Today there are well over 10 billion unique online searches each month, and that’s just in the United States! Of those searches, 40% of queries have local intent. So do they find you?
There’s a great tool out there for finding out how well your local business listing is actually LISTED with the major search engines out there. When I stumbled across this little gem I thought to myself, “Man, this is really handy and easy to use! If only I had known about this every time I’ve ever told small businesses to get listed as a local business on major search engines.” Now that I HAVE stumbled upon it, I couldn’t wait to share it with you!
The free service is called getlisted.org and their entire mission is to help small local businesses like yourself get listed on Google, Yahoo, and MSN local searches. Yes, you heard me, FREE. Anyhow, they don’t actually list your business on each search engine for you, BUT they do help you get to all the right pages so that you can do it pretty painlessly.
But why is this service such a big deal? I mean it’s a free service that just checks where you’re listed and then serves you up the pages to help you fill the forms out yourself. Big deal, right? Let me tell you why getting listed locally on all the major search engines is a big deal, and then you’ll be scampering over there!
Getting listed gets you on the first page of Google
- Example of Local Search in Blended Search Results
First of all it’s a great way to get to the top of organic search results. Google and other major search engines have started supplying searchers with what’s called blended search results, basically mixing up the first page of the results by adding local map listings and multimedia results together with the actual top search results. In essence if someone in Mesa, Arizona searches for “spa services” Google will show up with local results from Mesa, AZ as well as the top search results. So if you like being on the first page of major search engines, getting listed on their mapping systems is a GREAT way to do start getting there.
Wait, there’s more!
Getting listed gets you into mobile marketing
iPhone maps uses Google Maps by default
Thought you were a small business and could never afford mobile marketing like the big boys? Think again! Getting listed with local search in the major search engines also gets you on the map when it comes to customers using their mobile phones to find services. Think of this scenario, busy business person needs a place with good coffee for a couple of hours to finish a presentation before he’s off to his next meeting, he types in coffee into his iPhone and gets the local listings for coffee around him. A few years ago this would be science fiction, but today it’s possible, and you can be in his search results! When you get listed with Google you’re also listed on the mapping results in the iPhone because the default mapping program that’s SHIPPED with the phone IS Google Maps. So if you’re on Google Maps, you’re also listed in the iPhone. So when you list yourself, claim your listing, and add a note that you have free wifi at your coffeeshop, you’re likely to pique the interest of this traveling business man.
These two great reasons should be more than enough to get you excited to get into this free opportunity that only takes a few minutes to get set up and working in your favor.
So what are you waiting for? Go get listed!
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