Local marketing is a must, but if you’re like most local business owners, you’ve probably caught yourself thinking something like this:
I feel like I’m doing everything I can – why is my local marketing not delivering the results I want?
It’s a good question. After all, local marketing has a lot of moving parts. You’ve got to think about SEO, content marketing, social media and PPC ads – it’s a lot for anybody to handle.
The real key to effective local marketing is knowing what ideas are worth pursuing and which ones aren’t. Here are 10 killer local marketing ideas that can have a serious impact on your profits.
Facebook boosts your numbers for local marketing. More consumers, daily, turn to Facebook for information about businesses. There are two types of ads that can help you:
Brand awareness
Website clicks
Starting with brand awareness can help you break down barriers and prime your local audience to visit you. Following up with a website click promotion will capitalize on your brand awareness campaign and help you attract new customers.
Yelp is the insight to your company. Don’t ignore the reviews, people check Yelp because they trust the locals of the town. Reviews matter; Yelp has a huge SEO advantage. One of the best ways to boost your visibility online is to make sure that you’re using the right categories on Yelp.
A lot of local businesses choose their categories without giving them much thought. Go back and look at them – and keep your most important keywords in mind. Choose categories that highlight your capabilities and keywords and you’ll get more organic traffic from Google.
Unbounce is your answer. This tool can quickly create you an unique landing page for every marketing campaign. The benefit is that you’ll be sure that every click you get on an ad will lead people to a page that’s selling exactly what you’re advertising.
Conversion is an art and a science. The easier it is for people to draw a line between your ad and your call to action, the higher the chances that they’ll convert. Make it simple and you’ll see an increase in sales as a result.
Who better to trust than previous customers? Consumers rely on reviews of past customers. The trick is getting your existing customers to review your business.
One way to do it is to set up a simple remarketing ad for people who buy from you or fill out a form on your website. Try a headline that says, “Happy with your purchase? Leave us a review on Google+, Yelp, or Facebook!” Not every customer will respond – but some will, and every positive review you get will help increase your visibility and credibility.
Local marketing is all about embracing where you are – and helping your customers to do the same thing. For that reason, it makes sense to create a local guide for an activity that is likely to appeal to your target audience.
For example, if you sell cooking equipment, you might create a guide to local farms. Or, you could create a guide to hiking trails if you sell outdoor equipment. The key is to marry your local knowledge to your brand to give your followers something they can use.
Social mentions can create a big impact on the perception of your brand. You have to maximize the impact; you can automate responses to your mentions on Twitter. You’ll win every time.
A tool I like is Zapier, which allows business owners to set up triggers that send out instant responses when someone mentions their company. It gives an instant boost to your engagement and makes the people who mention you feel valued.
It’s hard to get out there, be noticed. Our society is constantly involved with media and content. We stare at screens to fill in the dull time. Online advertising is a relentless wall of noise. Everybody – including your competitors – is out there shouting about how wonderful they are. If you want to get through to your audience, you’ve got to stand out.
One way to do it is to use a third-person voice in your ads. For example, you might pull a line from a testimonial and use it as your headline. “Hiring ABC Company is the best choice I ever made” is a headline that will grab attention and use the power of social proof to bring you leads.
Google Adwords is art; targeting your ads by using their radius location targeting, Google Ads can give you the ability to maximize the chances that your ad will be seen by the people who are most likely to buy from you.
In AdWords, set up a series of radius targets so that your store looks like the center of a bullseye. Then, evaluate your data and adjust your local bids accordingly. Doing this can make a huge difference in your ads’ performance.
Let’s face it, the usage of mobile devices is higher than on computers. Since that’s the case, it makes sense to play up your local connection by including the distance from your store in your mobile ads on Google.
It’s easy to do. Simply use the Google Search Console to find new ad groups in your area. Then, add your zip code to your headline and see how easy it is to steal clicks from your competitors.
We, as a consumer, drive by local businesses countless times without going inside. One easy way to entice people to come see you is to add a photograph of the front of your store to your ads.
Seeing a photo will trigger a, “Hey, I’ve seen that place!” response from your audience. It’s a simple, inexpensive trick that can entice people to stop and visit you instead of driving past.
Don’t waste your time on ideas that don’t work…
Stop guessing which marketing ideas are worth trying. These 10 simple local marketing tricks can make a huge difference when it comes to attracting customers and growing your business.