This year’s report includes feedback from 34 prominent bloggers and local search experts.  Each factor is graded three ways; 1) the importance of the factor, 2) whether the factor has increased or decreased in importance since last year’s report, and 3) how closely the 34 participants agreed on each factor.

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The biggest factors I see for small businesses are that you no longer have to have a physical office to add your company to their directory.  With these changes Google will allow you to identify a service area and if you work from home or you travel around and don’t really have an office you have the ability to make your address private.

That is going to really open things up for the freelancer and work at home professional.

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One we have talked about here before and that is to claim your business listing in Google.  The second is to optimize your web site.  Huh! Imagine that.  And third is to integrate citation building, which is essentially having your company address information listed on your website and other internet properties such as directory listings and local business profiles.

With maps showing up in more and more searches and pushing down the top 10 natural organic results, its more important than ever for you to show up in these maps if you serve a local market.

Here’s the original video on the WebProNews site.

If you have trouble figuring this out on your own, give me a call.  I’d be glad to help you out.

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Thanks for visiting our site. I hope you enjoyed the interview we did with Kyle Hunt at Remodel Buddy, a marketing coach company for remodelers and home improvement professionals.  Below are some helpful links and additional information for improving your online presence as a contractor.

The most important thing to start with is to claim your local business listings in Google, Yahoo and Bing. Below are the links to do just that. Each of them are free so there’s no excuse for not doing this right away.

Google:

Here’s the link to look up your business.

Once you have claimed your listing you will need to verify your information. Google will provide you with a PIN by phone or by regular mail. Once you receive your PIN you will need to log into the Local Business Center and verify your listing.

Yahoo:

You will need to go here to sign up for your Yahoo Local Business Listing. You will need a Yahoo login, so if you don’t have one, you’ll have the ability to sign up during the process.

Bing:

You will need to go here to claim your Microsoft Map listing. You will need a Windows Live ID, so if you don’t already have one, get one of those first.

We also have our own Local Search Engine Business Profiles that are very well optimized for local search. Approximately 90% of them are on the front page of Google for their primary keyword phrases. For a limited time, we are offering a 50% discount for the first year. After that, it will automatically renew each year for $99.

We also recommend that you get your business listed in as many relevant online business directories as you can. You can find a multitude of free directories in which to list your business, but many of them will be of little value to your business.

There are also a handfull of paid directories (along with a couple of free ones) that we recommend. Below is a list of those directories along with a link to get signed up.

• DMOZ – http://dmoz.org/add.html – free
• Yahoo Directory – https://ecom.yahoo.com/dir/submit/intro/ – $299/yr.
• Business.com Directory – http://www.business.com/info/advertisewithus.asp – $299/yr.
• Best of the Web – http://botw.org/helpcenter/submitcommercial.aspx – $99.95/yr.
• Go Guides – http://www.goguides.org/addurl.html – $69.95/yr.
• Joe Ant – http://www.joeant.com/suggest.html – $39.99/yr.
• Rubber Stamped – http://www.rubberstamped.org/add-url-front.htm – $39.95/yr.
• Illumirate – http://www.illumirate.com/add_your_site_exp.cfm – free
• Wow Directory – http://www.wowdirectory.com/howtoadd.php – free
• Skaffe – http://www.skaffe.com/info/addurl.php – $44.99/yr.
• Massive Links – http://www.massivelinks.com/ – $29.99/yr.
• Starting Point – http://www.stpt.com/directory/ – $99/yr.

If you don’t have the time or inclination to do this yourself you can take advantage of our Link Building Program and we’ll take care of everything for you.

Don’t forget about doing a few press releases.  The two sites we recommend are PRWeb and FreePressRelease.com.  As I mentioned on the podcast, PRWeb seems to give you a little more exposure and a lot more flexibility, but you will benefit regardless of which one you choose.

If you have your own web site already and you’re not getting the traffic you want or generating the leads you want, you may want to consider one of our SEO Plans. After all, that’s our specialty and we’re proud to say that every single site we have worked on has gotten front page placement in Google, Yahoo and Bing.

And lastly, if you don’t have your own website, what are you waiting for? Every single day people in your town are searching for your services online. If you’re not there, you’re losing money. For a very reasonable fee we can set you up with a small business website and blog of your own, one that you can add content to and edit as often as you please.

To your success!

Ken Partain (follow me on Twitter)

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Here are the answers to your questions, Rebecca.

How do you make your business successful online?

As with most questions this broad, the answer is really “it depends”.  It depends on what type of business you are in and what your objectives are.

However, there are several things any small business can do to improve their online presence and help connect with their target market.

1. Establish a web presence.  You can do this several ways, but the most important way, in my opinion, is to have a web site that you control.  With our own website you have full control over the content of the site, how it is marketed, how well it is optimized, etc.
2. Get your business listed in relevant online directories.  There are a multitude of online directories, both free and paid, that you can list your business with.  Some of them, such as MerchantCircle, are a very good alternative if you absolutely can’t afford to build your own web site as I mentioned in #1.  We offer Local Search Engine Business Profiles that are very well optimized for local search and provide a good snapshot of your business, not to mention they are very inexpensive.
3. Get involved in Social Media and Social Networking even if you don’t have the first clue about how to proceed.  Get yourself listed with sites like LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter and slowly learn more about each one and how you can use it to connect with your target market and grow your business.

What is your favorite part of online marketing?

This seems to be a more personal question and my answer is optimizing small business websites.  I love seeing a company go from generating very few, or in some cases absolutely no leads from their website, to generating a consistent flow of quality leads because of the work we do.

Search engine rankings are not the be all, end all anymore.  With the introduction of Universal Search and Personalized Search from Google, evey single person could get different search results when looking up the same keyword phrase.  Therefore, the only true measure of how effective your optimization is, is whether or not your business improves as a result.

If you had to start marketing online again, what would you do differently?

I’ve done a few projects in the past where I just leaped out, spent a bunch of money on image stuff like logos, letterhead, business cards, etc. only to find later that the market either wasn’t there, or wasn’t willing to pay for the services we offered.

If I had it to do again I would do more market research before spending a bunch of money developing a web site and other materials.  I would start with some of the free tools available online and find out if there was a need for my idea and how big of a potential market there was for our product or service.

Then I would do everything I could to keep expenses to a bare minimum and not make any long-term obligations until the business started picking up steam.

I’d love to hear your comments and thoughts.

To your success!

Ken Partain

Follow Me On Twitter

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Your questions can be about anything related to search engine marketing, search engine optimization, social media marketing, social networking, local search, etc.

I’ll be posting the answers here on my site. When I answer your questions, I’ll give you credit for the questions along with a link back to your web site (if you would like).

Please complete the form below and check back soon for your answers.

Thanks for your participation.

To your success!
Ken Partain

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If not, now’s the time to claim your business listing.  Lisa Barone over at Small Business Trends did a nice post today on How to Grab Your Local Listing in Bing.  She provides a good explanation of the process and links to get it all set up.  Take a few minutes right now and go claim your listing.

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Recently I have decided to build some Local Search Engine Business Profiles for our clients and now I have decided to roll them out to the public.

These Local Search Engine Business Profiles include your company information, primary keywords so your prospects can find you, a short description of your products and services and a map to your location. They also include up to three links back to your own web site to help improve your rankings for those terms.

In addition they include links to other related profiles and links back from other profiles.

Each profile is hand-built by me and very well optimized for local search.

View a sample profile for a Frisco, Texas Electrician and then take a look at our Business Profile Master List for other profiles. There’s not a whole lot there yet, but it won’t be that way for long.

For a limited time you can save 50% off the first year. Sign up today!

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