area, getting eager buyers shopping for what you offer to recognize and respect your brand. Traditionally, there have been numerous ways to market locally, such as radio and TV advertising, telemarketing and print advertising including magazines, newspapers and Yellow Pages. With the advent of the Internet, however, traditional marketing is waning in effectiveness because consumers no longer respond to intrusive advertising.
Even though all of these methods continue to be effective to a smaller degree, we have found it much more affordable and effective to advertise our local business online. Marketing local business online is a broad topic comprised of different strategies. Yes, everybody today has a website. Regardless how pretty your website looks, the true tests of effectiveness are the number and quality of the leads your website produces. How many eager buyers shopping for what you offer contacted you last month because of your website?
Start Marketing Local Business To Nurture Prospects
For starters, not every visitor to your website is immediately prepared to buy. Email marketing targeted at local businesses is a good way for people to continue learning about your business. Social media marketing is also powerful at promoting your brand in your community. Individuals more closely relate to businesses within their community than from dissimilar geographical locations. Additionally, we are a very visual culture and video is a fantastic way to tell your local business story to a local audience. Becoming familiar with these facts helps you to take advantage of and use the strength of marketing local business online.
Search engine marketing is also readily directed at specific geographic areas and regions. Considering the simplicity of this strategy, in addition to effectiveness and affordability, it is the first I recommend that you consider implementing these days. Pay-Per-Click advertising is also readily directed geographically, but due to cost you need to allocate additional marketing budget. Last but not least, increase your website traffic with effective search engine optimization and basic back-linking techniques. SEO is really about publishing the rich, relevant and rewarding content search engine users seek. Back links are testimonials elsewhere on the Internet endorsing your local business by putting a link to your website on their website.
Many people question the effectiveness of search engine optimization for local business marketing. Basically, anticipating the key words and phrases that eager buyers type into the search engines allows you to be found wherever they look. Google facilitates this through Local Business Results and Google Places. Yahoo! and Bing are also eager to provide local business results because all search engines recognize that millions of eager buyers are searching to buy locally.
Marketing Local Business Speaks To Your Community
Marketing your local business is essential if you want any new business from your community. When you fully understand and implement some of these techniques, then your local business will profit from local customers. Every business is different and one size never fits all. Try these techniques marketing local business online and determine which combination best profits your business. Besides that, understanding the strategies and options available enable you to plan effective local marketing that best benefits your local business.
Give Me Your Tired, Your Poor, Your Huddled Masses Of Excuses …
Truth be told, all of the excuses listed below I have used myself. Yes, I’m as guilty — perhaps, more guilty because of my vocation — of irregular blog writing as many of you dear readers perusing this post. Writing my Blog is Social Media. For my Blog to be found I must publish. Search Engine Marketing assumes that my online marketing words can be found; therefore, blog writing is essential to my business success.
Knowing that it is human nature to avoid the unknown, those things in life and business that we do not understand, I, too, have procrastinated and equivocated. Today, Labor Day here in the USA, I want to take a few precious minutes to explore the very best, World Class excuses for not sitting down once or twice each week and scribbling to the world why, O why, are we in business?
Without Further Ado, Here Is My Top Ten List Of Blog Writing Excuses:
I don’t have anything to say.
Really? How do you sell anything? What do you want to say to your Best Customer when she’s sitting eyeball-to-eyeball with you? I know that you are passionate about what you offer; and I know that you will have a great deal to say to every eager Prospect ready to buy what you do best. Suppose you said some of this online. Furthermore, suppose somebody new reads your online words. Is it beyond reason that some of them will be influenced by your words, and ask to buy from you? Blog writing is nurturing your relationship with your marketplace.
Nobody wants to read my blog.
Rest assured, everybody is an authority in something — even you. Regardless online or offline, marketing your business requires you to build a relationship with each Prospect, nurture those relationships, and to service those relationships throughout your business life. Every relationship begins with a single conversation. Some will listen, some are not interested — that is the way of business. When you speak to a larger audience, what happens to the number of your listeners? What larger audience opportunity do you have than blog writing?
I don’t like to write.
Do you like to write sales orders? Will you write a proposal for me? How do you feel when you endorse a check? Writing is an extension of what you have to say. When you are comfortable with speaking with great Prospects, the words drip easily from your tongue. Record your best sales presentation. Listen to yourself. How does that story you tell your Customers affect you? Put it down in writing a few hundred words at a time. Tell your story. Your Customers love your story and they’ll read your blog writing.
I don’t have time to write a blog.
OK — time is of the essence. Do you have time to write orders? Do you have time to cash checks? If you find a simple method of attracting eager buyers who come to you to buy what you offer — will you find time to sell to them? Would you rather cold call or be found? I’m betting that when you sharpen your sales tools by honing the persuasive story you tell … I’m betting that blog writing will be well worth your time.
My industry/company does not allow self promotion.
Actually, this can be one of the most challenging hurdles. For example, Financial Services professionals are subject to stringent regulations from the SEC and FINRA, and their broker/dealers and compliance departments may choose to restrict rather than interpret rules. Nonetheless, I find no shortage of commercials advertising one Financial Services provider over another. Find a way to express your personality, your trustworthiness apart from your limited business persona. When was the last time you bought from somebody you didn’t like? Blog writing is telling your story.
I’m afraid I’ll lose my privacy.
Yes, it’s true. Those words you publish online are likely to live forever — and I do mean longer than your human life. You are a professional, and I’m asking you to keep professionalism in mind while writing your blog. Professionalism with personality … this is what makes your business better. This online universe is forcing us to be better businesses. Step up and be the personality for your business. Make your Customers so excited about you that they advocate for you in public, too!
My customers don’t read blogs.
Really? Are you willing to bet your business on this assumption? Yes, it’s true, some people aren’t online often or ever. However, it’s very easy to demonstrate that millions of people are searching online for what your business offers. Google measures over One Billion online searches each month for products and services that the searchers can find locally. When was the last time you sold to a prospect from the Yellow Pages? One person reading your blog might tell ten people about you — but, only after your blog writing …
My business cannot benefit from a blog.
Are you sure? If you want to be successful in this Online Age, you must step up and be a thought leader. The easier it is for Prospects to choose among competitors the better those competitors have to get to keep playing. Practice makes perfect — we’ve been told this forever. Your Blog is a tool. Blogging gives voice to the marketer inside of you. The more stories you tell, the better and more persuasive they become. Your blog writing shall become an influential book about you and your business.
I’m afraid of bad blog comments.
Blog writing is a subset of Social Media, which, by definition, is social and public. Blogs are most effective as discussions. When readers actively participate, you have engendered a conversation — so much more than a one dimensional monologue. As in real life, you will disagree with some, and some will disagree with you. Focus more on gathering Testimonials, and less on trading widgets and widget services for money, utilizing widgets and widget services as a means to Testimonials. Won’t business be more fulfilling and everybody win?
Blogging Return On Investment is too low.
Granted, measuring Blogging ROI is problematic. Measurement is your salvation. If you do not measure, how can you calculate ROI? If you do not know your ROI, how can you evaluate the value proposition? In this online universe, eager Prospects are already searching for what you offer. If they don’t find you, they will buy from somebody else. When you place your story everywhere they are looking for you, qualified Prospects will come to you. What will it take for you to be found everywhere they are looking for you? Writing your blog ensures your visibility.
Whether you agree with items in this list — or you find this all hogwash — I implore you to comment below. Tell us what you do — or don’t — get from blog writing. We want to understand what it is about blogging that does not work for you or your business. Furthermore, we want you to understand what you do not understand. Share with us — we will listen.
… Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!
Inbound marketing is the surest and simplest means to filling your sales funnel. Marketing local business online works precisely because it puts local business directly in front of eager buyers. A full sales funnel keeps you busy — profitably busy.
Thirty (30) years ago, we had to be told when a new widget or widget service was available. We blithely went about our daily lives mostly unaware of great new things to come. Inbound marketing wasn’t an option, because consumers had woefully less information easily available to them.
Newspapers, billboards, commercials, telemarketers … they intruded into our lives, then we knew what was available for purchase. We allowed these intrusions because, without them, we remained unaware how honest they had been with us. Many companies took advantage of us in many ways, telling us no more than they wanted us to know.
As we learn to search and find what we want on the Internet — when we want it — we respond less and less to offline media. Tivo is popular, especially allowing us to skip those commercials. Caller ID is ubiquitous, allowing us to skip those telemarketers interrupting dinner. Have you checked out the Sunday Tribune Classifieds recently? I see fewer billboards, and read fewer still. When was the last time you flipped through the yellow pages?
Somebody’s Sales Funnel Is Full
Right this minute … Right here in the Twin Cities … Somebody is on the Internet searching for what you offer. If they don’t find you, they will buy from somebody else.
What will it take for you to be found everywhere they are looking for you? Google reports that billions of people every month are filling sales funnels. How many are in your sales funnel?
Admit it. You, too, tune out intrusive outbound marketing. You have at your fingertips the miracle of searching the Internet Universe for whatever you want, whenever you want it. How do you shop? Do you shop before you are ready to buy? Neither do your customers.
Like you, my 80 year old parents go to the Internet when they are curious. They search the Internet to see if what they imagine is available for purchase. When they find it — surprise! — they may also find that it is available for purchase scant miles away. Have you seen the map? The Local Business Results list local businesses immediately adjacent to that map, showing you exactly how to get to what you want to buy.
How Full Do You Want Your Sales Funnel?
What difference will it make in your life when new customers come to you and they ask to buy from your business? When your best customers shop exactly as you shop, they will search for what you offer, go to one of the businesses listed next to that map in the Local Business Results and buy what they want from a local business.
Would you rather cold call or be found?
Inbound marketing is putting your business directly in the line of fire. Learn your customers well, very well. Anticipate what your best customers type into Google and Bing, and you can place a link to your web page on the Search Engine results page that they will read. Marketing local business online requires you place your link right next to that map. Go to where your best customers are looking for you and your best customers will ask to buy from you.
“Permission marketing is the privilege (not the right) of delivering anticipated, personal and relevant messages to people who actually want to get them.”
Marketing Local Business online demands a rigorous understanding of how best to be found when people search the Internet for what you offer. To best understand HOW people search for what you offer, it is necessary to understand the tools they are using. As I write this, Web Search Engines stand head-and-shoulders above other search tools; and Google dominates all Search Engines with more than 80% Search Engine marketshare.
Before we can understand Search Engine Marketing (SEM,) we must have a working relationship with Search Engine mechanics. Effective Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is predicated on creating content that people want to find in a way that the Search Engines will notice and catalog and make readily findable by those hungry seekers.
What is a Search Engine?
A search engine is a tool used to find interesting information in a database. In recent times, such search tools are computerized. In its simplest form, the electronic card catalog at your public library is a search engine.
Although search engine is a general class of computer programs, the term is often used to specifically describe systems like Google, Yahoo! and Bing that enable users to search online media, the World Wide Web and Usenet newsgroups.
What is a Web Search Engine?
A Web Search Engine is designed to search for information on the World Wide Web. Web Search Engines work by storing information from billions of web pages, which they gather from the web page code.
Web page contents are gathered by a Web crawler, or spider — an automated Web browser that reads every line of code in every web page, and follows every link on each page. Contents of each page are analyzed to determine how to index it for later retrieval. The index allows information to be found quickly.
Three essential features of Search Engines are:
crawling,
indexing, and
searching.
Search Engines evolved from Internet Directories
Archie [1990], “archive” without the “v,” was the first tool searching the Internet. Archie downloaded directory listings, not contents, of all files located on public FTP sites.
Gopher [1991] combined document hierarchies with collections of services and gateways to other information systems.
W3Catalog [1993] was the first primitive Search Engine, periodically mirroring numerous specialized catalogues.
World Wide Web Wanderer [1993] was the first web robot and generated an index called ‘Wandex’.
Aliweb [1993] was manually notified by web site administrators of an index file at each site.
JumpStation [1993] used a web robot to find and index web pages, and used a web form interface as its query program.
WebCrawler [1994] allowed users to search for any word in any web page, which is now the Search Engine standard.
Lycos [1994] was one of the first Search Engines with a for-profit business model, followed closely by: Magellan, Excite, Infoseek, Inktomi, Northern Light and AltaVista.
Yahoo! [1994] founders David Filo and Jerry Yang, Ph.D. candidates at Stanford University, started their guide as a way to track their personal interests on the Internet.
Google [1996] began as a research project by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, at Stanford working on the Stanford Digital Library Project (SDLP). Google’s first funding was secured in August 1998 in the form of a $100,000 USD contribution given to a corporation which did not yet exist.
Microsoft [2004] began a transition to its own search technology, powered by its own web crawler (called msnbot). Microsoft’s rebranded search engine, Bing, was launched on June 1, 2009.
On July 29, 2009, Yahoo! and Microsoft finalized a deal in which Yahoo! Search would be powered by Microsoft Bing technology.
How do Search Engines make money?
In 1996, Netscape sought a single featured search engine for their innovative web browser. Five Search Engines paid $5 million each to be in a rotation on the Netscape search engine page: Yahoo!, Magellan, Lycos, Infoseek, and Excite. Today, most Search Engines are commercial ventures supported by advertising revenue.
Some Search Engines allow advertisers to pay money to have their listings ranked higher in search results.
Other Search Engines seek to categorize and prioritize web pages by measures of intrinsic value and make money by running search related ads alongside regular search engine results. Such Search Engines make money every time someone clicks on one of these ads (Pay-Per-Click.)
How do Search Engines differ from Directories?
Historically, Yahoo! was among the most popular ways for people to find web pages of interest, but it operated on its web directory, contents of which were submitted by web site administrators. Web directories are databases of human-compiled results, also known as human-powered search engines.
Unlike web directories maintained by human editors, Search Engines operate on algorithms, or are a mixture of algorithmic and human input. Search Engines automatically create web page listings by using spiders that “crawl” web pages, index their information, and follow each page’s links to other web pages.
Spiders return to previously crawled sites on a regular basis to update web page changes. Everything that these spiders gather is entered into the Search Engine database.
How do I use a Search Engine?
Major Search Engines include a simple dialog box into which you type a word or phrase, and a Search submit button to begin the search.
A Keyword is this word or phrase of words in this simplest sense.
Most Search Engines support using Boolean operators AND, OR and NOT to further refine search queries. Boolean searching on the Internet may manifest in three ways:
Full Boolean logic with the use of the logical operators (rare)
Implied Boolean logic with keyword searching (typed symbols)
Boolean logic using search form terminology (multiple form entries)
When a user submits a query, the Search Engine compares it to its index and returns a listing of web page information, usually with a short summary containing page title and part of its content. Some Search Engines support natural language queries that allow the user to type a question in the same form you would ask it of a human.
What is a Search Engine Result Page?
A Search Engine results page (SERP), is the listing of web pages returned by a search engine in response to a keyword query. The SERP typically lists web pages with titles, a link to the page, and a short description showing where the keywords have matched content within the page.
SERP’s of the major Search Engines may include different types of listings: contextual, algorithmic or organic search listings, sponsored listings (PPC,) images, maps, definitions, videos and suggested search refinements. Major Search Engines visually differentiate specific content types, such as images, news, blogs and sponsored links.
Each SERP also includes navigation to subsequent and/or previous SERP’s, possible search suggestions or refinements, suggested similar searches, and back to begin a new search.
How do Search Engines sequence results?
Initially, web site administrators manually submitted their web site information to be included in Web directories, often for a fee. Often as part of their business model, these “search engines” featured these sponsoring web sites according to the amount of fees collected.
By 2000, the Google Search Engine was gaining popularity among searchers because it achieved more relevant results with an innovation called PageRank. Google developed an algorithm to rank web pages based on the number, trust and authority of other web pages that link back to them. Google’s premise is that good and desirable web pages are linked back to more than less desirable web pages.
Now, major Search Engines operate similarly.
How each Search Engine decides which pages match best and in what order varies widely from one engine to another. The methods also change over time as Internet usage changes and new techniques evolve.
What is an algorithm?
An ‘algorithm’ is an effective method for solving a problem expressed as a finite sequence of instructions. Each algorithm is a list of well-defined instructions for completing a task. In computer science, a search algorithm is an algorithm for finding an item with specified properties among a collection of items.
There are also many algorithms designed specifically for retrieval in very large databases, such as bank account records, electronic documents, product catalogs, fingerprint and image databases, and so on.
Each Search Engine uses a proprietary algorithm to index and return only meaningful results for each search query. The index is built from the information stored with the data and the method by which the information is indexed.
While millions of web pages may include a particular keyword, some pages are more relevant, popular, and authoritative than others. Search Engine usefulness depends on the relevance of the results it returns on each search query.
Who are Search Engine customers?
Major Search Engine business models are for-profit.
Each SERP has a clearly defined topic and targeted theme. Money comes from paid advertisements strategically placed on each SERP. Each ad includes a Web link to the advertiser’s web page. Advertisers pay for these ads to attract people searching for particular keywords.
No search engine has control over the content of the universe of web pages. The better a Search Engine responds to each search, the more money that Search Engine is likely to make.
These Web searchers are becoming more sophisticated everyday. Everyday, more and more people search the Internet to find and buy more and more.
It stands to reason that Search Engines will continuously hone their search algorithms to continuously improve profitability.
What is a Search Engine? Perhaps, it is the key to your Local Business prosperity …
It’s no longer enough to sit back and wait for new customers to come to your Local Business. Fact is, in these times, your customers are more sophisticated than ever. Barraged with thousands of Buy-Me messages everyday, they are determined to find for themselves true value. They are not waiting around for your message; but, they are seeking what they want to buy on the Internet.
Therefore, Marketing Local Business online is your new imperative. Now that you understand Search Engines, how they work and who uses them for what, it is time for you to seize the day. Use the Search Engines to market your Local Business. Put yourself in front of your customers. Take the initiative.
Be found!
Eager customers are looking for you in the Search Engine …
“… a Marketing Relationship is a specific conversation between Business and a market. Therefore, Internet and Online Marketing are relationships between Business and customers and prospects that take place in the New Media of today, and New Media of the future.”
How have new customers found you in recent months?
Today, people find out about your Local Business in two main ways:
Word-of-Mouth depends on the good will of existing customers. How would you like people publishing Word-of-Mouth recommendations online? Why not spend zero dollars marketing your Local Business?
What is Outbound Marketing?
In traditional outbound marketing companies focus on finding customers through:
Building brand awareness,
Advertising, and
Promotion
Outbound Marketing includes:
Focus on your product / service (advertising & promotions),
Focus on your transaction (sales),
Focus on your business (public & media relations),
Focus on your post-sales support (customer service), and
Focus on your customer after-the-fact (customer satisfaction)
Everyday, a typical consumer is overwhelmed with over 2000 outbound marketing interruptions!
They have become quite creative in blocking these interruptions, including:
Caller id,
Spam filtering,
Tivo, and
Satellite radio
Customers need to find a very good reason to visit your Local Business.
Marketing Local Business online is quite a challenge!
What is Permission Marketing?
Alternatives to intrusive and increasingly ineffective outbound marketing are based on what Seth Godin calls Permission Marketing:
“Permission marketing is the privilege (not the right) of delivering anticipated, personal and relevant messages to people who actually want to get them …”
“It realizes that treating people with respect is the best way to earn their attention.”
For the business to engage the prospect, the prospective customer must grant either:
Explicit Permission (e.g., request email or catalog), or
Implicit Permission (e.g., follow a search engine result link)
Furthermore, Godin says:
“In order to get permission, you make a promise. You say, ‘I will do x, y and z, I hope you will give me permission by listening.’ And then, this is the hard part, that’s all you do. You don’t assume you can do more.”
What is Inbound Marketing?
Google reports more than 1 Billion searches each month for local products and local services.
Fully qualified prospects are already looking for products and services in your industry. Inbound Marketing is when customers call you to:
Make appointments,
Purchase products, or
Gain information
When customers find you and like you, you can get business from them, from their friends and from their family.
“Home delivery is the milkman’s revenge… it’s the essence of permission,”
Godin says.
Online Marketing is starting to make more sense …
What comprises Inbound Marketing?
Rick Burnes suggested an intertwined relationship between three main components of Inbound Marketing:
Inbound Marketing Content
Content is the substance of Inbound Marketing.
Content is the information that attracts prospects to your Local Business.
Content includes the Call To Action that converts prospects into customers.
If people don’t know you exist, how are you going to do business?
SEO makes it possible for potential customers to find your content.
Marketing Local Business online must include both Search Engine Marketing (SEM) and SEO if you want your Local Business found.
Inbound Marketing Social Media
Social Media amplifies the impact of your content.
Widely distributed content will be discussed.
Socialized content taken seriously becomes authentic.
There is more trust when a person has a choice.
Social Media have two sides:
What you say about your business
What others say about your business
Why Inbound Marketing?
Inbound Marketing has high Value
Cost less than buying ads, PPC, mailing lists, print, etc.
Blogs and Twitter accounts are free to start
Higher Return on Investment (ROI)
Inbound Marketing is Effective
Targeting specific markets is easier
Prospects qualify themselves
Pre-sold customers search, find you and ask to buy
Inbound Marketing has great Timing
Prospects search for you
Searching prospects are considering a purchase now
Prospects considering a purchase are more receptive to your message
Godin remarks,
“One of the key drivers of permission marketing, in addition to the scarcity of attention, is the extraordinarily low cost of dripping to people who want to hear from you.”
What are Prerequisites to Inbound Marketing?
You need to do your homework and fully understand those looking to buy what your Local Business offers.
Your Market analysis includes:
What groups of customers exist? (markets)
Which customer groups do you prefer to serve? (target markets)
What do they need?
How do their needs change? (market trends)
How do they use these products and services?
What price are they willing to pay?
How do they want to receive what they buy? (distribution)
What do you offer that meets those needs?
Who are your competitors?
What are your competitors doing about your target market?
Exactly how are your customers searching for what you offer? It’s not enough to know how you describe your offering. What matters most are the exact words prospects use to search for it.
Simply make it easy for potential customers to find your Local Business.
“The Internet means you can treat different people differently, and it demands that you figure out how to let your permission base choose what they hear and in what format,”
instructs Godin.
How is Inbound Marketing Done?
Setup your web site to attract visitors naturally through:
Search Engines,
the Blogosphere, and
Social Media sites
Don’t forget your Call To Action to convert visitors once they arrive on your web page!
The Inbound Marketing process is straightforward:
You provide content of interest to people wanting to learn or know something.
You share similar content from other people who do the same.
Interested readers come to see you as an authority in your field.
When somebody considers a purchase related to your expertise, they will come to you.
Inbound Marketing is like Word-of-Mouth with people passing recommendations online.
Seth Godin sums it up like this:
“Real permission works like this: if you stop showing up, people complain, they ask where you went.”
Marketing Local Business Online Is Inbound Marketing
“Marketing is a system the sole purpose of which is to communicate with the marketplace.”
Marketing, then, is the social process by which individuals and groups obtain what they need and want through creating and exchanging products and value with others. The Marketing concept becomes a philosophy. It makes the customer, and the satisfaction of his or her needs, the focal point of all Business activities. It is founded on the belief that profitable sales and satisfactory returns on investment can only be achieved by identifying, anticipating and satisfying customer needs and desires.
Let’s look not only at identifying customer needs, but also to satisfying them and anticipating them in the future. The right product, in the right place, at the right time, at the right price …
In that same spirit, Internet Marketing is a relationship between Business and customers and prospects that takes place in Internet Media, such as Search Engines and Web Pages.
Furthermore, Online Marketing is a relationship between Business and customers and prospects that takes place in Online Media, including Email, Mobile Phones and Internet.
As you recall, a Marketing Relationship is a specific conversation between Business and a market.
Therefore, Internet and Online Marketing are relationships between Business and customers and prospects that take place in the New Media of today, and New Media of the future.
Internet and Online Marketing are relationships between Business and customers and prospects — the only difference between these relationships and other Marketing processes is the Medium!
What, then, is the Opportunity and the Potential offered by this unique Marketing Medium? Let’s compare and contrast:
If a Medium has a continuously shrinking Market, the potential for doing Business in that Medium approaches zero.
If a Medium has a continuously growing Market, the potential for doing Business in that Medium approaches infinity.
This, then, is the crux of everything we have to discuss in this and subsequent conversations.
If you want to grow your Local Business, you must participate in the largest and fastest growing Markets for what you offer.
If Business is not communicating with a continuously growing Market there can be no relationship with that Market and little or no Business comes from that Market.
What Relationships do you want with your Market?
Over 1 Billion Local Searches are performed every month on the Internet …
… if your Customers do not find you, from whom will they buy ???
The Internet is one of the largest and fastest growing markets in the known Universe. Ecommerce and multinational companies have created extraordinary fortunes based solely on Internet Marketing. Local Internet Marketing for small Business is quite a different animal, as we will discuss in subsequent conversations.
To learn more about Internet, Money and your Local Business browse our Web Site and see if our ideas work for you and your Local Business. Look for our further conversations and Brilliant Ideas About Internet and Money !!!
Marketing Local Business Online Is Internet Marketing
