The internet is still growing very quickly as more and more people get online. These day, the internet has transformed from what it was just a few years ago. One of the big opportunities at the moment is local search engine marketing.

Is your business on Google Places?

Local search engine marketing is an opportunity for you to reach out to your target audience by optimizing your website for local SEO results. Basically, local search marketing no more than allowing your local prospects be aware of your business and make it more accessible. The purpose of this article is to learn how you can get into local search marketing and utilize it to your advantage for getting more exposure for your company within your local area.

Quality content

First and foremost; understand the importance of creating quality content to impress the local search engines and add more value to the local directories you’re submitting. Many business lack in the area of good content, that is shown to be the key to success with local search. When you have unique content you will have a competitive advantage over others and see to the full benefits of the local search marketing. Make it a goal to set a high bench-mark for you goals then exceed them with superior content. Adding valuable content to your website to your targeted prospects, will be a great benefit to both parties. The more value you are able to give to your prospects, the better results you will achieve in the long run.

Selecting the right keywords

Secondly, when generating keywords for your local search marketing, don’t get confused by focusing on too many keyword tools. A lot of businesses end up wasting time trying to find the magic solution for finding the right keywords with the wrong tools. Nothing works as well as Google Keyword Tool which is both efficient and reliable.

So brainstorm as many keyword phrases as you can on your own and enhance your list with this tool. As you work to generate keywords, remember that quality is more important than quantity.

Get started now

Last but not the least; getting started should be your first priority. You won’t really see any results come your way, if you don’t get out there and take some real action. By wasting time, your competition will have a better advantage of you, so don’t be a procrastinator. Getting thousands of visitors from local search engines and directories is definitely possible, but if you’re just going to waste your time analyzing and studying, instead of moving forward, it will be difficult to make a mark.

Local search marketing plays an important role in today’s online scenario. Focusing on the local segment of the market can be highly beneficial to your business, even though there are lots of marketing methods. While local search is nothing new, awareness of it is spreading thanks to social media showcasing the importance of local audiences. When you include these local search tips as part of your online marketing plan, you’re moving in the right direction.

This transcript is the fifth part of my Ed Dale interview and this part focuses on Google Local Business Listings.

27:24 DB: Wow, a lot of really good information there. In fact, that was the question that I was just going to conclude on in terms of what’s the important site to keep an eye out in 2011. Is it Facebook or are there… one two other sites out there that may be worthwhile considering or should Facebook be the full focus?

27:42 ED: Yeah, well, I’ve been looking a lot into this… Definitely Facebook is definitely going to be number one with the bullet. There’s no question about that. But having said that, it’s not the only game in town and it’s a good thing. There’s… Google is there. And I think in Google if there was one thing I’d really like to highlight in Google and that is Google and Google Places and Google local business listings. So Google is desperate to deliver relevant results and that’s how it came into existence. And it knows that if products and services… If everything is equal between company A and company B, everything, price, service, product, the whole deal, yet one is a multinational and one is your local, is actually down the road from you in your local town, then who are you more likely to buy from, David?

28:35 DB: Absolutely. It’s got to be the local one.

28:37 ED: You’d buy the local one and Google understands this so they want to emphasize people who are local in their results. So business… We’ve been advising businesses who do have a national footprint is to really focus on making sure their individual branches are… well and truly, obviously available and most companies often hide their local branches inside complex, dare I say it flash driven types search services. You can’t do that. You’ve got… You can use the fact that you’ve got a local footprint to a huge advantage. So for me, getting your… Not ignoring Facebook is absolutely going to be crucial in 2011, looking at locality and how that applies to your business. And if I can give you a third one, David, is mobile, my goodness, the apps-based economy. As we discussed earlier on, the stats in this are absolutely unbelievable.

29:38 ED: Let me give you just one that’s slightly not work-related, but it just goes to proving a point. You add up all the games that have ever been produced ever, any electronic game that have ever, ever been produced on any platform ever in existence right back to your Sinclairs, ZX80 and 81s, your Spectrums, your VIC-20s, and right through to your Xbox 360 and your PS3s. You add up every single game, and your PCs, chuck them all in there, put them all in. That doesn’t… That number does not even equal half the number of games that have been released just for the iPhone and iPod Touch. It’s mind boggling, right? This is… This is beyond… It is, again, an unavoidable thing. So, unlike Facebook where I’m saying, yeah, if you’re seriously don’t have a Facebook starting in 2011 then I hope you’ve got a retirement strategy. It’s literally that serious. I wouldn’t say that… I wouldn’t say that with mobile just yet but I’ll tell you what, now would be the time to ask yourself, “What would people on smartphones and in particular Apple devices, but smartphones in general, how would people interact, what can we provide with our business product or service that is actually going to be useful for people in a mobile context?” Because again, most people are spending most of their time… In terms of Internet time, they’re spending most of it on their smartphone or their tablet device or iPad.

31:13 DB: Absolutely, and if you don’t know, ask your customers and I’m sure the customers will give them the information.

31:18 ED: Abso… Goodness me, what a concept David. What a concept, you know. It’s just such the best… Because often, and I find myself in a situation where I say, “Oh gee, I wish they had an app for that or… ” And asking your customers… And the good thing is, and here’s the exciting part, there was a real constriction, sort of 18 months ago, on people who were capable of producing iPhone apps. But of course people follow the market and of course every kid that’s even vaguely interested in programming is now programming for these apps in iPhone in particular. And so, the price of getting an app produced is really becoming pretty reasonable. And the important thing for people listening to the podcast is you don’t have to know code, you don’t have to know design, but you have to have an extremely strong vision about what you want the thing to do.

32:17 DB: Right.

32:18 ED: What you want that app to do. And if you’ve got that, you’re set. You have no problems. When people run into problems when it comes to creating an application or a program and relying on other people is their vision isn’t strong enough. And so they start to rely on, “Oh what do you think?” and, “How do you think this should work?” And that’s where you start… That’s where the project blows out, scale blows out, budget blows out. Everything becomes a problem. They would be my three definites to watch for in 2011, Dave.

32:49 DB: You’ve given a lot of great information there, Ed. Thanks for joining me. I’m sure that after listening to that, some of the listeners will want to hear your thoughts on other internet marketing topics. So where’s the best place for people to find you online?

33:02 ED: OK – If they go to eddale.co, that’s E-D-D-A-L-E.co, then you’ll see links there to my Facebook fan page and Twitter and all of those things. And thanks for having me on, David, really appreciate it.

33:17 DB: Wonderful. Thank you for appearing. Great to have you.

The 50th edition of our podcast brings you week #16 from the original 26-Week Internet Marketing Plan. This video gives you a guide to submitting your website to local directories.

The recording is taken from our original 2007 seminar. At the time it sold for £399 as part of our 26-Week Internet Marketing Plan home study package. Now, for the first time we’re giving it away for free via our internet marketing podcast.

Why are we giving all this great video content away for free?

Although these videos still offer a lot of great tips, internet marketing methods change over time. We’re going to be launching a brand new version of the plan soon, and we’re sure that by sharing these original video recordings for free, you’ll be persuaded to jump on-board when the new paid-for version launches! Stay tuned to our newsletter to find out more.