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If trends in media marketing spend are anything to go by, businesses are going local. Local advertising spend is predicted to reach $157.7bn by 2019, a 14% cumulative increase of $139.4 billion in 2015, according to BIA\/Kelsey\u2019s US Local Media Forecast 2015. Business marketers are increasingly realising that their local stores or dealerships now own the brand relationship with the customer, and this is what needs to be nurtured. What\u2019s driving this change is the mobile consumer, who is using multiple devices to search for local business or service information, and shop locally. Mobile buying propensity has never been greater. Industry estimates show that mobile calls to businesses will leap from 93.8bn in 2015, to 161.9bn in 2019, which represents almost a 75% increase in the next four years. The tech giants of this world, such as Google, Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest have leapt on board with these developments, providing local businesses with new tools and updated features, to build a mobile presence and communicate with their customers more easily. With mobile connections and usage so high, the average consumer now expects local business information to be available at their fingertips. Now is the time for businesses to have their local marketing strategy in order, if it isn\u2019t already. Here are the top five considerations multi-locations businesses should be aware of, to ensure they don\u2019t get left behind…<\/p>\n
Accurate, up-to-date business information forms the crux of local marketing success. Multi-location businesses must check the accuracy of their business listings, including name, address, phone number, email address, images, maps and opening hours. Ensuring a consistent company name, for example, across all data points, is crucial for being found locally. Additionally, businesses need to claim their local listings to ensure information is accurate, and also to verify the account. The places listings can be claimed from include Google My Business, Facebook business pages, Foursquare for business and Bing places for business. If this data is accurate advertisers can link the information to their PPC activity via location extensions. Brands can communicate their location and phone number without paying for the click.<\/p>\n
Google has shown recently that the \u2018local pack\u2019 is gaining in importance, and its search algorithms allocate increasing importance to location. Consequently it has become more important for businesses to optimise local landing pages with information that is relevant to the location, and so that they can be found on their own as well as through the main brand site. Businesses therefore need to localise how their site is coded. Pages should always include titles and meta descriptions in the local language, optimised for the key terms most likely to be used by customers in a specific area. They should also localise on-page business content to include trading hours, driving directions, and local descriptions. Brands should perform keyword research for every store location. Long-tail terms are where local businesses should be setting their sights, which are longer and more specific\u00a0keyword\u00a0phrases that visitors are often likely to use when they\u2019re closer to a point-of-purchase or conversion. However, the search volumes for long-tail terms are significantly less than generic terms, so businesses should be aiming to rank for a high number of them. It is important that local SEO data is current and fed to online directories such as Yell.com, since search engines cross-verify their data with such sites. When the data matches, it becomes trusted, verified data and results in better rankings.<\/p>\n
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