New resource helps small businesses with Local Search

As a follow-up to yesterday’s post, I just had to tell you about a new small business service that launched January 20th.

GetListed.org helps small business owners learn more about the way their businesses are listed online.

Their mission:

“to help small businesses claim and enhance their listings at major search engines.”

What a fantastic new resource for small businesses.

GetListed.org is extremely easy to use. Simply enter the business name and zip code you want to look up. The results provide local listing information for Google, Yahoo, Live Search and Best of the Web.

As I’ve talked about before, the potential to attract new customers via Local Search is enormous. Now, GetListed.org can help your business get started building and improving your search engine presence. They also offer a resource center if you find yourself overwhelmed by the world of Local Search.

Small business marketing takeaway:

If your small business depends on customers from your city or neighborhood, you have to get found online locally. Advertising in the printed version of the Yellow Pages, is not enough in this Web 2.0, mobile world.

Beyond 411: Define your place in your city

I’ve talked about local search before, stating that I believe it to be one of the most important and practical online strategies for small businesses. I stand behind that statement 100% and find myself continually surprised that more small businesses haven’t embraced local search as an affordable and effective marketing activity.

The numbers don’t lie…

• 10+ billion (that’s “billion” with a “b”) monthly unique searches, just in the U.S.
• 40% of searches have local intent*
• 5% of searches use the city and/or state name
• 2% of searches include terms like “neighborhoods”
• 0.5% of searches include zip codes
• 43% of people online are looking for something to buy locally
• 54% of internet users have thrown away the phone book

* source: Ian White, Urbanmapping.com

As you would imagine, getting found locally doesn’t happen automatically. Small businesses will need to invest some time into submitting their information to search directories. I’ve provided a list of some the more popular sites, but, in reality, if you concentrate on the first four, you’ll be in great shape.

• Google Local
• Yahoo Local
• Microsoft Live Search
• Best of the Web
• CitySearch
• Local.com
• YellowPages.com
• Yelp
• TrueLocal
• Switchboard
• Judy’s Book
• SuperPages

What’s the small business marketing takeaway, you ask?

If your small business depends on customers from your city or neighborhood, you have to get found online locally. Advertising in the printed version of the Yellow Pages, is not enough in this Web 2.0 world.

Social Media Breakfast coming soon to Toledo

I came across Bryan Person and Social Media Breakfast just before the holidays and made it a 2009 goal to start the event in the Glass City - Toledo, OH.

The above word mark was the winner of a contest to determine a visual identity for SMB. Once we get off the ground in Toledo, we’ll get our own. For now, I posted Ottawa’s logo so you could see the winner. Very cool!

From my conversations with people, the thinking is that many northwest Ohio-based small businesses are beginning to understand the importance of engaging their customers directly through knowledge sharing, two-way conversations, and the creation of valuable digital content. My impression, however, is that they are confused about social media terminology, what SMM tools are, what they can do for their business and how they go about adding them to marketing mix.

I think this ongoing event can be a lot of fun and I’m looking forward to learning more about social media myself.

The Social Media Breakfast was founded by Bryan Person in August 2007 as an event where social media experts and newbies alike come together to eat, meet, share, and learn. Marketers, PR pros, entrepreneurs, bloggers, podcasters, new-media fanatics, and online social networkers are all welcome to attend.

Things have progressed fairly quickly. I started a discussion thread on the Ad Club of Toledo LinkedIn group and have had three people express interest in helping to plan SMB events in northwest Ohio.

We’ll be meeting soon to determine a venue, format and speaker for the first event. Check back here for updates.

Revealed: The secret to small business marketing success

The topic of differentiation has been on my mind for a while. I talked about it Saturday and have run across several other posts that make me think I’m not the only one consumed by the notion.

I especially enjoyed Tom Fishburne’s “blend into the herd” cartoon and post. Tom writes:

“Blending into the herd” feels like one of the most common responses to the recession.  2009 is full of so much risk on its own, businesses are becoming even more risk adverse than usual to compensate.  The first projects to get cut are the speculative ones.  Many companies are pulling back on innovation as a way to batten the hatches.

This defense is illusory though.  If anything, retailers are facing even greater pressure to rationalize their shelves.  Redundant products are in danger of getting cut.  Consumers are shifting to cheaper private label if there’s no compelling reason to buy branded products. Differentiation is more important than ever.

I could not agree more.

Given nothing to prove them wrong, your prospects will believe that your business is just like any other. Any accountant is good enough to complete my tax return, any electrician is good enough to install my ceiling fan and any restaurant is good enough to fill my stomach and stop my hunger pangs. We have become a society where undifferentiated businesses are lumped into the category of “good enough”, where products and services are differentiated solely based on price.

Small business marketing takeaway:

A quality point of differentiation is in the way you do business, the way you package your product, the way you sell your service, the fact that you send cookies to your clients, the fact that you show people how to transform their lives – it’s in the experience you provide.

Describe what it is that you do that sets you apart from the good enough businesses. I’d love to hear from you.

The closest thing to a small business marketing magic bullet

I recently asked the following question to several LinkedIn groups I belong to: As a small business owner, what are the top three marketing challenges you face that need to be addressed within the first quarter of 2009? Even though the method is highly unscientific, I wanted to take the marketing pulse of small businesses, not just in northwest Ohio, but around the country.

As you can imagine, the things that keep small business owners up at night are varied, from the economy and branding to time management and referrals. While I believe that there is no “magic bullet” to marketing, almost without exception, the answers that were given can be boiled down to one thing: finding and communicating the core difference of their business, product or service .

If you remember one thing from this post remember this: if you can’t find a way to differentiate your business from every other business that does what you do and if you can’t communicate that difference in a way that really matters to a narrow target market, then you’re basically in the commodity business. If I can’t tell how one business is different than another then I will use the only thing I can measure – price. Yes, the driving force in the commodity business is always price.

Marketing is about creating know, like, trust with your clients and developing an ongoing relationship - this doesn’t happen quickly and there’s no magic bullet. It takes hard work, time and consistently communicating your core difference to build your reputation and loyal customer base.