Consider the following consumer behavior:
• “70% of US household now use the Internet as an information source when shopping locally for products and services” (Kelsey Group)
• 31% of all business buyers turn to a Search Engine first when looking for a locally based product or service
• Product Research and Comparison shopping happens online, but 67% of those purchases happen offline (Accenture)
• 90% of purchases are made within 50 miles of a person’s home (Kelsey) Consider the following local search data:
• 43% of all searches on the Google network included a geographical identifier. 86% of those people followed up with a phone call. 61% of those people ended up making a purchase offline.
•There are an estimated 4 billion mobile phones worldwide. 130 million web enabled phones just in the U.S. This number is rapidly increasing and will exponentially increase local search.
The Old Way
• Newspapers
• Print Yellow Pages
• Radio
The New Way
• Search Engine Marketing
• Email Marketing
• Social Media Marketing
Keeping It Real
You may have tried some online marketing tactics in the past and failed. You’re the norm, not the exception. Online marketing is easy, just not simple to learn. There is just so much bad information out there. Incapable people are slamming the industry, and failures are giving the industry a bad name. Be very careful of those things people tell you that they ‘tweaked’ a website to rank higher. Here is a document put together by Google that EVERY buyer of online services needs to see.
Straight from Google
If you’re thinking about hiring an SEO, the earlier the better. A great time to hire is when you’re considering a site redesign, or planning to launch a new site. That way, you and your SEO can ensure that your site is designed to be search engine-friendly from the bottom up. However, a good SEO can also help improve an existing site.
Some useful questions to ask an SEO include:
- Can you show me examples of your previous work and share some success stories?
- What kind of results do you expect to see, and in what timeframe? How do you measure your success?
- What’s your experience in my industry?
- What’s your experience in my city?
- What are your most important SEO techniques?
- How long have you been in business?
- How can I expect to communicate with you? Will you share with me all the changes you make to my site, and provide detailed information about your recommendations and the reasoning behind them?
Taken From: http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=35291
