20 Ways to Market Your Local Business Online

Local businesses don’t usually have the budget to hire a marketing firm to launch a promotional campaign.

Usually you’re duct taping things together, rubbing in some elbow grease and hitting the “good enough” button.

But there are plenty of ways to leverage the web to promote your local business – and most of them are more about investing your time than opening your wallet.

Here are 21 things you can start on today that will increase your traffic and market your business online.

1. Start a hyperlocal blog

“Hyperlocal” essentially refers to content focused on a very tight geographic area – like your neighborhood.

With many of the traditional local newspapers going defunct, a hole has opened in local news. Hyperlocal online publications, like blogs, can fill it.

Matt McGee started HyperlocalBlogger.com, where he blogs about, well, hyperlocal blogging. It’s a great place to start your reading.

2. Build a local portal

Information on local events, parks, businesses, eateries, etc, is usually scattered in various places. Websites like Yelp are making things better, but they’re far from perfect.

Building a guide to your area, complete with a directory of places to go and things to do, complete with links to the appropriate websites if they’re available. This can be a great way to bring visitors and local residents to your site, and your fellow local business owners will appreciate the traffic (you may even get some backlinks out of it).

Careful what you read out there, there’s a lot of crappy content about “how to profit from building a local business portal” – most of it is spammer garbage you should ignore. Nobody seems to have tackled this topic well – which suggests this isn’t an over-used tactic, so have at it.

3. Leverage pay-per-click (PPC) advertising

In PPC, the less competitive a keyword is the cheaper it costs per click. Local keywords are usually on the low end of the cost spectrum.

Tell me another form of advertising that gives you the level of controlled targeting and tracking that PPC does, and I’ll mail you a shiny nickel. You can advertise to exactly who’s searching what you have to offer, at the precise moment they’re interested. And you only pay for the visits you actually get. Compare that to your monthly Yellow Pages ad.

It’s a good idea to at least consult with someone who knows PPC before you set up your campaigns and hit “go” – there’s a bit of a learning curve here, and you’ll save yourself money in the long run by paying for some upfront consulting from someone who knows the pitfalls that can waste your budget.

4. Secure your local search listings

This one is a serious no-brainer.

The big three two search engines (Yahoo! search will soon be run by Bing) allow you to register your local business for free. Once you’re in the local system, you show up in the local search results. These are the results listed A-G alongside a map with pins for each business location.

To make this easy on yourself, head over to GetListed.org, a great (and free) tool created and maintained by David Mihm and Pat Sexton. Drop in your business name and zip code, and the tool will tell you what listings you’ve got so far and where you can go get the rest.

Make sure you verify your listings – local listings can be hijacked if they aren’t verified and locked down by their rightful owners.

5. Write a recreational guide for your area

If you’ve ever taken a vacation to a new town you know it’s frustrating to figure out what the hell you’re going to do all day. You dig around in the search results, looking through outdated websites set up 10 years ago by park administrators, or “directories” that are really just thin advertising websites set up by spammers to capitalize on tourism searches.

In short, there’s rarely very useful local-oriented stuff out there. Fill that gap.

A few ideas:

• The Guide to Mushroom Hunting in Long Island Parks
• The Best “Pick Your Own” Spots on Long Island’s North Fork
• The Guide to Long Island Beaches

It might help if the topic is at least somewhat related to your business, but the point is to build something awesome – a well-written, well-designed resource. Then you need to tell people it’s there – let local website owners know, especially if their business or website is related to the guide.

6. Herald other local businesses

Don’t be afraid to talk up other businesses, even people who may technically be your competitors.

For one thing, it just builds good karma – not in the mystical way (unless that’s your thing), but being generous and promoting other people almost always comes back to your benefit in the long run. People often feel a need to reciprocate when someone’s done something generous for them. An immediate return shouldn’t be your goal (it’ll be obvious if it is), but things have a way of coming back to you one way or another (especially in local business where the world is much smaller). Plus, it just feels good to do it.

Not to mention it shows your confidence. If you’re not afraid to talk up what someone else is doing it makes you look a lot less desperate for work. And confidence is attractive.

7. Sponsor a local event or charity

There are obviously more reasons to do this than online marketing. It’s just good marketing in general.

But when the events or charities you sponsor have websites, you can usually be featured there. And along with being featured, you can usually get a link to your site. And links help you rank better.

Similar to #5, you don’t want to go into a sponsorship with an obvious attitude of getting back as much as you’re giving. But it’s the karma thing again -generosity has a funny way of coming back to you whether you ask for it or not.

And if you ask for a link to your website in the mean time, that’s not usually asking too much.

8. Buy banner ads on local online publications

Online advertising tends to be cheaper than print. You aren’t paying for all the overhead that has been dragging down print publications over the last few years.

There’s something to be said for banner blindness online. People increasingly ignore banner ads on websites. But you can still gain some awareness out of a well-placed ad that grabs attention.

Additionally, many online publications will include a link back to your website with the ad. In these cases the ad is giving you dual value: 1) it’s serving the traditional purpose of organically gaining people’s attention, and 2) it’s building one more inbound link to your website (helping your site rank better).

9. Develop a useful mashup

Using open services with APIs (that’s programmer speak) like Google Maps, you can create all kinds of useful tools specific to your local region.

A prime example of this is the live, interactive maps that were created during the 2007 California wildfires.

Hopefully there isn’t such a catastrophe in your neighborhood – and there are other ways to use this functionality.

How about an interactive map of all the great picnic spots in your county, for example?

There’s some cost in setting these up (you’ll probably have to hire a developer) – but if your mashup spreads and builds you a handful of inbound links, that cost is often worth it.

10. Publish case studies with testimonials

Social proof is powerful. People are much more likely to believe one of their peers than they are to believe you, the person doing the selling.

Don’t take it personally, we’re just wired that way.

The great thing about local case studies with client testimonials is that while they hit on all of those important triggers – social proof, demonstrating results, etc – they also tie you to your community.

This is especially powerful if your work improves the overall beauty or integrity of your community. If you do renovations, for example, or landscaping. Not only are you demonstrating how you’ve helped one of your customers (and letting them report on how happy they’ve been with the experience), but you’re showing your contribution to the community.

11. Host a local event (and the feedback)

Chances are, whatever your business model is, there’s some aspect of DIY to it. In other words, there are things people can do for themselves without hiring someone like you. Or at least there are things they should know.

Hosting a local event is a classic marketing tactic – you can teach people about something that will allow them to help themselves (instant value), and while you’re doing that it builds your position of authority.

Why not also build a place on your website where attendees can reflect on the experience? Invite one or two of them to write about their experience, what they learned, or maybe post questions about things they still don’t understand.

Host the conversion. It makes your website the destination.

12. Cross-link with your affiliates and friends

When nobody links to your website, your website won’t rank for any even modestly competitive keywords.

So you need links to rank.

One of the easiest ways to start getting some links: leverage your existing relationships. Approach your affiliates, your friends, any industry associations or local associations you belong to, and ask them to link to your website (and you’ll link to theirs in return).

This “reciprocal linking” will help both websites do a little better in search rankings.

Note: don’t go overboard with this. It’s better to keep it to actual real world relationships. Search engines don’t appreciate it when people engage in large link building schemes – and if they catch wind of you reciprocally linking to hundreds/thousands of sites that aren’t related to yours, they may penalize your site.

13. Start a local-focused newsletter

Many people are still more comfortable with email as their main source of incoming content online.

Publishing a newsletter for a local audience is a great way to keep in touch with your community – and keep you and your business in their minds.

It’s all about value here, and you’ve got to provide it in spades. The worst thing to do in a newsletter is get salesy. It turns people off, and they’ll unsubscribe. And you won’t get what you’re after.

Instead focus on making it the best newsletter possible, with loads of relevant, timely and valuable information. This isn’t about direct sales, it’s about building an audience of people who trust you.

14. Champion a cause, talk about it on your site and invite others to join the conversation

Ever hear the expression, “all politics is local?”

People are much more likely to get passionate about things going on in their own back yard.

What are the local causes you can get behind? Maybe there’s a local park you want to protect/promote, or a historic building that is threatening to collapse or be condemned.

You may not want to ruffle feathers, but playing it safe is the best way to be boring and forgettable.

I’m not saying get controversial and focus on issues that divide the community, but if it doesn’t bother anybody chances are it’s a topic nobody cares about.

Start a section of your site that speaks to the issue/cause you’re passionate about, and invite others to engage in conversation with you there. Host an open dialogue. This is one more way to make your website more than just an interactive brochure. It gives people a reason to show up and engage.

15. Showcase great photos of your neighborhood

Chances are there are some passionate photographers in your area, both amateurs and professionals.

Search Flickr for photos taken in your area. Many times these photos can be used provided you give credit to the photographer – which you should anyway.

Put together a section of your site where you showcase the beauty of your community, and publish the work of local photographers there.

Not only will they be happy you appreciate their work, but it’s likely some of them will point their friends and colleagues to your site (maybe with a link)  to see it.

16. Take some great photos yourself and spread them via Flickr

Flickr is also a great way to spread your own content.

This won’t necessarily work for every business (if you run a debt collection business, for example, it’s doubtful there’s much you could photograph and post to Flickr that people would want to see).

For many businesses, though, this is a great strategy.

Quick tips for this:

• Tag your photos with everything relevant you can think of
• Use keywords in your photo titles (use the same language to name your photos as you think people will to search)
• Allow Creative Commons sharing (this means people can freely republish your photos so long as they link back to you) – this is a great way to allow others to spread your content, and brand, for you
• Make sure people can get back to your main site (via a link in the photo description and your profile)

17. Do some guest writing for local bloggers and publications

The problem of online marketing for most small businesses is that they don’t have much of an audience.

An audience means attention, attention means links, links mean better rankings, etc.

So how do you start building an audience?

One of the best ways is to find an existing audience somewhere else, show up and be cool and informative.

Find blogs and online publications that focus on your area, get to know the people who publish them and, once they know who you are, ask them if you might write a guest post/article for them. Most will be happy to, provided your content isn’t salesy, is well-written and provides value to their readers.

You get in front of a new audience, and usually you get a link back to your website as well (2 wins).

18. Network with the local online community via social media

In-person networking is a classic way to get new business and build your professional network overall.

Over the last few years networking has moved increasingly to the online world.

Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook all present opportunities to connect with people in your area.

For Twitter, Twitter Grader is a good tool to find local Twitter users in your area. Just search for your town/city/county/region and you’ll get a list of the Twitter users that match your search, sorted by their “grade” (a basic measure of how many followers they have and how active they are).

The key here is not to get salesy. Hard selling doesn’t work in these arenas. In fact, it’s counterproductive – you’ll turn people off.

Instead, show up, be cool and be helpful. People want to hire someone they like.

19. Go global – get involved in the bigger conversation

Whatever your industry chances are there’s a broader conversation going on around it.

If you run a construction company, for example, there are frequently new laws and regulations dictating how your projects will have to be managed, how you handle employee safety, etc.

These issues effect everyone in your industry – not just the people in your local area. And you probably have something to say about it.

Seek out the places where these issues are being discussed – blogs, forums, social networks, etc – and join the conversation. The benefits here are multi-fold:

• You gain exposure to a new audience
• You can often build new inbound links through these online communities (which helps your site rank better overall)
• You might make a few new friends in the process

20. Hold a contest with a valuable prize

Contests are frequently used to build an audience and attract attention online and off.

If your business lends itself to the model, a contest is a great way to get attention locally as well. And why not use the online channels to promote it?

Get entrants to do something relatively easy to apply – like write a comment on your blog post explaining their biggest problem with X (and X should be related to what you do).

The prize should have real value (hint: a “free consultation” doesn’t sound so great).

You can gain a few things from this strategy:

• A list of people interested in your product or service
• Market research (all of those explanations of the common problems your market perceives)
• Traffic and links to your website
• Testimonials
• A few new long-term customers

Laura Roeder created a great video explaining how she uses this strategy. It’s definitely worth watching.

There are more possibilities than I’ve named in this list, and if I haven’t included something you’ve done for yourself or a client that helped you leverage the web to grow a local business, I’d love to hear about it in the comments.