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Online Marketing Tips Video: Utilizing Yelp for Small Business Marketing

By Li Evans

If you haven't noticed, things have been a little bit slow here on SMG, since I'm the main writer here, it gets kind of hectic when your family life gets thrown into turmoil at the drop of a hat, somethings have to take a back burner.  We all know that, so I won't drone on about that point.  Things though are getting better, so regular posts should be returning!

First up, our Tuesday's Online Marketing Tips video!

This week I'm talking about Yelp and how small businesses can utilize key features of Yelp to help to market themselves.  From making sure your information is right to asking for a reviews, these 5 tips can help just about any small business involved in some kind of service industry, market themselves a bit further online.

Also note, there's a bit of a difference in the video this time around.  Different camera, different shooting style and the 5 tips listed after the discussion.  With this new camera, you might see a few different formats till we decide on what works best. :)

Video transcript after the jump....

Online Marketing Tips Video: Local Search Optmization for Small Businesses

By Li Evans

This week's tips in online marketing video is all about Local Search for Small Businesses and how they can use local search even if they don't have a website.  Also covered is how to make sure your social media profiles on rating and review sites is correct, and adding location pages to your website.

And there's no music on this week's edition, we had a glitch in our editing and had to redo this edition, so music and credits were left off, but as the others were this one is sponsored by KeyRelevance and it's a Benday Production

Full transcript after the jump....

SES New York: Why Local is Different

By Li Evans

Moderator: Ian White, CEO, Urban Mapping

Speakers:

• Gib Olander, Director of Business Development, Localeze
• Benu Aggarwal, Founder & President, Milestone Internet Marketing
• Chad Schott, Vice President, Business Development, Marchex, Inc.
• Vik Advani, Co-founder & CTO, UpNext.com

Chad Schott:
The role of local is the next great mega trend.  The first being communications (email/im), search being second, next they believe is local.  Local as the online equivalent of everything you consume like newspapers, print yellow pages, community forums, spot-TV, and radio.  From a advertisers' perspective its about how they can get their message in front of their audience.

There's about 15 million small businesses in the US driving over 100billion in revenue, only about 1 million are advertising online today.  By 2011 local online advertising nearly equals 2007 total ad dollars.

It is difficult.  Local consumer experience is fragmented and still evolving, there isn't one leading source of local business information on the internet.  Lack of volume has resulted in national advertisers not allocating a significant amount of their budget to Local. Small to medium sized businesses lack the time to manage search marketing and their business.71% of SMB's prefer to get a phone call than a visit to their website.

86% of search engine users search for local product and services.  92% of the internet shoppers make their purchases offline.  The consumer experience is evolving to better help users discover local businesses.  New streams of innovative ad units and technologies, such as pay per phone call, video ads, better mobile applications & Growth of free DA, simpler , more intuitive self service tools to update and enhance their organic listings.

In the end its about connecting hig value consumers with relevant content online.

Benu Aggarwal:
9 ingredients to a good local search recipe.
1.  web site research, content
2.  site design & Programming
3.  Pure Local Search Engines & Maps
4.  IYP's
5.  Business Data Providers, Info USA & Acxiom
6.  Local Vertical Listings
7.  Social Media, User Generated Content, Images, Blogs
8.  Online Videos
9.  Goetargeted PPC

Make sure you do your local keyword research.  Look in your own backyard.
Optimize pages for local addresses
Pure Local Search Engines Listings & Maps - make sure you claim your profile on Google, Yahoo & MSN
Using social media, blogs, flickr, video, etc is powerful.
Feeds to 2nd tier local directories and vertical directories are great too.

Vik Advani:
Location is what matters.  If you want to find a pizza, you want it close, not 20 miles away.  The holy grail of geo-targetting is "city" "zip code" "neighborhood". 

One way to get more specific is by using Maps.  When you look at a map, you are getting very specific.  Basic Grid Maps, Enhanced Streetview Maps, Interactive 3D Maps - users use these to find out "what's there".  Geotargeting on Basic Maps - you can narrow the level down to very specific areas.

This is really important to help businesses take advantage of local search.  It's about where you are at and location is what makes it unique.

Gib Olander:
Gib highlights a recent survey about local shoppers habits:  67% respondents said they prefer to make purchases in physical stores, 69% research products of features on line.

Local search is only partially about the web page/site.  Less than 50% of business locations have an independent website.  Gib shows some results for local search, not one of the results link to the exact local website, it's to IYPs and review sites.

Create a content cloud of content for each individual business location.  Keep in mind that the content must answer both "Discovery" & "Recovery" local search queries.  Recovery Content, Discovery Content - Own your content!  Your foundation is built on database inclusion with data aggregators.  Make sure your information is available on your website as well as with different partners.  It should be short succinct data to it can be consumed by all devices - mobile, search, even Tivo.

That base of doing the work of establishing what your business is about is the foundation of this.  Make sure whatever you do across the Search Sites and IYP's is consistent.  Business Listing Aggregators are important as well.

SES New York: Video Made the SMB Star (Kelsey Group Track)

By Li Evans

Steve Espinosa - eLocal Listing, LLC
Frank Rocco - EZ Show, Inc.
Andrew Bennett - TurnHere
Peter Goldstein - Mixpo
Mike Boland - Kelsey Group (Moderator)

Mike:  Users are coming to expect Video as part of their search results. 

Frank Rocco:
EZ Show makes it easy for advertisers to create a "spot".   Do It Yourself, build and post flash advertisement.    First can use video clips with background music and graphis.  Images can be assembled with panning affects.  All based on a login, can select length - 30, 45 or 60 second video.  Then assemble the add, with their stock or your own.  The user interface is really simple to use (Frank demonstrating it).  Last steps let you add keywords & contact information www.ezshowstudio.com.

Voice overs are offered as well, both stock and scripted voices overs.  Getty is one of the stock photo providers.  Exclusivity by geographically, anything generic won't be repeated in that market place.

Andrew Bennett:
platform of over 3k film makers, produce videos in over 50 countries.  People know they want video content but don't know how to do it.  Travel videos, How to Videos, etc., style - 1st person documentary style.  Signature TurnHere style, visible first person, non-actor narrator to height authenticity and believability.  Mini documentary style.

Yellow pages, super pages - merchant profiles.  Try to capture passion.  In the past small business couldn't afford media buys, and the supply wasn't there for this small market.  Now it's much more cost effect - connected this supply and demand.  Shows and example of Nic's Martini Lounge, and before when search for him, it was just a link, now, this video shows.

These videos  help drive sales and branding. do a search for "Peanut Butter & Company"  in New York, shows results in Google maps.  They work with the IYP's, and this is how they are coming up.  The video is "the content", not like pre-roll ads. 

Peter Goldstein:
Platform, enables video advertising for SMBs.  Video is all about conversion.   Measurements and analytics, using video to enable search.  57% of Consumers moved closer to a transaction after watching a video.

Mixpo is about publishers, work with newspaper groups, radio and tv stations.  they are "behind the scenes"

Use "flex"- next iteration of flash.

Testimonials work quite well.  Promotionals, and they have "booknow" buttons, overlays - clicking right on the video, you can go right to the sponsors' page.

A lot of people are creating their own video and putting it into Mixpo.  Also create videos with pictures, easy to do with Mixpo's interface.  Re-purposed Videos, created a long time before, with their tool, can add overlays.  "mike shaw video"

Video enabled landing pages.  Push out to 10-12 video search engines.

Mixpo has a really in-depth analytics panel, that tracks conversions from the video.  They are able to tell what's happening in the video that's creating the conversion.  Shows geographical conversions and views.  Shows what sites they are coming from as well.

Mixpo has stock and you create your own abilities.  Overlays are easy to put in, customized very easy.

Steve Espinosa:
Take videos for small business and get them plugged in for universal search.  find most effective platforms for small business. 

Yahoo, Google both have videos.  Yahoo & Google Locals will both eventually show these.  3.2 more time likely if you have video and a local listing.

Google TVAds, Big Exposure for Small Business, reach thousands of people with small budgets - Viewers not Spots

Google AdWords feature Video - Goolge Adwords video = Higher CTR.  "Build it and they will come" 

Each industry is different - attention thresholds, especially on SERPS.  They aren't going to watch for 3 minutes. 

"Calls not Clicks"  You Phone number is more important than the website.  Make sure its ready for the big leagues, TV Ready.  Make it viral, put a twist to it.

Optimizing - SWF file when possible.  Do NOT use ActiveX Controls inside movies.  Google's not compatible.  Video Sitemaps - utilize Google video sitemaps and available variables  (phone number as thumbnail).  Host Your Own Video.  "Branding Branding Branding".  Build a page for each video you produce.

Link from your index page to your video (and no, not just in the footer), optimize that page.

Free tools - Website Optimizer, and analytics.  video too long, video placement - Google website optimizer helps you with placement.

Local Keyword Research Laying the Foundation for Success at SES Local: ILM 07

By Li Evans

Liana "Li" Evans (KeyRelevance.com) - Keyword research is foundation to both PPC & SEO, without it companies coming onto the internet and doing online marketing are driving blind.  Research gives you insight into popularity, opportunities and what drives quality traffic. 

Popularity is overrated.  Popular keywords can drive traffic, but not necessarily quality.  Marketers need to determine what their goals and conversions are before setting off on campaigns, know what your goals are helps to choose the right keywords to drive success for a website.  Popularity can be highly overrated, it can drive a lot of traffic, but is it relevant - does it accomplish your goals.

Brainstorm for keywords, get people in a room, just coming up with keywords, don't be judgmental and don't "fall in love" with keywords.  If keywords don't work, change them!   Don't forget misspellings, synonyms, abbreviations, and jargon.  Remember to speak the language your audience speaks.

Nico Brooks (Local Matters) - Finding vs. Searching.  Understanding how people are finding you is important to successfully marketing online.

Search query log data (web analytics data) is a treasure trove of information.  Tools like Hitwise, Comscore, your search engine logs and the leaked AOL data also give insight into what is driving traffic to your site as well as your competitors.

Analyzed the AOL data, found that 22.4% of the queries had local modifiers.  Which indicates that searchers are refining their searches to find specific things near them.  Modifiers included:  zip codes, city names, county names, state names, streets (etc.).  These are all indicative of searchers looking for local information when attached to a common keyword.

Andrew Shotland (Loc@alSEOGuide) - Keyword Expansion

Most companies have a narrow set of keywords.  The key to expanding this is to have variations on these keywords.  Vary the title tag - example "City Name Plumbers | A Quality 24 Hour Emergency Plumbing Company".  Another key is content, use it to vary these keywords.

Alternative navigation paths seem to be very effective, as well (Yelp uses these effectively).  Micro communities and tag pages work great.  Targeted backlinks, make sure you are using your keywords and their variations.

Matt Van Wagner (Find Me Faster)- Matt has 3 case studies.

Patisserie Blue - local bakery which has an all local search audience.  Target audience is really the foot traffic.  Narrowed down their keywords, but didn't bother with zip codes.  Used city names, vicinity names, landmark names with much success, also used the words "near" "area" "west" (directional words), and county names.  Tracking was a challenge.  Used free listings from Google, Yahoo and MSN local services.  Had to be careful old postal abbreviations.

Bebop - children's clothing shop, wanted to win the local market in online marketing.  Focused on community building around "new mothers".  If they focused on national they would've gone broke.  Found local success, also found a new demographic "Crazy Grand mothers"

Granite State Opera - goal was to fill seats.  Opera - to broad and no one thought of it with New Hampshire.  Keyword list with geo-targeting didn't work well, but what did work well was contextual ads on local news sites, specialty websites, newspapers, and specialty music sites.  Also bought ads for newspaper and radio through Google - it was a bargain.

Facebook's Chamath Palihapitiya Keynote at SES Local: IML 07

By Li Evans

Facebook unveiled new advertising features at the beginning of the month.

So they wanted to think about how people buy things.  But what about people who just want information.  How do businesses say "I have something interesting you should take a look at."  Facebook thinks they can work with mediums like newspapers, yellowpages, etc.

People influence people.  Your friends recommend things to you, you are more likely to do something because you've been influenced by someone who you trust.

Mid 2005 Facebook has changed, no longer just high school and college users.  They've seen unprecedented growth, since they offer "things" people can really use, as well as allowing 3rd party developer access to their API.  Diversity is unbelievable.  Majority of the users are out of college - they are the core Facebook user.

Facebook has 55 Million active user.  Active user is someone who has used the service in the last 30 days.  Equivalent to the entire paid newspaper service.  They are doubling ever 6 months.  By fall of next year they predict to have over 155 million.  Most users return every day. 70 billion page views a month, at the end of this year over 1 trillion pages a year.  Every users (average) generated 40 page views a day.  Gives Facebook the ability to have a subtle conversation with the users.

Social Graph - trust and safety comes along with developing a network.  With accurate social graphs and facebook, you can distribute your information virally, you tell your friends, they tell their's  and so on.  All for free and a lot less friction than the way it use to be done.  The news feed and the mini feed is what powers the distribution of this type of information

The news feed is a "readers digest" of your friends lives.  This page dynamically changes constantly.  The mini-feed is where you decide what content and information that you want your friends to see.  The mini feed "Feeds" the news feed.  This powers the viral distribution of information at no cost.

Facebook Platform, any third party can access to these benefits.  In the first 4 days 1 application had 1 million users (iLike), today there are over 100 applications with more than 1 million users.  So how does all of this relate to advertising.

Distribution is a precious commodity, commanded by the few.  Newspapers, radio and TV.  distribution became a bottle neck.  But today the game is different.  Now, for free - anyone can now in an effortless way can have access to massive amounts of distribution.

Facebook Ads - 1st thing is Pages - this allows business to create a page for free.  This allows you to created your own network.  2nd thing is Social Ads, it works as a free market auction, CPC or CPM.  3rd is Insights, gives you a views into your ROI on Facebook.

Pages - Design your own page, for free.  Can add photos, videos, events, discussion board, flash content, music player.  3rd party application - open table, zagat, fandango.  These all take less than 10 minutes to create and implement.  These all allow the business to connect with people and have very powerful conversations with people.  Beacon allows social actions from your site to distribute it to Facebook, users control their information (Yelp is an excellent example of this).

Social Ads allow you to amplify that social distribution.  Social actions + content is what Social ads is about.  If you are a local business, you can now create 1 to 1 ads.  Can appear in the newsfeed or the left hand area for ad units.  Targets exactly the audience you want.  Criteria - location, county, state, interests, gender, activities, major, tv shows, books, work history, political views, relationship status, etc.

Insights holds Facebook accountable.  gives the advertiser information on page views, who's clicking on the ads.  Pulse (facebook product) gives you insight into every dollar spent into the ad system.

What does all this mean?  Just get started!  www.facebook.com/ads.

Local Link Love at SES Local Search: ILM:07

By Li Evans

Sage Lewis (Sage Rock ) - don't put the  cart before the horse.  All link campaigns start with content.  Think win/win - in order to develop a local link campaign you must have some appeal for local sites.  Link-worthy sites are hard to come by, they require time, dedication and commitment.  So what's a linker to do?

• Integrate the community into your corporate events
• Create an offshoot service or product that helps the local community
• Promote the good work you are doing in your community
• Augment the values you have as an organization

You just don't build the site and hope the links will come, ask for the link!

Matt Stoddart (LinkWorth) - How do you get local links?  Where do you find them?  Get the obvious ones - the BBB, Chamber of Commerce links, search for "city/state  + associations" to find relevant organizations. 

Local is Social - local directories, calssified, review communities - citysearch, yelp, local.com, craiglist.  Join region-specific groups within large social sites - facebook, myspace, linkedin.  Find local & niche bloggers and interact - technorati, mybloglog.

Buying local links, search for relevant, non-competing businesses to buy directly from, ask them or offer to buy.  Buy through broker, or buy a link from google - $1995 a year, buy the google mini - they give you a link.

Be creative - donate to local charities and request a link from their site.  Sponsor a youth sports team.  Local restaurants, churches, retailers ... any local businesses with a website - offer specific coupons.

Ian McAnerin (McAnerin Networks) - Seearch engines can be a great way to find links - its what they do!  To find a relevant directory or links page try searching for one using "directory indicators".  Look for "carpet cleaning" + "sumbit.php" or "addurl.asp" - "coffee" + "submit site", "philadelphia add url".

Other places, DMOZ, local associations, charitable work, contests, related sites (ex. Movers < > real estate agents), reciprocal links - stay on topic with these.  How do you ask for a link?  Wrong way - spammy emails to people.  Don't send an email about "Page Rank" or "being important to seo".  Right way - look for invitation (form, outbound links, etc.), stay on topic, get the address and name right - personalize it, explain why you're relevant.

Non-traditional - ratings & reviews, testimonials, press releases, contests, tools & utilities, entertainment.  Evaluating links - don't evaluate just on PR, its not the be all and end all.  Search position, # of other links on the page, context and relevance, neighborhood (good/bad), anchor Text, 302 redirects, cache.  Watch Out For:  nofollow attribute, frames. 

Use the phone!  More personal.

Local Link Love at SES Local Search: ILM:07

By Li Evans

Sage Lewis (Sage Rock ) - don't put the  cart before the horse.  All link campaigns start with content.  Think win/win - in order to develop a local link campaign you must have some appeal for local sites.  Link-worthy sites are hard to come by, they require time, dedication and commitment.  So what's a linker to do?

• Integrate the community into your corporate events
• Create an offshoot service or product that helps the local community
• Promote the good work you are doing in your community
• Augment the values you have as an organization

You just don't build the site and hope the links will come, ask for the link! 

Matt Stoddart (LinkWorth) - How do you get local links?  Where do you find them?  Get the obvious ones - the BBB, Chamber of Commerce links, search for "city/state  + associations" to find relevant organizations. 

Local is Social - local directories, calssified, review communities - citysearch, yelp, local.com, craiglist.  Join region-specific groups within large social sites - facebook, myspace, linkedin.  Find local & niche bloggers and interact - technorati, mybloglog.

Buying local links, search for relevant, non-competing businesses to buy directly from, ask them or offer to buy.  Buy through broker, or buy a link from google - $1995 a year, buy the google mini - they give you a link.

Be creative - donate to local charities and request a link from their site.  Sponsor a youth sports team.  Local restaurants, churches, retailers ... any local businesses with a website - offer specific coupons.

Ian McAnerin (McAnerin Networks) - Seearch engines can be a great way to find links - its what they do!  To find a relevant directory or links page try searching for one using "directory indicators".  Look for "carpet cleaning" + "sumbit.php" or "addurl.asp" - "coffeed" + "submit site", "philadelphia add url".

Other places, DMOZ, local associations, charitable work, contests, related sites (ex. movers<>real estate agents), reciprocal links - stay on topic with these.  How do you ask for a link?  Wrong way - spammy emails to people.  Don't send an email about "Page Rank" or "being important to seo".  Right way - look for invitation (form, outbound links, etc.), stay on topic, get the address and name right - personalize it, explain why you're relevant.

Non-traditional - ratings & reviews, testimonials, press releases, contests, tools & utilities, entertainment.  Evaluating links - don't evaluate just on PR, its not the be all and end all.  Search position, # of other links on the page, context and relevance, neighborhood (good/bad), anchor Text, 302 redirects, cache.  Watch Out For:  nofollow attribute, frames. 

Use the phone!  More personal.

Local Search - Why Your Business Needs to bBe There & How at SES Local Search: ILM:07

By Li Evans

Zorich Gordon (ReachLocal) - What you were buying historically is not working any more.  Local businesses really want to cut a check and let someone else do the work with local search, since their level of expertise is not there.  These people want to run their business not online campaigns.  When a campaign is launched for local, business are blown away by the amount of leads generated by local search ppc campaigns. 

Gib Olander (Localeze) - Local search in an inefficient market today.  Local search closes the loop on the buying cycle.  Creates engagement at the store level.  Local is where the buying poer is.  Supports all other forms of advertising and marketing.  68% prefer to buy a product at a local place, but 58% want to research it online first. 

Create a cloud of content for each individual business location.  Keep in mind that the content must answer both discovery & recovery local search queries.  Foundation is how you build your base data.  SEO and PPC then help spread that information. 

Business Listing database index, very important to having your business listed.  Organic web crawling is the 2nd piece.  PPC is the 3rd piece.  Think beyond local search being just the opportunity to optimize a website.

Eric Stein (Google) - Shows a listing for car wash in 94301, has listings with address, phone, some have photos, business contents, and coupons.  The advertising opportunities as well.  Businesses have the opprotuntity to upload content such as coupons which generates foot traffic.  Small businesses and medium business generally need help with this, because they are more focused on running their business, so they need an additional form of service through agencies and also Google.

Ethan Stock (Zvents)-  Zvents is a local search engine that includes "time".  Time based promotions are key marketing tool to drive foot fall and revenue today for local merchants.  Go somewhere, do something - NOW.  Zvents powers "things to do" local search - they why theat gets consumer out the door - for large and growing media network.  Business can put in information for free - basically information.  Zvents is highly optimized so this helps as well.

Chris Tolles (Topix) - co-founder of open directory project.  Topix launched and aggregated news site in 2004, didn't set out to do "Local" - boring, not our core competency.  51 % of traffic , 10% of content in 2004.  Local news is tough, because there are over 32k in zip codes. 

Topix allowed users to put in own stories, and the database grew, and engagement grew.  This isn't just working in big cities, it helps with small town America as well.  There's a huge market 7.68 billion market by 2001.  Investments like $55M ReachLocal just received.  Comments in 19,868 towns, 1,500 cities, 70k posts per day, 60% of traffic on commentary, 60% of comments original.  Partnerships with 3 major papers.

DigPhilly - Satisfying a Niche Market Need in Social Media

By Li Evans

Kristen over at Mashable turned me onto DigPhilly.  Being from the area, I was definitely interested in scoping out this neat new social network.  I hope you'll forgive the little indulgence, but this site is actually pretty cool and definitely useful.  I've been in it for a couple hours now, and I'm impressed and they've found an passionate user in me.  Also, just to clarify The DigPhilly name, is not a ripoff of Digg, the "Dig" points more to "my digs" meaning, "my home".

There's actually a lot of thought put into this social network, and it's rather easy to use.  There is also a portal part of the site too, from news to shopping to finding things to do or events to attend, this site as a lot to offer its members.  From center city Philly, to Manayunk to Audubon there's a lot within the site that's attractively designed with a great balance of flash and content.

Here's some unique features I've found that could actually be truly useful to its members:

• Groups - there's groups you can join groups by your interest, whether it's sports (go eagles!), TV shows or interests there's the beginnings of what could be a really great place to meet local friends.  You can also create a group, which I took the liberty of doing - "SearchMarketing".
  
  Groups can also have forums and calendars.  That's really a great feature.  Unlike Meetup.com this just puts the usability part of the group ahead of most of the sites out there.
• Neat Articles  - special articles related specifically to things around the Philly area.  Learn how to make a cheesesteak, fun things to do in Fairmount Park (like catching an Anaconda *not!*).
• Sharing - photos, videos and blogs for both users and groups can share these with friends, group members and the public.
• Buy/Sell - you can buy from the site's list of vendors or from members selling items through the site.  This could be pretty useful in that, it's local, it's more of a community which means members could be seen a more trustworthy than an ad on CraigsList or classifieds on Philly.com.

There are a few things that could be worked on, I think the navigation could likely need some help.  It's not exactly that intuitive and 75% of it's in Flash.  I also know it's a "Web 2.0" type site, but, just aesthetically, it could do wonders to loose that Web 2.0 mirror type logo on it's front page and at the bottom of the pages. 

Lastly, information about who digPhilly really would be helpful.  The only information I could find was the email addresses in my registration confirmation and the information in the whois record which doesn't give any information at all beyond the company CoporateDomains controlling the ownership.

This site definitely fills a niche, hopefully they were smart enough to do this for all the major cities in the U.S., otherwise, I can hear the sound of domains whisking away right now.