Latest Digital Marketing Trends
Managing a humongous global business seems to be a more daunting responsibility for most people compared to owning a local one. However local businesses demand the same amount of energy, effort and street smarts, thereby making them just as daunting as the former. Despite being an unnerving venture, there are always ways to make one’s local business succeed. One of these ways is through maximizing the use of SEO. But how is this done? We’ve asked many experts and here are their top 5 answers to the question, from the least effective to the most effective! But don’t get “least effective” wrong. According to our experts, even the least effective tip delivers great results!
Number 5: When content marketing is expensive, try a different tactic! Business owners and SEO authorities alike seem to have a debate about this idea but many local businesses do try to find an alternative to SEO content. If you start paying attention to thriving websites, you will realize that rather than rambling about the brand, service or product that they are selling, these websites have games, apps, forums and other interactive stuff. This is because people enjoy things that let them have an interactive experience and are likely to linger on sites that contain them.
Number 4: Having great citations can work wonders! Unique brand? Check! Interactive website? Check! Great Content? Check! So what in the world is missing then? Why is it that your business isn’t giving you the ROI that you have projected? Check your citations! Even when you have everything else pat down, if your citations are not consistent across all listings, your market wouldn’t know if you are legitimate. Make sure then that your company listings all have the essential basic information: Company name, address and phone numbers (otherwise known as NAP)! Make sure too that you have your NAP not only on your homepage but also on third party websites.
Number 3: Visual cues can decrease your website blues! Photographs are food for the eyes and when people are online, they are hungry for visual stimulation. Studies have shown that it is easier for customers to digest information about a certain place, service or product, if they are accompanied by pictures. In fact, articles that contain images get viewed over 90% more compared to those that only have words. Likewise, consumer behaviour data shows that more than 55% of prospective customers would contact businesses that have photos in their local pages. You might wonder why. Well, it’s simply because pictures have become the universal language. When a person from another country checks out your website and does not understand the language that you use, he looks at the photographs to make sense of the available information. So you see, websites just seem a bit more fun and more engaging when they feature pictures.
Number 2: Being reviewed online can take the in out of invisible! Customers look for online reviews of places and services to help them decide on whether or not they would click the link to these places and services. Naturally, they prefer visiting webpages of businesses, local or otherwise, that have good reviews. So make sure that you garner an adequate number of positive online reviews from customers (and even mystery shoppers)! That way, your local business would achieve the visibility it rightly deserves.
Number 1: SEO keywords really do count and can optimize your website! Page titles of websites connected to your business should have keywords because they allow your business to be found by Google. The better your keywords are, the bigger the traffic they bring to your website. You can even use Google Analytics and Google Keyword Planner to check if the keywords that you are planning to use will actually be beneficial to your business. Aside from the two Google services, there are other keyword planners online that would help you generate keywords (even long-tail ones) so that you could have a better search network campaign!
So there you have it, the top 5 tips straight from the fountain of genius of many SEO experts! You can try one of them – it would deliver good results. But why try just one when you can have it all? That way, the results would not be merely good, they would be the best! So what are you waiting for? Say hello to maximizing your SEO options and wave goodbye to small ROI!
