As you can tell by looking at the chart above search engine optimization is becoming increasingly more important to small businesses as they realize the value that having a strong online presence can have.  When considering SEO as a part of your marketing strategy I suggest you consider a few things.

1. It’s typically an upfront cost with little to no ongoing fees once rankings are achieved. Unlike the Yellowbook or other forms of advertising that you will have to continue paying for year after year.  You may need to chip in a few bucks now and again to keep your top rankings but for the most part once you’re #1 it doesn’t take much to keep you there.
2. More and more people are using the internet every day to find local businesses.  Google has stated that 20% of all searches done on the internet have local intent and Bing recently has stated that over half of the searches done on mobile devices like your iPhone or Blackberry are for local businesses.  Traditional forms of advertising may not be going away completely but the internet is going to only increase in usage as more and more young people become the primary consumers.
3. Even with the huge customer base and AWESOME potential businesses are not utilizing SEO in mass yet.  This means the competition for your industry is probably not that great and when you’re the first one there it’s much easier than trying to compete with 5 other businesses who realized this opportunity before you.
4. It’s NOT THAT EXPENSIVE. If you’ve had the wonderful folks from YellowPages, The Blackbook, or Dex in your office you know how much that costs.  Anywhere from a couple grand to well into the five figures and really to reach everyone you have to advertise in all of the big ones mentioned above.  A good Coeur d’Alene SEO can provide you with a full list of services that will probably provide more ROI for a fraction of the cost.

So when considering where you want to spend your advertising dollars this year I think you should give some strong thought to search engine optimization.  If you want to schedule an appointment with me to see what I can do for you fill out the form on the right or give me a call.  Remember you dont pay a dime unless I get you results.  You can check out my pay for performance guarantee here!

After you’ve completed your on page SEO which I’ll talk about in another blog post the next step to getting top rankings in the search results is to start getting links.  If you’re unfamiliar with what link or hyper link is check this out.  Below are three great places to get links from.

Press Releases

Issue a press release with your local news paper.  Most news papers have an online version now days and when you issue a press release it will more often than not be included online.  I’ve found that they will let you include a link back to your site from that release.  This is really a great link because it’s coming from a local source and usually newspaper websites carry a lot of weight which translates into them passing some of that weight to your site.

A side benefit to this is that your press release is likely to be seen by a lot of people which could potentially generate some business for you as well! Here is a reference if you are unsure how to write a press release.  We can write the release for you for a fee of $75 as well if you’d like to go that route.

Local Blogs

The next place that can be a great source of traffic as well as a juicy link is local bloggers.  If you live in a town of any size at all there’s a good chance there is someone out there blogging about topics specific to your area.  For example in Coeur d’Alene you have IloveCda.com You might have to be a little creative depending on what your business is but here are a few ideas.

1. Offer To Write A Guest Post For Them On Your Area of Expertise
2. Ask Them To Come Try Your Service At No Cost In Exchange For A Fair Review
3. Flat Out Pay To Advertise Your Site On Theirs

Industry Specific Or Local Directories

There are directories out there today for about everything you can imagine and not all are created equal. However, the right ones can really help you.  Most industries have web directories. For example, you can probably find a directory specific to lawyers that will provide a list of all lawyers within a certain state and most likely city.  This would be a good spot for a link as it’s very thematic (pertaining to lawyers) but also tells the search engines exactly where your business is located.

Local directories are just as great if not better.  These are specific to certain areas and provide a large list of different services provided in your area.  CdaWebDirectory.com is a good example of this.  Local directories provide a lot of benefit as they once again really convey where your business is located and depending on what anchor text you use what your website is about.

Now it’s time to get out there and build some links!  If you’re more confused or overwhelmed now than when you started reading it might be a good idea to outsource this process to an SEO company.  If you’re considering this read my post on 3 Tips To Hiring A Coeur d’Alene SEO Company.

However, if you’re not doing something each and every day to grow your business you’re either as big as you want to be or you’re not trying hard enough.  We’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume it’s not due to flat out laziness! I’m guessing the majority of us didn’t fall into our business and it required some significant work on the front end to get things going. Maybe now though as your business has grown you’re not quite at the place where you can afford to hire someone to do all the mundane tasks that fill your time so you can be out doing the valuable customer getting activities that got you to where you are now.

I encourage you to get back into the mindset of trying to do one thing every day in efforts to bring in at least one new customer.  This is a great opportunity to spend updating your web site.  It is after all a tool that you should be using in order to get more foot traffic in your shop.  Making your site more search engine friendly, and following the process to move it up in the search engine rankings can be a great use of your time.

If we look at the stats back from 2007 approximately 109 million annually people performed local searches online and at least 41% of those people were searching for businesses in their area and not an area they were planning on visiting.  The comScore study also said 82% of local searchers visited a merchant as a result of their internet searches.  That’s 2 years ago!  Think what the numbers look like today as we get more reliant upon these boxes by the day!

So consider working on building some links, adding a blog post, twittering about something related to your market, or doing some on page optimization, and then go home and have that cold beer that you so well deserve.  Those efforts over time will most certainly generate some visitors and sales!  If you’re too busy to bother with this consider getting  a quote from a Coeur d’Alene SEO Provider as you dont want to be left behind in this area and miss out on all the potential customers searching for your business online!

So you can either spend hours trying to find all the different 411 directories and figuring out how to submit to each different one or you can spend 15 minutes and a couple dollars and have it done and off your plate!

Here are a list of where they post to:

411 Directories

• LSSI
• INFONXX
• V-Enable
• TellMe

Local Search / Mobile

• Yahoo!
• MSN / Live.com
• Google
• AOL
• Citysearch
• YellowPages.com
• SuperPages
• WhitePages
• Yelp
• Local.com
• Quebecor/canoe inc.
• InfoSpace/Idearc
• Ask
• BlackBerry/RIM
• infoUSA Express Update
• Acxiom
• Dex
• iBegin
• Insider Pages
• OpenList
• Yellow Book
• Yellow Page City
• Yelp
• Disney
• Merchant Circle
• Collarity
• Yellow Bot
• YP
• Menu Networks
• Mobio Networks
• Search Bug
• Spock
• Topix
• YP.com
• Zingy
• Deep Data
• AllPages
• LocalMatters
• BeanPool
• HelloMetro
• OneCallNow
• Search Initiatives
• SwitchBoard.com
• Electronic Directories (Yellow Pages, Inc)

GPS Navigation / Mapping

• MapQuest
• OnStar
• tomtom
• Lowrance
• TeleAtlas
• DigiWalker
• ALK
• ViaMichelin

Click Here Now To Get Listed in the 411 directories as well as GPS guides today!

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