Now that you've decided you can reach local markets with your website, how should you go about doing it? In
Part 2 of "Online business and local markets" (www.small-business-online.com/articles/online-markets-2.shtml) we discussed how web will eventually reach critical mass and begin to replace services such as "Yellow Pages" as default source for local business and service information. That article was primarily about role of major Search Engines in leading this process. Eventually SEs will develop methods of listing, categorizing, and searching for websites based on location as well as keywords. At same time we will start to see more and more local-oriented websites coming on stream, and more and more people looking for local services on web.
What should we do in meantime?
In meantime it is up to website owners to aggressively make their presence known and to "push" their services towards local prospects who would otherwise have no idea these online services exist.
The smart website owner will use a three-track approach.
First, she will build her website so it scores well in search engines. Second, she will make her website(s) score well with soon-to-be-popular locally oriented search engines.
Third, she will use a variety of methods to "network" in local community, and create an online "brand" that is easily found by customers and prospects.
Let's discuss these strategies one at a time.
1. Scoring well in Search Engines
There is an endless amount of information about "Search Engine Optimization". If you know nothing about "SEO" (Search Engine Optimization), here are some of most important general principles to be aware of:
Search Engines use "keywords" to find web pages and web sites. That means you must build your site from ground up around specific keywords.
Not all keywords are equally useful. Some are too popular (e.g., "web marketing") and you stand almost no chance of getting good ranking in SEs with them.
Others are rarely searched on (e.g., "online strategies"), and so nobody will see your site if you focus on them. There are ways of analyzing keywords to pre-determine which are most likely to bring you traffic. This service is built into Ken Evoy's Site Build It!(http://buildit.sitesell.com/ebizstrategics.html) and is also available through my service called SBO WebReport.
You must build your pages and your site(s) in certain ways to maximize your chances of "scoring" well with SEs. This is only way you can get good ranking when people search on your keywords
You must consistently "submit" your optimized web pages to major SEs.
You must build valuable content into your site, so it is actually worth looking at.
You must seek alliances with other web owners in your field, and exchange links with them.
2. Scoring Well in Local Searches
If you want LOCAL traffic, structure your pages and sites to clearly associate them with desired local geographic area. For instance, if you sell landscaping services in area around Cincinnati, build consistent mention of your service area (Cincinnati and surrounding area) into your most important pages. This is based on premise that Google-style surveys of your pages are looking for hints within your pages about your geographic service area. You might as well help them along as much as possible.
Where is best place to mention these things? There is no definitive answer yet, but following are safe bets:
--In your page names (e.g., landscaping-cincinatti.html) --In your meta-tags (title, keywords, and description) --In body of your page, as near to top as possible --In alt-tags, comments, etc.
In other words, use same strategies for your location hints as you use for your most important keywords.
3. Networking in your local area
Perhaps most important thing you can do is to define what I call a "Location-Focused Identity" — an LFI. If you don't do this, you will constantly be debating whether your website is too focused on local market, or not focused enough. Websites are cheap, so my advice is to create a locally-oriented website specifically to reach local market. By making it local-user-friendly you will have created a base for your local promotion efforts. Here are some good places to start:
If you can, give your website an easy-to-remember name with a clear connection to name of your company or service.
Your LFI should also be your domain name. Try to build your location name right into it. For example, www.indian-food-toronto.com, or www.pools-orlando.com.
