SEO is still perceived by many as a highly technical term that only big brands and online e-commerce giants like Amazon and eBay need to be investing in. And while SEO once seemed to only benefit the big guys, things have changed a lot.
In 2017, SEO is now a powerful tool providing all businesses, regardless of size, the opportunity to achieve prominent search visibility. There are more than 63,000 search queries performed on Google every second, leading to more than 2 trillion searches every year across the globe.
Yes, I did just say 2 trillion!
So it’s simple, no matter what product or service you offer, if someone is interested in buying your product or paying for your service, they will log onto Google to research their options before making their purchase.
Can SEO benefit every business?
Unfortunately, the answer is no as there are some instances where having the best SEO company work on your website will bring you zero results in terms of new customers to your business.
There are, on the other hand, certain types of businesses that NEED to be investing in SEO.
Let’s run through some of the businesses that can benefit most significantly from Local SEO…
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Start-Ups
If you’re launching a new business, your most significant obstacle to overcome will be to get the word out there. Adding to this issue is the fact that you’ll most likely have a small budget available to achieve this goal, which means large scale advertising won’t always be financially viable.
Your solution?
SEO can quickly and cost-effectively build your online search presence, a search presence that will consistently expand month on month as you continue to publish optimised blogs and articles and syndicate them via off-page SEO tactics.
Your advertising investment doesn’t need to go into expensive display, radio or TV advertising campaigns where people who “might” be interested in your business can become aware of it.
Instead, you can focus on a much cost-effective tactic, building awareness of your business in front of the people who are actively searching for your product or service.
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Bricks and Mortar Stores
Traditional “bricks and mortar” stores that have been in business for many years and weathered many economic storms are suffering decline at the hands of heavy competition from giant chain stores and online retailers.
For the most part, this decline is not even occurring because of price. These stores are simply being forgotten about and are not featuring in a potential customer’s purchase decision.
SEO has proven to be a highly effective solution to this issue. A common buyer behaviour now is for someone to research online where they can buy specific products in their local area and then subsequently visit that specific store.
In fact, local searches lead 50% of mobile users to visit stores.
Building a local SEO presence is easily achievable and a very cost-effective marketing tactic. By appearing in Google for the various local searches performed around the products and/or services your store offers, you can massively increase enquiries and footfall.
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Tradesmen
Tradesmen have always acquired new business based on word of mouth. However, towns and cities are a lot larger than they used to be and getting recommendations from people in the local area can be a little more difficult.
Instead, people tend to search online for local contractors in their area. Local search results will display their options and feature reviews from past customers while the tradesman’s website may feature examples of their work and instructions on how to get a quote.
All boxes ticked with one online search!
Tradesmen don’t need to do much in terms of marketing to ensure a continuous stream of leads as making an investment in local SEO alone can prove a very cost-effective way of getting your business phone ringing off the hook.
All tradesmen need to ensure that their website and contact details can be found in search results so that they can be a considered option for the numerous local people searching for their services online every month.
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Professional Services
Professional practitioners like solicitors, doctors, dentists, driving instructors etc. may not necessarily have a “brand” to build. That’s why finding a medium of marketing which can help them to continuously grow their client base can seem difficult.
There is a simple solution though. Yep, you’ve guessed it – SEO!
If someone doesn’t have the contacts in their local area to recommend a dentist, doctor, solicitors etc. or the one recommendation they do receive can’t provide an appointment, how do they discover other options?
They’ll search online.
Our professional practitioner clients are always surprised when we provide them with the insights into just how many people are searching for their services every month in their local area. By getting their practice featured high in local search results, they get the opportunity to turn most of those searches into new clients.
The bottom line is that SEO has a place in almost every business’s marketing strategy. As this post explains, even new, small and local businesses have great reason to put SEO at the top of their list in terms of marketing strategies.
Unlike many other forms of advertising, you get out of SEO what you put in. The team here at Next Stop Marketing help local businesses rank high in Google’s search results with the end result being increased revenue for each business that we work with.
Feel free to reach out to us today to see if your business would benefit from SEO. You can contact us here.