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Cue the Local Carlsbad Customers

 
Technology is merging with user habits, allowing us to instantly connect with local businesses and even see what others have to say about their specific purchasing experience, patronizing every place from the local pub to the neighborhood apothecary.

In our ongoing efforts to promote effective social, local, and mobile San Diego small business digital marketing, we’re going highlight a couple specific examples of mainstream television advertising that can have a significant impact on local business, no matter the industry, product, or service. (more…)

Top 5 Reasons Why Your Carlsbad Small Business Needs Blog – Part 2

 
Carlsbad small businesses are feeling the economic crunch; we can probably continue this post with minimal blow-back from that claim.

But inside of all this doom and gloom, the smart San Diego small businesses are adjusting to change.

The smart small businesses in town are adapting to this transition, this shift in digital marketing communications.

They are actively overcoming the challenges a stymied economy and sky-rocketing unemployment rate represent to local Carlsbad small businesses.

And that’s only two challenges. (more…)

How Google Buying Zagat Impacts Carlsbad Small Business – Part Deux

 
In the past week we’ve examined, or at least loosely discussed, how all of this social media, local search, and mobile marketing buzz affects our local Carlsbad small businesses.

SoLoMo digital marketing is here to stay, embrace it sooner rather than later to save money and capitalize on opportunity while competitors languish or make excuses.

In Part 1 of our Google buying Zagat examination – we use that term loosely – we chose to highlight how that Wall St. acquisition impacts Main St. small businesses right here in Carlsbad. (more…)

How to Increase Small Business Profits with Local Search and Social Media

 
After not so much feedback concerning our last post, we decided to do a super simple follow-up examination of how to profit from local Carlsbad small business social media efforts.

While we’re at it we’ll throw in some local search for good measure, the two actually go hand in hand toward taking your marketing digital.

It’s still pretty amazing how many retail establishments and small businesses out there have yet to take advantage of the social media marketing and local search opportunities out there in today’s digital (and increasingly mobile) world.

Local business owners are concerned with how neighborhood mom and pop stores can possibly compete with big box retailers…social media and local search are a good place to start that battle.

Take advantage; develop, nurture, and continually participate in your social local small business identity.

Return on Investment

Return on investment (ROI) is probably the number one calculation most small business owners need to be concerned with when figuring the bottom-line long-term success of their business.

Although calculating and analyzing ROI is sometimes more than confusing, defining that magic number is essential to get an idea of how your products and services are generating profit.

Generating increased profits (more new customers) should be the end goal of any local retail or small business marketing campaign. When it comes to social media for local small businesses, calculating that profit is relatively simple.

A few benchmarks can at the very least give you a clearer picture of how well your chosen marketing avenues are performing.

ROI = (Revenue – Investment) / Investment * 100

For example, let’s say you spent $200 on your monthly Pennysaver advertisement. And taking into consideration the fact that you have accurately tracked the response from that ad…let’s say you’ve grossed $2000 in revenue for the given time period (say one month):

ROI = (Revenue – Investment) / Investment * 100
ROI = (2000-200) / 200 * 100
ROI = 1800 / 200 * 100
ROI = 9 * 100
ROI = 900%

Not bad for a $200 investment…let’s just hope your real Pennysaver ad delivers similar numbers!

Now that we can calculate our success with our Results Oriented Information, how can we go about obtaining it with social media and local search?

Get Started

In order to profit from social media efforts and local search visibility, you first need to be part of the community. Don’t delay any longer; use this simple 3 Step Beginner’s Checklist to move forward with your social local marketing plan. We won’t force you to…but if you like the checklist, then please ‘Like’ us on Facebook and let us know!

By simply initiating social media profiles for your local small business and confirming (probably existing) local search profiles, you are immediately increasing local online visibility for your small business.

But be careful, that’s only the beginning. Now that your business is part of the social media and local search community, you need to take advantage of every single opportunity the media outlets and search engines make available to enhance your listing.

A user-friendly, concise environment inviting conversion from prospect to customer is the end goal.

The key to profiting from social media and local search efforts is controlling your online business identity with a well planned course of action.

The first step in doing so is to join the community – get started with your social media profiles and confirm your local search listings if you haven’t already.

Then be sure to populate your listings and profiles with photos, website links, video, coupons, promotional offers, customers reviews…lather, rinse, repeat for all local search environments and chosen social media outlets.

If you want to start profiting from social media and local search efforts, first you need to start planning for success. Launch your business into the social local stratosphere, then accurately track and calculate your return on investment.

What is your second biggest fear when it comes to local social digital and mobile marketing?

We’re sure the primary fear is losing money!
 

Online Visibility for Carlsbad Retail Businesses

 
When it comes to retail small business advertising and marketing, it’s almost like a virtual desert. You can do a search for something like, “carlsbad dry cleaners” and come up with exactly one actual local business website. Sure there are a few Yelp listings or Citysearch results to weed through, and several directories that require further clicking, but as far as an actual business location having a presence on the first page for the associated keyword search?

One. Out of how many oh-so-coveted spots on the top search engine results pages?

If those listing were parking spaces, would those business owners be able to find their car?

The search was done with Google, but none of the Google Places listings was an actual confirmed listing for a dry cleaning business in Carlsbad. That’s pretty much a desert. Sure, how many searches are there every day for dry cleaners in Carlsbad, probably not too many – relatively speaking. But is that any reason for a local business to not control and profit from having a highly visible online presence?

A Yahoo search for the same keywords did not result in much better. Again, we’re talking about better in terms of business owner input these listings appear to lack. None of the top five listings appeared to be confirmed and controlled by the actual business.

This blind approach just doesn’t work in the digital age; there are way too many avenues of local exposure out there to not be identifiable and accountable when it comes to online visibility for your retail business. The best part is with a little research and lots of time, you can get started right away without breaking the bank. You’d be surprised how much online visibility you can gain for your local retail business for free. As technology improves, what was once a complex task, is now commonplace – ask a travel agent or digital video editor.

The days of zero dollars in the ad budget, and relying on your customer word of mouth to give your business neighborhood prominence are not completely over, it’s just going to require some change in thinking and some adjustment in execution. For the average retail business owner in Carlsbad, digital marketing and social media are not at the top of the to-do list. Will we be saying the same thing 5 years from now, or will every local business have some type of beneficial online presence?

Will the virtual desert materialize into a local online retail oasis?

When you’re looking for a local service or product, where do you begin your search?

Most of us go right to the Internet, some right on our mobile phones. According to web info company, Alexa, the majority of us search Google when we go online to search. Some ask friends and family, and others go the old fashioned route of checking the phone book. Do you think the new Facebook Questions functionality will take off when we consider local shopping?

Whatever the answer is, the important point to remember is people are looking for your products or services every single day, in your immediate area. Doesn’t it make sense to have your business represented within the most popular modes of information gathering?

We think so.

Here we will present a super simple formula toward gaining online visibility for your Carlsbad retail business. Five easy steps you can take toward securing online visibility for your local retail business.

1.       Develop a Website

If you haven’t taken the plunge already, develop a website for your retail business. That thing called the world wide webternet is not just a passing fad, actual commerce happens there. Get involved; build a website to showcase your products and services. $500 can get you started on the right foot, and $5000 can prepare your business to deal with whatever changes in virtual landscape we experience – or is it vice versa? These days it need not be expensive (maybe free if you’re tech savvy and DIY inclined), or expansive. Our feeble attention spans couldn’t handle it anyway, just give us the goods and let us buy them – online. That’s good enough. When in doubt, keep it simple.

2.       Start a Blog

No, you don’t have to produce the next great American blog. The stay at home Moms out there have you beat anyway. Just get involved in your industry, and let the surrounding community know how much you’re involved. A blog is a great way to keep fresh and relevant content flowing to your website. Some may say blogs are a thing of the past (short attention spans again), but use your blog to keep us up to date on your products, services, industry news, community efforts, and even customer experiences.  Keep it simple take two.

3.       Build a Facebook Page for your Business

Easy-peasy, go to Facebook and give your local business some social street cred. You’re nowhere these days unless your dry cleaning business is on Facebook. Own a Laundromat? Facebook is a perfect place for you to connect with your patrons and offer them some free soap as a thank you for their continued loyalty. Not in the dry cleaning or laundry biz…then start reading between the lines!

4.       Explore Other Online Options

Alliteration aside; Angieslist, Foursquare, MerchantCircle, HotFrog, Superpages, Citysearch, Facebook Places, Foursquare, Groupon…the list goes on, and it will keep fluctuating and changing. Get started with the research now if you haven’t already, click around on some of these sites and see how your business could benefit from a listing. Some are free, some appear to be, and some are not. There are probably another few hundred sites out there to list your business; these are only the most popular.

 

5.       Get Local on the Search Tip

The first two screenshots on this blog post were representative of Google Places and Yahoo Local, respectively. In the interest of utmost fairness…Bing has their own too; yep you guessed it – Bing Local. For a definition on local search from Wikipedia, click here. Basically when we say local search, we mean online representation for your retail business in these highly visible localized search engine environments. And we’ll concentrate on those three – Google Places, Yahoo Local, and Bing Local. Go search for your business right now on each of those search engines, then just follow directions to confirm or verify your business listing. By doing so you are at least taking the first step in securing your online business presence with respect to these localized search engine results pages. Be careful, take your time, and do some sniffing around to make sure you don’t have any duplicate listings or any other associated virtual malady.

The aforementioned plan is a simple five step sample plan to gaining online visibility for your local retail business. Does it end there?

Nope…in fact, after proofreading this fifty times we’ve come to realize that perhaps an entire series should be dedicated to tactics as much as strategy when implementing a plan to begin building local online identity for your Carlsbad retail business.

We have a lot of work to do.