Archive for the 'Local Search' Category

Brick-and-mortar stores that want to track sales from search engines certainly have a challenge. The search engines are quickly and robustly developing Local Search. Pay-per-call is also an option for retailers.

However, it still remains a challenge for local retailers to connect the dots from search-to-store sales. Specifically for tracking their offline conversions from their PPC search campaigns.

Here’s a couple of solutions:
1) How about creating a coupon or other search specific promotion that is only redeemable in the store? Offer special codes that the customer needs to either write down, or print a webpage coupon and redeem it in-store.

2) Customer Tagging by examining each purchase, then correlating an online cookie with a customer number or their credit card data.

If you want to dominate the Search Results page, then get into News Search. Both Google and Yahoo show the Local results and the News results above the regular web results. See below:

The ideal situation would be that you appear in all 4 spots. News, Local, Organic, and Paid Search.
News Search is widely used by itself, so it behooves you to be in there. A handy way to get into News Search is to issue a Press Release thru PRweb. Yahoo offers a submission form for Yahoo News. Make sure to write copy in your Press Release that is optimized with your chosen keywords. And, include hyperlinks which have your keyword as the anchor text.

Blogs also appear in Google News and Yahoo News. Yahoo News now includes Blog results on the right column of the search results page. Additionally, journalists scour the blogosphere daily looking for news stories. So, try to get your news (and link) on some blogs. It’s best to write about something that is truely newsworthy. Like original research, company announcements, etc. If another blog mentions your story, it is highly likely you’ll be found on one of those blogs that come up in the search results. The journalists might also mention your story in other News Search Engines like: New York Times, Washington Post, and MSNBC. Large media websites are a already a trusted news source, and get crawled by Google and Yahoo for stories.

Bottomline, if you SEO your site, conduct PPC search campaigns, use blogs, News Search and Local Search, you will increase your coverage and visibility across all search channels.

Other than the paid local search, there is also free local search. Google has changed the name of their local search from Google Local, to Google Maps. Yahoo calls their local search, Yahoo Local. Once again, I will focus only on the biggest players, Google and Yahoo.

Let’s start our discussion by understanding where Google and Yahoo get their data. Bruce Clay has a great relationship chart for Local Search Engines. It shows who feeds who. Basically, where the data comes from.

Now, for the big question…How to get listed? To borrow a popular expression, there are a couple of ways to skin a cat. Either enter your business details into the large business databases like: Amacai, InfoUSA, GeoSign, and Acxiom. Or, enter your business details directly to Google and Yahoo thru their submission pages. Google has a Local Business Center. Yahoo has Local Listings page. Your Google Local and Yahoo Local listing will also appear in the regular Web Search in the “one box”. The “one box” appears above the organic search listings. See image below:

Of course there are many local search engines popping up. Some are free, some are PPC, and some are a fixed-price per month. Here are just a few: Superpages, Local.com, Switchboard.com, Yellowpages.com, AOL CityGuide, and TrueLocal.

You can identify a local search ad in the SERP’s when you see the state listed underneath the destination URL of the ad.

You might be wondering if the advertiser has to pay a higher cost per click for these ads because they are more relevant? The answer is no, they actually pay less. How can that be?

But, it’s true, a click from a Local Search campaign costs less than a national search campaign.
The answer is because there is less competition for clicks. For example: when you compete in NYC for the term “ipod� vs nationwide for “ipod�, the amount of bidders are less than the global amount of bidders. So, there are less people bidding the prices up. Hence, a less expensive pay per click. A local click might cost .50 for position #2, while a regular campaign click might cost 1.00.

So, here’s your Local Search PPC strategy: You just build a local campaign for every region/state in the nation.

Local Search is getting a lot of attention lately. Recent market research indicates that Local Search, and Vertical Search is going to be the way the majority of people use Search in the not too distant future. So, I figured it’d be a good idea to outline the basic differences between the two biggest players in the Paid Local Search space. They are Google Local Targeting, and Yahoo Local Sponsored Search. Both are based on a Pay Per Click ( PPC) business model.

Google Local Targeting
1) Part of your Adwords account - no need to open a new account. Just create a new campaign.
2) Regional Targeting is possible (state, city, metro area, radius from address, customizable polygon).
3) You must have a website.
4) Physical location is not required.
5) Ad serving based on IP address (IP Mapping). Google knows where you are based on your IP address.

Yahoo Local Sponsored Search
1) Separate account (Login) from Sponsored Search. You must create a whole new account with Yahoo.
2) Website is optional (they have a hosted “Locator Page”). This is an advantage for brick & mortar businesses / services.
3) Physical address is required. This is disadvantage for web-based businesses.
4) One targeting option (based on radius from address of 0.5 miles to 100 miles)

Market Share of Local Searches
• Google Sites — 43.7%
• Yahoo! Sites — 28.2%
• MSN — 13.7%
• AOL/Time Warner Network — 7.5%
• Ask — 5.5%
• InfoSpace Network — 0.9%
• Lycos, Inc. — 0.3%
Source: comScore, August 2005

The smaller PPC engines will produce less traffic / clicks. However, they are worth a test, because even though they produce less clicks, they might be more profitable by outperforming the bigger search engines.

I hope this brief analysis helps you decide which Local Search engine is best for your specific situation.

Postscript: I was speaking with Greg Hartnett from the Web Directory, Best of the Web. And I asked him if he if thinks the increase in local search will have any effect on Directory search? He said, “ Absolutely, we have seen a spike in submissions to the regional categories. People are really beginning to take notice of the local aspect of listings and search.�

I also touched base with Greg Sterling to ask his opinion, and he told me, “some people will navigate directly to “vertical” sites (e.g., craigslist) but in many or most cases I think people will discover vertical sites through search. I do think the advertiser gets a much more qualified lead in a vertical environment generally speaking because the consumer is either more serious or closer to a purchase decision. But I think it’s hard to make broad generalizations because consumer behavior is convoluted and complicated.â€?