All posts by Joshua Mackens
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Protected: The Essential Post on Essential Oils
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Localeze’s Future with Moz Local
Localeze’s Future with Moz Local
I received an email from a fellow Local SEO a few days ago asking me my thoughts on Moz Local. My first thought was, “I’ve never heard of Moz Local”.
I head on over to the Google machine and check out the first listing I see which is from the Moz Blog.
Apparent, David Mihm and Moz have been hard at work fixing some of the most glaring issues with Local SEO, namely having to register your business or a client’s business with the 3 longstanding, major data aggregators InfoUSA (Infogroup), Acxiom, & Localeze separately.
Moz Local fixes this by giving you one platform to manage your data with all three of the major data aggregators along with Factual and Foursquare which they consider as 2 other major data aggregators. The product also has a few other interesting tools but the ability to submit to the major data aggregators simultaneously is arguably its major draw.
That’s a pretty cool product. One that I am definitely interested in.
Localeze?
Being well versed with Localeze and actually in the middle of trying to start reselling Localeze’s premium product myself (which they now call “True Identity“) to other Local SEO’s, I was more than a little surprised that Localeze went along with such a proposal.
I later reasoned that there was no way Moz was tapping into Localeze’s premium product. Localeze must have allowed them to tap into the free product API.
I called my Localeze rep to check in and what she told me really floored me.
Moz Local’s product includes the premium Localeze product.
Why did this surprise me? For a few reasons.
One, Localeze sells their premium product for $300 a shot. That’s a huge discount from $300 to Moz Local’s $49.
However, as we know bulk can certainly make up for almost anything, see Sam’s Club. Localeze will actually give you a bulk discount if you will sign a contract with them and pay an upfront fee. They’ll discount you down to a very affordable price if you have enough volume. So, that’s not initially surprising.
What is surprising is Moz Local’s own rate of $49. Even at Localeze’s lowest quoted price (to me), Moz Local still beats it (although just barely) AND Moz Local also packs in InfoUSA & Acxiom as earlier mentioned.
This just doesn’t make sense on so many levels.
Localeze’s Product Future
My first thought in all of this is that Localeze has seriously undermined their premium product. I highly doubt they had much sales coming in from the one off local businesses that were willing to pay $300 a year. I imagine they had a few but that couldn’t have been their main sales strategy.
Their main strategy had to be on the reliance of the Local SEO community knowing and understanding Localeze’s value to their Local SEO campaigns and success. This is where the contract pricing came in with a relatively hefty up front cost. However, the Moz Local price point has made Localeze’s contracts futile. The Moz Local price point is lower, doesn’t have a contract, doesn’t have up front pricing, and provides more bang for your buck with the other data listers.
There is seemingly zero advantages toward being a Localeze reseller at this point not to mention steep downsides.
So what’s the future here? Why is Localeze undermining their entire pricing structure for their premium product? What is Localeze’s thought process?
Sales Game
One explanation is that Localeze may be having sales issues. Whether it’s volume, staffing, or something else, this would explain a lot.
If volume is an issue, Moz’s branding solves a lot of that, especially with David Mihm’s sway and brand in the Local SEO world.
Localeze is also only one of Neustar’s products. Neustar may see the Localeze product under performing and plan on downsizing and streamlining the Localeze department down to just a few people. This would make sense as Moz Local will drive all of the sales for Localeze and all they would really need at that point is probably 1 support and a few techs. And realistically, they probably wouldn’t even need a dedicated tech at all.
Downsizing & streamlining. That’s an easy way to make a languishing product profitable.
Long Term
While Localeze may be having sales issues, this could just potentially be a branding issue. An interesting and highly unlikely theory, Localeze could cash in on Moz’s enviable branding machine and when Moz’s contract comes due, simply refuse to renew it and revert back to their old pricing structure and keep up their own branding. Or, Localeze could negotiate a higher price that makes more sense for them.
However, I would imagine crossing a company like Moz wouldn’t bode well for business as they are the “good son” of the SEO world.
Other Considerations – Profit Margin
I also am very curious about Moz’s profit margin on this. For them to make money off of a $49 product, your margins have to be pretty decent or you have to have massive volume to make up for it. While Moz can draw a lot of volume, I’m not sure there’s enough volume in the Local SEO world to go around and make this work financially. But obviously Moz has done their homework and I’m sure feel confident in it. That means, in my opinion, Localeze must be selling at pennies on the dollar.
If Localeze really is selling razor thin, consider what that means in conjunction with Moz Local’s attractive $49 price undermining Localeze’s entire pricing structure. Localeze has two audiences, the local business owner and the local SEO agency.
If I’m a local business owner, I’m saving $250 dollars by using Moz Local (not to mention all the other awesome features).
If I’m a local SEO agency, why would I sign a binding contract, pay an upfront fee AND pay essentially the same price for less product?
What I Do Know
At the end of the day, there are a lot of unknowns in this deal. But there is one thing I do know:
I’ve already cancelled my Localeze reseller contract.
Long Overdue…
by Joshua Mackens
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Yeah, we haven’t blogged for over a year…
There’s really no excuse for it. We redesigned the site, have been super busy growing but honestly, I just haven’t made time. I don’t like excuses and there isn’t one here, so I will spare you.
However, we are back on track and blogging ahead of a major product push that I’m super excited to talk about.
Growth & Opportunities
As we’ve been growing, we’ve realized that our services, namely Local SEO, have fallen out of the realm of affordability for probably 90% of local businesses. As you know and have read, our heart is with local businesses. We’re one in the same really. I just, honestly, truly, like you guys. I like real people who are out there making it happen, not collecting a non-performance based check and going home. Local businesses tend to be more passionate and there’s more on the line. It’s do or die. You have a bad month? Someone might be getting laid off. It’s high pressure and I absolutely love it.
I love watching you guys succeed. I love watching you overcome adversity. I love watching you grow and the prosperity it brings, both financial and otherwise. It’s just nice.
You’re real people, and I love real people.
So, it pained me each and every time price was the issue when we couldn’t work with a local business. Many times, they were start ups and just didn’t have enough capital yet. Sometimes, it was just that they weren’t accustomed to spending that type of money and honestly couldn’t afford it. The reason didn’t matter, the fact remained, we weren’t able to help as many people as we wanted.
Mindbombing
So, I started brainstorming. As I was trying to figure out what to do, I was simultaneously hit with an overwhelming sense that something was missing from the business. I soon realized that I wasn’t getting to spend as much time interacting with people as I had hoped.
I’m naturally a social person. I also love teaching (I may have missed my call as a professor). When I get the opportunity to consult with people, my day just gets brighter and brighter. I love helping local businesses understand internet marketing and that it isn’t difficult to implement. You just have to know how. Now, it is true that we have natural resources at Tutelary Marketing to speed up that process that most don’t have but there’s a little caveat there too. That can be overcome with time. I only have so much time to spend per client, per month. A local business can spend infinitely more time on their own marketing than I can. So, it can actually balance out.
When I realized that I wanted to help more local businesses, that I enjoyed consulting for the teaching and mentoring aspect, and that local businesses could actually be just as successful and even more successful at their internet marketing than an outsourcing company could be, as long as they’re willing to put in the time, it became clear to me.
I decided I was going to start teaching local businesses how to do exactly everything we do in our business model, and I’m going to do it on a broad scale. The only thing holding me back was that old foe, time. To help the amount of people I wanted to help would cost me hours of my life that I don’t even have, literally. I normally do 1-2 hour consulting sessions for a pretty reasonable fee. I have a 40 hour work week or so. I can help, at the most, 40 businesses a week, 160 a month, 1,920 a year.
Now, that’s not bad. However, when you consider that each company would only get one hour of my time a month when really, they need at least 4, especially when just starting out? That number shrinks drastically. Then, if they want to get advanced, the number shrinks even more. I started to calculate everything and I just realized, to do what I wanted to do in the manner I wanted to do it, consulting 1 on 1 wasn’t an effective way to reach as many people as I wanted. I needed another solution.
The Internet
I ended up coming up with an idea to create tutorial videos of pretty much everything we do, website design, local SEO, social media, content marketing, blogging, etc for my clients and giving them to a viewership of people that wanted to take their local business to the next level through internet marketing but just couldn’t afford it. These would be the exact same techniques my clients pay me thousands a month to do, and show you how I do them so you can implement them in your business.
And the Local Business Internet Marketing University was born.
Basically, when it’s all said and done, you’ll be able to login to our Local Business Internet Marketing University website (I know, it’s a mouthful), start at ground 1 and build your own local business website without any coding experience through our tutorial videos. Actually, you won’t be coding at all. You’ll pretty much just be clicking options and checking boxes to build the site. The end result is a specialized local business website that Tutelary Marketing would create for you for around $2,000.
You’ll also be able to go through video tutorials on beginner, intermediate, and advanced SEO techniques that will help you far outrank your competition. Things like keyword research, on-site optimization, off-site optimization, review generation, citation building, etc. The exact same techniques I use to make my clients rank at the top and bring in thousands upon thousands of dollars in revenue for them monthly. The value there? Over 5 figures a year. That’s what we charge for local SEO at Tutelary Marketing.
And that’s just the beginning. Eventually we’ll be adding social media, content marketing, blogging, e-mail marketing, etc.
Currently
We’ve already got a bunch of videos up but when release rolls around, we’re probably looking at around 50 videos for SEO and 30 or so for website design, if not more, with more added every single day. I’m sure before it’s all said and done down the road, we’ll have over 1,000 videos teaching local businesses pretty much everything they need to know to be internet marketing rock stars.
Sounds like a pretty sweet deal, right? We think so too.
The initial cost will be $149 a month. We wanted to keep it low so it’s affordable for everyone.
The release date isn’t official yet but we’re aiming for within the next two months. We’ll be providing more details as time goes on. We’ll also be having some promo’s where we release a few essential videos early, such as how to sign up for your Google+ Local page, etc. We’ll probably have a few Q&A’s on Local SEO as well, and probably give away a few free Local SEO audits. Just a few things to provide value and amp people up for the release. If you have any ideas for us to do as well, let us know.
Any updates will be posted on the blog AND on social media as well, so don’t forget to stay connected with us on Twitter, Facebook and Google+ as well.
Well, the update has been a long time in coming, and here it is. We aren’t dead, far from it of course.
Get ready for the show people, it starts now!
Fantastic Local Business Opportunity
This opportunity has expired. Thank you for all that participated!
We’ve been privileged enough here at Tutelary Marketing to get in on a limited time deal for local businesses and we’re passing on the good news (and savings). If you’re a local business and you want to dominate Google, read on! Choose the statement that best applies to you below so that you can best understand what is being offered to you.
Choose Which Statement Best Applies to You:
OR
Position 1:
“I know about local SEO. I know what search directories are. I know who Localeze is and what they do for my local SEO ranking.”
The Deal:
Tutelary Marketing is going to become a channel partner with Localeze and because of this, the normal listing service they provide for local businesses that costs $297 for a year (around $25 a month) is only going to cost us $100 a year ($8.33 a month). We’re passing this on and not marking up the cost to local businesses that are interested. Why? Honestly, because there is a steep initial cost to becoming a channel partner and we want to recoup that cost. So, we feel like it’s a fair trade. We get the listings at $100 a piece, you get a phenomenal deal (66% off) and we get to recoup a business cost.
Some people are going to ask why we don’t mark the cost up and make some money off this deal due to the fact that it’s already incredibly cheap. As a business owner myself, I’m just not too interested in that. I’m happy just to recoup our cost, even though we may lose a bit of money due to the time it takes us to set it up for you. But mostly, I just like passing on a good deal. It makes me feel good.
So, if you want to jump on this, we have 7 spots left. Call us to reserve your spot. But make sure you do it quick. After the 7 spots are taken, this deal will be closed off.
You can learn more about the product at Localeze.
Position 2:
“I have no idea who Localeze is or what they do. I don’t know the first thing about Google. I have no idea what SEO stands for. I do not know the first thing about how to market my local business on Google.”
Short Version:
To rank well on Google, you need to have your business information all over the internet so that Google can pick it up. The more places your business information can be found, the higher you will rank. Localeze is the most powerful tool to make this happen. Localeze sends out your business information all over the internet and can easily be the difference between a top ranking or obscurity on Google.
Normally, Localeze is going to charge you $297 a year to use their service. However, for a limited time you can go through Tutelary Marketing to secure that service from Localeze for $100 ($8.33 a month) for one year.
Why are we doing this? Frankly, because our deal with Localeze costs us a good amount of money up front. The best way to recoup this expense is to sell the spots we don’t need. In our deal we were allotted a certain amount of spots at a certain price. Each spot cost us $100. Why aren’t we marking them up? Because we don’t want to take a month (or longer) to recoup this cost, we want to get rid of them now and $100 is going to sell more quickly than $150 or $200. That’s just the brutally honest truth from me directly to you.
So, we have 7 spots left for this deal out of our original 15. It will be first come first serve. The last 7 companies to put down their $100 deposit will be the last 7 companies that we will add to the first 8. After that, the deal will be closed.
If you are interested, we highly recommend you read the longer version below to get a better grasp on what is being offered and what exactly it will do for your local business.
Long Version:
SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. Google is a search engine. Therefore, SEO is the process of optimizing your local business to appear high on Google search results. For example, if you’re a dentist in Nashville, you want to show up #1 when someone types in “dentist Nashville” into Google. If you’re an auto repair shop in Boise, you want to show up #1 when someone types in “auto repair shop Boise”.
Why Google?
Why do you want to show up at the top of Google search results? Because 9 out of 10 people when looking for a local product or service use a search engine (Google, Yahoo, or Bing) to find it. No one uses the phone book anymore to find local businesses, they use Google. People are even starting to rely on word of mouth less these days because Google provides reviews of a business for you. 72% of people trust an anonymous review just as much as if they knew the person and Google gives them the ability to instantaneously find reviews on a local business versus the customer taking the time to call or text someone they know to ask for a recommendation. SEO absolutely and unequivocally reaches the most amount of people when it comes to local business marketing. That’s why you want to optimize for Google.
Where Do I Start?
So, how do you start ranking on Google? Google wants to see you optimize the three pieces of internet property that your business has: your website, your Google+ Local page, and your local search directory information.
We are only going to focus on search directory information in this post as it is relative to the deal we’re offering. If you’re interested in how to optimize your website or Google+ Local page for local SEO, you can find all the information you need by doing a quick Google search on the subject.
Local Search Directory Information
So, what are local search directories? Local search directories are also called IYP’s (Internet Yellow Pages). You can understand why, because they are literally just digital versions of the old yellow page phone books. However, unlike the telephone books which were few in number, there are literally hundreds of IYP’s on the internet. You’ve probably heard of the more popular ones such as CitySearch, Yelp, Judy’s Book, Angie’s List, etc. Google wants to see your information on all these local search directories (or IYP’s). Not only do they want to see your information out there but they want to see it in a consistent format. This means that your business name, address, and telephone number are always the exact same across all the local search directories. This is called your NAP (name, address, telephone number). If your NAP is consistent across the board, Google will rank you higher.
The Methods
Now, you can get your information to these hundreds of search directories a few different ways. The first way is to just go to each search directory individually and submit your information. This can take between 15-45 minutes per directory depending on how thorough you want to be with your information (including coupons, photos, descriptions, etc.). As we said, there are hundreds of directories out there. As you can see, this can be extremely time consuming. Most businesses just make this a gradual process and try to gradually cover as many local search directories as they can in a year or so.
However, there is another option and luckily, this option is a whole lot easier. You see, these local search directories we’ve been talking about don’t rely just on local businesses (like you) to submit their business information to them. If they did, their databases wouldn’t have even 10% of the amount of business listings that they have. No, what these search directories do is BUY local business information (NAP) from local business data aggregators. If there were only a way to to get your information on these local business data aggregators, then you could submit your information to them and sit back while it populates across all of the local business directories without you having to do so much as lift a finger. I think you know what I’m about to say next. There is a way to do this and yes, it is as easy as advertised.
Submitting to the Local Business Data Aggregators
How do you do this? Well, fortunately there are only three major data aggregators out there: InfoUSA, Acxiom, and Localeze. You just submit your business to all three and you’re in good shape for the most part.
InfoUSA is free to submit to. Acxiom is a bit complicated to submit to but it’s going to cost you between $50-$75 for a full year no matter how you do it. However, the real jewel, Localeze, is going to cost you a whopping $297 for a full year. I’m sure that you feel exactly the same way about that as I do. That’s way too expensive for the ordinary local business.
Luckily, for a select few there is a way around that. Tutelary Marketing has a temporary deal with Localeze where the same package that costs $297 a year normally is only going to cost you $100 ($8.33 a month) a year through Tutelary!
What’s the Catch?
Why are we doing this? Frankly, because our deal with Localeze costs us a good amount of money up front. The best way to recoup this expense is to sell the spots we don’t need. In our deal we were allotted a certain amount of spots at a certain price. Each spot cost us $100. Why aren’t we marking them up? Because we don’t want to take a month (or longer) to recoup this cost, we want to get rid of them now and $100 is going to sell more quickly than $150 or $200. That’s just the brutally honest truth from me directly to you.
So, now that you know what’s going on, you need to take advantage. Localeze submission is a staple of our Local Search Solution and every local business with Tutelary Marketing is submitted to Localeze as one of our first priorities. Localeze is an absolute necessity if you want to dominate Google.
You can learn more about the product we’re talking about at Localeze.
There is limited space available as we mentioned. In fact, we only have 7 spots left out of the original 15. So, the first 7 to get in contact with us and put down their payment will be the 7 we go with.
If this offer doesn’t interest you, maybe it will interest a fellow local business owner you know. Please email this page to them and give them a fair chance to dominate Google as well.
The Complete Website Purchase Guide for the Local Business Owner
Purchasing a website is a big deal. Once you have a website, it is in the best interest of your business to stick with that particular website. So, you need to carefully choose a website company that you feel comfortable being with for the long haul. If you pick the wrong company, they can make your life a nightmare. I have two personal stories for you that drive home that point.
The AT&T (Corporate) Horror Story
I have a client who paid over $1,000 each year for his website to AT&T. Each. Year. Now, you may think that’s not such a big deal and even now you are in the exact same process. If you are, let me be clear here: you are being bamboozled. My client, just like you, was paying over $1,000 each year to rent a website when he could spend that much once and OWN his own website! When I mentioned this to him, you can imagine his surprise and delight at first, and then his outrage later on that he had been paying more money to rent a website than he would have had to pay to own a website outright. He immediately wanted to switch to our website services and so we did.
However, it wasn’t that simple. AT&T owned his website, his content, and his domain name. To my great surprise, they were going to release the domain name to us (in my experience this is rare) but we had to apply for a domain name transfer. The transfer took over a week, which meant his website was down for that period of time. Now, this client through his own hard work and through my help as well ranks incredibly well on Google and other search engines and I think he would tell you that the majority of his business come from search engines. That means, for a whole week, he lost out on probably thousands of dollars, maybe even tens of thousands of dollars, all because he had to switch website companies. And in his case, he was extremely lucky. The process could have taken even longer or they could have held onto his domain name. See, most companies that rent websites will not give you your domain name. Had we not been able to secure it, he would have lost ALL of his ranking completely, crippling his main source of revenue. Are you starting to see how important it is to make sure you pick the right company right off the bat?
The Local Guy
The last story was a story that is honestly fueled by corporate greed, in my opinion. This story, however, is about the local website guy. The guy who you may know of through a friend of a friend, or a family member, who may or may not have a legitimate business. The guy who can put your company in a bind, QUICK.
I have a client who went through a local website guy and the local website guy actually owned his own company. The relationship was amicable for awhile but then they started to notice severe lags between times when changes were requested and when those same changes were completed. They also started to notice their website would be down every once in awhile. This was particularly tough on them because they ranked #1 for every major keyword on Google in their respective business market. So, when customers were searching for them and found them, their website was down. Not only were they not able to capitalize on those potential customers but it ruined their brand image. If your website is down, potential customers relate that to the quality of your business (whether right or wrong). If your website is down, it says something about you. So, not only was he costing them business by turning away potential customers, he was ruining their image as a quality business as well.
Well, my client decided enough was enough and wanted to switch companies. So, I asked them whether they owned their website, content, and domain name. They had no clue. When I took a look at it, I was doubtful that they owned any of their website, content, or domain name. It was even more doubtful that even if they did own the website, whether they could get it from him in the first place considering his aversion to communication. In fact, my client was so tired of this local website guy that she just wanted to buy a whole new domain, content, and everything, costing her a lot of money. However, I explained to her that her domain name was worth thousands of dollars because of all the work we had done to it. She was so fed up with him, that for a time she didn’t even care, she was willing to take the hit and move on. But, knowing how valuable the domain name was, I convinced her to make an attempt to get it from him.
We’re currently still in the process of trying to obtain the domain name. The local website guy registered the domain name under his own personal name which means that legally, the domain name is his. He owes them no legal right to the domain name that I would conservatively estimate at being worth between $3,000 – $5,000 because of its ability to bring in new business and the amount of money we’ve spent on building it up in the Google rankings. At this point, losing that domain name would be devistating to her business. I hope this starts to shape how important choosing the right company is.
How To Avoid a Website Story Worthy of This Post:
So, how can you avoid being swindled? How do you make sure you choose a company that is going to not only provide you with an excellent service but also the ability to walk away with everything intact if need be? You need to find a company that has a website service with these 5 traits: Practicality, Functionality, Flexibility, Beautiful Design, and an excellent SEO service.
Practicality
Strangely enough, practicality put me on the path toward writing this blog today. As an SEO (Search Engine Optimizer) I work a lot with my clients’ websites. There are the rare companies that make this easy on me and there are the all too common companies that make this extremely difficult. In this particular instance, all I needed were a few simple changes, changes that take me 5 minutes to make on any website that our company creates and changes that would only take 10-15 minutes for my clients to make to their own website themselves (our service is so simple, our clients can make changes to their websites on their own). It took this particular company over 30 minutes just to tell me not only could I not make these changes myself but they couldn’t either, that they would need to put in a support request to the coders to make the changes. By the way, 20 of those 30 minutes were spent on hold or calling them back because they dropped my call twice. This is the same company that just a few months ago took so long to make a few simple changes I requested that I was able to get my client their website service for free for two months.
The Issue: I say all this to make a point: find a practical website company. A website company that has a system where you can easily make the changes yourself and the company has a great response time of between 24 – 48 hours for more complicated changes or changes you don’t have time to make.
The Solution: Ask the company for a tour of the system they use to make changes. Note how user friendly it is. If they don’t have a tour, ask if they have a mock website for you to play around with.
Functionality:
The Issue: The website needs to function well. It needs to have a 99% uptime, load pages fast, etc. Every company is going to claim that they offer this as it is very basic. However, you would be surprised at how many companies manage this poorly.
The Solution: Ask for contact information to references. Ask if these references receive any financial benefit for being a reference. If they do, ask for the contact information of a reference from someone who doesn’t. If they won’t provide one, you can find one. Almost every company puts a link to their own site on the websites they design. Just Google the website company name and snoop around. Find a business that uses them and call that business.
Flexibility:
The Issue: This may be the biggest trait. Your website company should be flexible. They should allow you domain name and content control. Possible even hosting control as well. This allows you to own everything associated with your website and if the relationship heads south quick, you retain control of your website.
The Solution: Tell the company you will be purchasing or have purchased your own domain name and hosting. Ask if they will be able to accomodate this. If they won’t allow you to own your own domain name, that is a red flag. However, if the hosting is an issue, you’ll need to make your own decision on that. If you really like the company besides this one fact, I wouldn’t let it stop me. Just make sure it’s understood that you own everything having to do with the website. Content and domain name.
Beautiful Design:
The Issue: I worked for a guy once that had the first 30 minutes of every single day dedicated to straightening our showroom because he knew that if the showroom was unkempt, no one would stick around long enough to buy anything. Your website is your online showroom. If the design of your website looks terrible, just like in a real showroom, customers won’t stick around. Beautiful and attractive website design is of paramount importance.
The Solution: Take a look at the websites in your industry and location. Then, take a look at the websites in your industry in a much more populated location. These websites will probably be on the cutting edge and may represent something you want to shoot for. It might be good for business to have a website that blows everyone else away but also works for your respective niche. Finally, you should have a good picture of what you want and then see if the company provides what you’re looking for. You can ask to see samples of their other websites.
SEO Service:
The Issue: Your website is a 24/7 salesman. It’s never late, takes breaks or vacations, or calls in sick. It works all day, every day and never needs to be managed, encouraged, or motivated. It is your single most profitable sales tool, period…IF you rank well on Google. That’s what SEO does. SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. SEO optimizes your website to show up as high as possible on Google which gets you the attention of potential customers. In my opinion, if you’re not ranking on Google, you’re wasting money on a website. When people are looking for a local service or product, 9 out of 10 will use a search engine to find it. You do the math.
The Solution: Just as with Functionality, go through the reference process. You might not want to ask for references from the company on this one. Do the legwork to find your own references. When it comes to SEO, the company will definitely put their best foot forward. You can also ask to see the search engine ranking reports that they give their clients, something they should be doing. If they’re not doing this, that’s a red flag. What company doesn’t report to their clients their results?
Conclusion
If you can find a company that offers the five traits above, you’ve found a winner. Stick with them, treat them well, and make sure they stay in business. Refer them out and get them more customers and make sure they have a referral program too. You brought them money, you should get a cut as well.
Companies We Recommend:
This is pretty straightforward, we recommend Tutelary Marketing. Everything we just described and told you to look for in a company, we have..and more. Check out our website services and watch the video on the page to learn more.
Always Brand Yourself
“Shoulda-coulda-woulda.” Man, did I mess up. Early in my entrepreneurial career, I wasn’t accustomed to taking advantage of golden opportunities when they were given to me. Learn from my mistakes.
Scene: The Local Electrical Store
One day, I realized I was going to need an ethernet cord. You know, one of those pesky things that plugs into the back of your desktop computer and provides you with internet if you weren’t cool enough to have a wifi-card. I was cool, I just didn’t have a wifi-card, okay? Anyways, I realized I was going to need a pretty long one as my roommate had conveniently placed our router almost as far away from my desktop in our house as possible. So, I called up a local electrical store for a 50ft investment.
Let me interject this for a moment. Local electrical stores are awesome. I bought an ethernet cord for about 70% less (if I remember correctly) than what Lowes, Home Depot or even Wal-mart would have charged me. Wal-mart actually doesn’t sell them that long obviously but if I bought all 10 ft ethernet cords, became an expert electrician overnight and was able to cut and connect them all…well you get my point.The fact is that your local electrician store is a magical emporium with goodies unimaginable. Give it a look-see.
Anyways, the electrician priced me for a 50ft cord at a great price, so I told him to hold it for me. I head on over there and the electrician takes me to the rack with a ladder to grab it. He climbs up and says, “Uh oh”. I’m thinking he’s about to fall so I brace the ladder. After seemingly no impact, I look up and he tells me, “Apparently, I don’t have one. Since I told you I did, tell you what, I’ll just sell you the 100ft at the same price.” Bingo!
He’s a frugal, frugal man
As a Mackens, the scent of righteous savings overwhelms me. I’m about to sweep up a killer steal! But then I start to feel bad. If I were this guy, in this economy, I would hate taking a loss on something like that, especially right now. However, 100ft is longer than I need and I don’t want to pay more or go anywhere else, I’m already here and he did tell me he had it in stock.
We stride on over to the register and I tell him, “Hey man, tell you what. How much did it cost you to bring that thing in? I’ll pay the cost that way you don’t have a loss.” I don’t know if the smile that came out of him was because I just dropped a super sick rhyme and he appreciates art when he sees it or because I was meeting him in the middle and saving his company money a good bit of change (I bet it was my rhyming skills, I can turn a phrase when called on). No matter the reason, he was very grateful.
Always Keep A Weather Eye
We idled in the store a bit, chit chatted and then I went on my way. I arrived at my house, plugged up my computer and proceeded to draw up what today is Tutelary Marketing. Great story, right?
WRONG.
I had created a great situation where my true colors as a person had shown. I created a beautful moment where someone saw me for who I was and isn’t that what we’re always trying to do, if we’re honest people anyway? That was a perfect opportunity for me to hand him my card, talk a brief smidgeon about what I do and sear my company into his memory by branding.
Another aside: branding is all too often associated with manipulation. People want to brand their company as something they’re really not and because of that, the branding fails. Customers will always be able to tell a fake after they’ve interacted with you and trust me, there’s nothing more a customer hates than a fake company. They will quit your product and then trample on it by telling anyone and everyone that will listen about you and do just about everything short of burning down your building. Sure, you may fool some people but they’re the minority. The majority will find you out and the majority will root you out. Become what you want to brand yourself as, then brand.
Back to the story. That was a missed chance to really cement myself in this person’s mind as a quality company. Through my actions, I showed him my integrity as a person, my true self and therefore, should have associated those values with my company through branding.
You may think that was just one opportunity Josh, don’t beat yourself up. You’re right. I shed a tear when I realized my mistake and then I moved on. No, really though, it’s not a huge deal but it’s a lesson you can learn from. Carry business cards with you always (a simple act we seem, to our detriment, to neglect) and when you have a positive experience with someone and show your true self and your character, do yourself and that person a favor and brand. It doesn’t need to be a targeted consumer either. Consumers talk, word of mouth (something I know you’ve never heard of), and it will move around.
Always be looking for these opportunities, they’re everywhere. But don’t just start doing nice things to brand yourself (if you’re considering this, read the aside on branding again and digest it this time). As mentioned previously, you’ll be found out and will be in worse shape than before. Work on your charatcer, yourself as a person, and let that reflect in how you treat people and do business. Like I said, it will get around.
The Google Places Transition to Google+ Local
The Google Places to Google+ Local Transition
Well, here it is. The blog I’ve been telling you guys I would be writing on the changes that have happened in the last week and a half at Google that is going to seriously impact Local SEO.
Now, most of you that read my blog are involved in some type of local business and as you know, our aim with the Tutelary blog is to keep you updated on trends in marketing, especially in internet marketing as those changes seem to be the ones that happen to most frequently and can also be the most confusing. With that being said, I am going to keep this pretty short, basic and to the point with a more in depth analysis coming later.
What is Google Places and why do I care about the transition?
Some of you reading this know what Google Places is and some don’t. As a quick explanation, Google Places is simply the platform that Google used up until a few weeks ago which allowed local business owners to control how their business appeared to the public on Google search. So, when someone searched for a service in a specific area, ie “Chiropractor Nashville” more than likely the results Google would return would be a “Local Google Result” (formerly a Google Places result). They look distinctly different than regular search results on Google:
Local Google results are differentiable from regular Google listings by the contact information right in the search results themselves along with other information such as how many Google reviews the company had and the quality of those reviews. Google Places also allowed the business to extend offers to their customers, post pictures and videos (among other features) and also had a place for their customers to leave reviews and for the busines to reply to those reviews, giving the business an effective (albeit limited) Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tool.
On May 30th, Google announced the transition from Google Places to Google+ Local as their platform for local search. Why is this important for the local business owner? The biggest reason is because 9 out of 10 people, when looking for a local product or service, use a search engine to find it and most people using a search engine use Google. So, when Google switches interfacing platforms for their local search, it’s a big deal.
What has changed?
Platform-wise:
The Google+ Local page for your business has replaced the Google Places page. Your Google+ Local page is what customers will be seeing from now on when they click on reviews about your business from the Google search results.
Lots of people are asking, “What is difference between Google+ Local and Google Places?” Google Places was a pretty static marketing tool. There wasn’t really any interaction beyond being able to respond to reviews your customers left. Consumers just used Google search, found your local listing, read reviews, went to your website, or called you and that was the extent of your interaction. When you take a tool like that and switch it over to a social networking platform (which is what Google+ is) then you get Google Places meets Facebook and that fusion birthed Google+ Local.
Marketing-wise:
Search Engine Optimization has now finally met Social Media in full. They are no longer disconnected entities for local businesses but have become a pair. This transition from Google Places to Google+ Local marks the detachment from static Search Engine Marketing, where owners just focused on gaining a top result on Google search results and fostering online traffic to their website or Google Places page. Now, you’re going to not only need to focus on a top result but social interaction as well. Google+ Local, because it is a social network, will give you plenty of tools do that.
Next steps for local businesses
As a local business owner, what do you need to do about this shift?
The Google Places to Google+ Local transition is in the early stage. The shift is cosmetic in the first stage. The middle and later stages (maybe only a few days away) will see a heavy focus on the functional which will change Local SEO. However, there are a few things you can do now to be caught up and ready for the change.
If you have never claimed your Google Places page, I suggest you go ahead and claim your Google+ Local page now. Search for your business name and location in Google and your Google+ Local listing should come up in the search results. Click “Google Reviews” or “Google+ page” and you’ll be taken to your Google+ Local page. I think you have to sign up for Google+ in order to claim the listing but I don’t know that for sure.
Due to the speaking seminar I am committed to, I got a little behind on the changes for my taste. It took me 3-4 hours to read everything I wanted to read and catch up to a point where I feel more or less comfortable. If I could go back, I would digest 1-2 pieces on the subject a day instead of all at one time. I say this so that you can benefit from my experience. Don’t wait 6 weeks from now when the completed Google+ Local is rolled out and you have a huge learning curve. Go to this form and fill it out. It will keep you informed on changes straight from Google. Also, follow our blog and we’ll update changes as they come out that you need to be aware of.
Otherwise, there isn’t much else to do yet. The change right now is more of a cosmetic change as I said but the infrastructure change is coming. Make sure you are prepared.
Stay tuned to the blog as we will be providing updates as well as insights into the present and future of Google+ Local and Local SEO.