Typical Overwhelmed Business Owner
Are you a small business owner thinking about Local Online Marketing? If so, what is a new customer worth to your business and what are you doing to acquire that customer? Potential customers are online searching for your services right now. And if you’re not ranked, your competition is getting all your business.
Maybe it’s time you hired a Little Genius. Our specialty is local online marketing for small businesses. Specifically our goal is to help small businesses get found online and DOMINATE their competition. Our online marketing efforts are designed to consistently move up the local Google search rankings with the ultimate goal of getting ranked on Page One of Google and staying there.
The next question everybody asks is,”Dominating my market sounds great, but what’s it going to cost to do that?” Our answer is simple, “Nothing!” Because the properly crafted online marketing solution should pay for itself and then some. It should not feel like just another business expense. If you put in $1 and get back $5, that dollar certainly doesn’t feel like a “cost” or “expense” does it? It’s an investment. We insist that you get a return on investment that makes your online marketing campaign an asset not a liability. In fact it costs way more to wait or do nothing out of fear or frustration as your competition surges ahead.
So we ask again, does your business Website or Facebook page steadily generate new leads and bring in new customers to your business? Or are you still wasting hundreds of dollars a month on untrackable print, Yellow Pages or TV ads while your Website sits ignored and your Facebook page is dormant? How long can you wait to earn the extra 20%, 30% or even 50% increases that are possible by ranking online. You definitely need a Little Genius.
What is involved in Online Marketing for Local Businesses?
A successful approach to local online marketing with the goal of ranking at the top and engaging customers is a comprehensive blend of the following:
- Reputation Marketing – comprehensive program for collecting and displaying reviews while protecting your online reputation
- Social Media Marketing – Facebook Ads and retargeting campaigns for capturing more leads than organic seo alone
- Google Business Profile (Google Maps) – pages and posts optimized for search engines and social engagement
- Local Online Directories – business citation listings to expand local business footprint & dominate local web presence
- WordPress Website – dynamic, content-oriented site with blog, photos & videos
- Local SEO – Search Engine Optimization with On-Page and Off-Page ranking factors emphasizing results in local search
- Analytics and Tracking – use of tracking codes on the web to verify site traffic and tracking phone #’s to verify call performance and marketing results
These are the foundational basics behind a solid local online marketing campaign. But you can still branch out further with online marketing for mobile using pay per call ads and more.
When you see that list above and think about how hard it is just to keep up with your day-to-day operations, no wonder so many small business owners are completely overwhelmed and lost when it comes to local online marketing. Hiring a Little Genius is probably a good idea.
How to Avoid Overwhelm in Your Online Marketing
That’s where Little Genius Marketing comes in. We will take the time to understand your business, evaluate your market and study your competition. Then we will craft an internet marketing campaign that is “locally focused” to get your business noticed on the web and pulling in leads and sales originating from local internet search. We provide turn-key, done-for-you marketing solutions so all you have to do is serve your customers and make sales … you know, the stuff you originally set out to do when you started your business in the first place.
The goal is to structure your online marketing in a way that achieves a Page One Google Ranking in your local market to get your cash register ringing. A local Page One Google Ranking provides instant credibility and instills a sense of competency and authority in the marketplace. You no longer try to find customers … they find you.
But if you’re not on Page One of Google, even though you may have the best product or service, your competition will be getting all the business. And they will continue to dominate your market, in spite of not offering the best product or service. In fact, the top 5 businesses on page one of Google get more than 50% of the business in any given market.
Think about it. What do you do when you need to find a product or service? You Google It! And in seconds you have an answer right there on the first page. (By the way, Yahoo and Bing are relevant but account for less than 10 – 15% of average website traffic. Google is the 800 pound gorilla – feed it and you win.)
Plus the beauty of the internet is it’s always on, and your website and social media properties will work 24/7 for peanuts and never ask for benefits or days off.
So how do you get your business on Page 1 of Google?
You’re probably thinking a page one ranking is simply too competitive and everyone else already beat you to the party right? Well, it’s certainly not an overnight process, but the long term benefits are invaluable. Ranking is a zero sum game, so as you work on ranking your site you are literally “deranking” your competition … in other words, somebody else has to be pushed out of the way.
At Little Genius Marketing we are experts at ranking local businesses on Google. Our mix of SEO techniques, linking strategies, content creation, website optimization and integration with social media, video and local directories creates a synergy that steadily drives our clients to the top of Google and keeps them there. The result is outstanding traffic and increased business. Whether you’re new online or have been at it awhile and just need a change of direction, we can help.
Local SEO and Getting Ranked
Search engine optimization (SEO) often seems like voodoo to all but the geekiest of online experts. But with the amount of noise in the online space now, SEO is vital to rise above your competition and get noticed in the local marketplace. Google has made many changes to its search and ranking algorithms in the last few years, and many in the industry have given up in confusion thinking “SEO is Dead!” But we’re here to tell you it’s not. It’s just not as simple as it used to be.
It helps to start with a great website. Little Genius Marketing will build or rebuild your WordPress Website with the necessary custom tweaks to optimize all of your posts and pages for maximum ranking benefit without trying too hard as over-optimization is just as costly. But as good as WordPress is right out of the box, it still needs considerable customization to get maximum SEO benefit, and Little Genius Marketing knows all the ins and outs of WordPress SEO. In addition we make sure your site is secure, optimized for speed and backed up at all times.
That’s a good start to your ranking plan, but SEO goes way beyond a great website platform and a bunch of good articles and pages. It must include optimized photos, videos, Google+ Local interaction and Social Media interaction while also attracting inbound links from other web properties and business directories on the internet. This ties all of your local marketing together in the eyes of Google to convince them you are the authoritative source for the information, product or service your clients & customers are searching for.
Creating and curating authoritative and relevant content over all of your web properties and syndicating your best content out to other sites that link back to you is key to a good ranking strategy. Fortunately at Little Genius we have “done-for-you” content delivery services to maintain the quality and ranking of your sites while avoiding the overwhelm of dealing with all of it. That way you can focus on running your business and serving your customers while we focus on bringing you qualified traffic and leads.
Monthly Maintenance & Performance Tracking
Do you know what search terms your online visitors are using to find you? Do you know which web pages they like and which pages they ignore? How about the open rates on your emails? Can you send a new email just to the people who didn’t open that last email you sent? How many phone calls were driven by your website last month? With Little Genius Marketing, you’ll have all these answers and more.
Tracking is paramount to evaluating your success online. Ongoing monthly marketing programs from Little Genius Marketing include collecting business reviews, maintaining listings in local directories, adding new directory listings where appropriate, tracking traffic stats and tracking click patterns on all web media. We provide unique tracking phone numbers on your web properties too. Now you can tell exactly how many phone calls come from your new online marketing campaign. Plus you can track call duration, peak call times and more. Everything is trackable and quantifiable. Effective marketing lets you see what works and what doesn’t and where to tweak things to get better results … no guessing at what works or the ROI on your marketing investment.
If you’re ready to grow your business 20%, 30% or as much as 50% or more; if your online reputation needs a lift; if you need to get ranked online, contact Little Genius Marketing today. We’ll help you get more traffic, leads and sales and make you look like a “Little Genius“ too.