Top 5 Marketing Mistakes Costing Local Businesses Money

Poorly Optimized Website & Online Presence

Local business websites should do more than just exist; they should generate new customers for your business, and encourage your existing customers buy from you more often. If your website isn't producing new customers like you think it should, check these 3 common website issues to see if they are contributing to your poor results online.

• Website not mobile friendly
• Website & online presence not SEO optimized
• Website not conversion optimized

Tip #1. Take A Mobile First Approach To Local Marketing

Over 60% of people use the internet from a mobile device, so mobile friendly is no longer a convenient option, it's mandatory if you don't want to risk losing customers. Make sure to optimize the site to not only look good on mobile, but provide a convenient experience that gives the buyer everything they need to make a decision to contact you.

Tip #2. Don't Overlook Local SEO

Organic search traffic results in the highest customer lifetime value over any other channel because those visitors are actively searching for your products and services through key phrases they type into Google. You can earn these ranking over time with search engine optimization by doing keyword research, local citations, content marketing, social signals, and many more factors that Google looks for in order to rank you #1.

Tip #3. Convert Your Local Website Visitors To Qualified Leads

Last, but not least, your website needs to be designed with a strong, and unique value proposition, and call to action to get visitors to perform the action you need them to take such as booking an appointment, scheduling a consultation, adding a product to their online shopping cart, joining your newsletter, etc.

Bad Online Reviews

90% of consumers read online reviews before entering a business.

There are 3 areas you need to focus on in order to make the most of your online reviews:

• Managing/ suppressing bad reviews
• Generating new reviews
• Responding/ engaging with all reviews

Tip #1: Manage Negative Reviews On Your Local Google Page

It usually takes about 5 positive reviews to outweigh one negative reviews, so if you have bad reviews, try and work it out with the customer or have one of help you manage / suppress the bad reviews for you.

Tip #2: Regularly Get Customers To Leave Online Reviews

Next you need to make sure you're making it easier for customers to leave reviews for you by giving them a call to action to review you on Google. This can be done through several ways such as geo fencing that sends mobile push notifications when the customer is near your location, another option is to print a QR code they scan with their phone that takes them right to your Google local page, or if you have the customer on your email list or social media, you can send them a message with a link to review you.

Tip #3: Quickly Respond To Online Reviews & Customer Feedback

Lastly, it's important to respond to all of your reviews whether they are positive or negative. It tells both Google and your customers that you care about them and people will trust you more when they see you have great communication and customer service.

Poorly Optimized SEO & Marketing

93% of online experiences begin with a search engine like Google. This is why it's so important to first understand how customers are finding you before you dump money into ads that force themselves in front of people that aren't actively searching for you. I think we can both agree that it's better for a customer to chase you, than for you to chase them with an ad trying to convince them to buy. Start with researching the keywords buyers are searching for when they look online for your products and solutions.

Tip #1: Research Your Ideal Customers & Direct Competitors

You can do research with tools like Spyfu, SEM rush, wordtracker, ahrefs, etc. This will give you a better idea of what your competitors are doing and some of the ways customers are finding them online to save you time building a strategy from scratch.

Tip #2 Craft High-Quality SEO Optimized Content

Next make sure to craft unique, high quality, and useful content that contains the keywords your target customers are searching for, and distribute that content on your website, blog, social media, other blogs, news outlets, video sites like youtube and more to gain both referral and organic search traffic which are 2 of the highest quality traffic sources.

Tip #3: Optimize Marketing For Conversions

Last, but not least, be sure to take advantage of marketing strategies like retargeting ads, messenger bots, and email marketing to maximize the number of prospects you convert into a qualified lead or sale by keeping your message in front of them throughout the entire customer journey.