Blog – Page 30

A Google a Day Keeps the Doctor Away… Or Does It?!

Last Updated: July 17, 2017

Curious about where your company is showing up on the web? You might think, “Where’s the harm in quickly googling my business name?” And that’s where you’d be wrong!
Googling your company name may seem harmless enough, but it can actually have surprisingly negative results. Here’s how.

Google Keeps Track of Your Search Habits

Google’s algorithm is designed to return personalized results. Factoring in your search history, search terms you favor, what location you’re searching from, and other data, Google’s search results are tailored specifically for you. So when you search, you get different results than your neighbors or coworkers, even when you search for the same terms.
One way Google compiles data for personalized results is by paying attention to both your past searches and how you interact with search results. This way, it can deliver the most satisfying results to you. So, if you frequently search for a specific keyword phrase—perhaps your company name or your town name paired with a service you provide—Google takes note.

More Importantly, It Keeps Track of What You Click

Frequently googling your company name becomes problematic when you factor clicks into the equation. Since Google personalizes its search results for each individual user, it only wants to deliver results it thinks you’ll like. So, for example, if you search for your company name and don’t click on any of the results, Google’s algorithm assumes you didn’t like any of the results listed.
No big deal, the first time. But the next time you do the same search, Google is likely to display slightly different results. After all, you told Google (by not clicking on any of the results) you didn’t like the answers it gave the first time. And if you don’t click on any of the results the second time—or the third time, fourth time, and so on—Google will yet again assume you don’t like the results and try another variant. The cycle will continue.

Negative Consequences

That’s why it’s so easy to drive your company’s placement down the list in your own personalized Google search results. And it’s also conceivable that if you search for your own company or the same service phrase frequently enough, you could impact the results displayed when other people search, too.
So, while there can definitely be reasons to occasionally search for your own company or keywords, don’t make a habit of it! If you search too frequently, the only thing you can be sure of is that you’re skewing the results displayed.
If you’re definitely not getting an accurate picture of your company’s placement on the search results page AND you might be driving your listings down the results page, why do it?!

It’s Not Always Bad

Now that we’ve scared you straight about not googling yourself frequently, we do want to note the two reasons to OCCASIONALLY google yourself.

Managing your reputation. The old saying, “All press is good press,” isn’t actually true. Bad PR can ruin a business by destroying your reputation and running off potential customers. That’s why it’s important to know what’s being said about your company online. The occasional Google search can help you do that. Alternately, you can let Google do the work for you by setting up Google Alerts. This service enables you to set specific keywords you’re interested in (such as your business name). Google will then send you a notification when it finds new results containing those search terms (blogs, articles, websites, etc.). This lets you keep an eye on what people are saying about your company WITHOUT constantly googling yourself.
Keeping your competitors in line. Did you know that Google AdWords allows companies to bid on their competitors’ company names as keywords? That means when someone searches for your company name, your competitor’s ad could display on the results page. There’s no way to know if this is happening without doing the occasional Google search. And, unfortunately, you can’t prevent this kind of ad from appearing (Google won’t take them down, as these ads adhere to current AdWords policies). You can file a complaint if a competitor is using your trademarked name in ad copy, but the competitor can still bid on your name as a keyword. Googling yourself occasionally can turn up these kinds of ads. Once you know a competitor is bidding on your name as a keyword, you can decide how to proceed. For example, you may decide that turnabout is fair play and bid on their company name as a PPC keyword for your ads…

Find Your Balance

Balance is the name of the game when it comes to searching for your company on Google. Too frequently can create problems, but too infrequently can miss other problems.
Perhaps the best approach is “an occasional google keeps the doctor away,” but that doesn’t have quite the same ring…
Have questions about your company’s web presence? We can help!

Were You Offered a Free Website Audit? It's Probably a Scam

Last Updated: July 13, 2017

Have you seen an e-mail in your inbox offering a “free website audit”? Lots of small business owners are receiving these e-mails from various sources—some valid, but most not.
Whenever a client calls us and says they were e-mailed about a website audit, or the “results” of an audit, we’re immediately skeptical. And it’s not because we’re worried about what the results will say. In fact, we’re confident in the quality of our work, so we know our clients’ websites will pass any legitimate audit. Rather, it’s because we don’t want our clients to fall for a scam.
A free website audit typically falls into one of two categories:

Outright scam
Deceptive sales gimmick

We’ve seen plenty of examples of both. They’re equally worrisome.
In this blog post, you’ll discover the telltale signs that a “free website audit” is actually a scam. You’ll also learn how to spot misleading sales tricks so you don’t get duped. So, ready to protect yourself? Let’s get started!

How to Know When a Free Website Audit Is a Scam

The good news is outright scams are fairly easy to detect. Here are a few dead giveaways that you should delete the e-mail right away:

The e-mail will be mostly text and poorly written.
The e-mail will likely address you as “the owner of [your website domain]”—or won’t address you at all.
The sender’s e-mail address will not have a business domain (like prospectgenius.com). Instead, it will have a generic domain like gmail.com, yahoo.com, verizon.net, etc.
The e-mail will have virtually no identifying information about the sender’s business: no website link, no phone number, no street address, no professional logo.
The sender makes vague references to SEO buzzwords without demonstrating any understanding of what they mean.
The sender guarantees he/she will fix your website and get it “#1 ranking.”

But the biggest giveaway of all?
The pretense that someone actually took several hours to do strategic keyword planning, audience research, location targeting, and so on—the elements of a genuine audit—for free. No one is doing that kind of work for free, especially when the website owner has never shown any interest in their services.
In short, the entire premise of this kind of solicitation e-mail is bogus.

How to Know When an Audit Report Is a Deceptive Sales Trick

As you know, there’s a difference between a downright scam and a misleading sales tactic. It’s a fine line, certainly, but it’s an important distinction.
Many well-known digital marketing companies engage in tactics that we can only describe as deceptive. They’re clearly not scams because they’re real companies providing real services. However, they often leverage fear and a lack of SEO knowledge to trick unsuspecting business owners into signing up for services they don’t need.
Take Yext for example. They send out an official-looking “diagnostics report” that supposedly shows you how your business appears on several popular websites and directories.
Here’s an example that came directly from one of our clients*:

*Business name redacted for privacy.

This report has lots of scary alerts and intimidating red text to trigger a fear response. Of course, this tactic is manipulative, but that’s not even what troubles us about this report.
What bothers us most about this report is that it’s completely false.
Within seconds, you can debunk this report. As we mentioned earlier, we’re confident that we do good work for our clients. As soon as our client sent this report to us, we knew it was fake because we knew for certain that we did, in fact, optimize a Google listing for this business.
However, since many small business owners aren’t performing their own SEO or digital marketing, they can’t be as certain. As a result, they’re more easily convinced by such a report.
That’s why we put together this quick video to show you how to fact-check these reports for your own business. Like we said, it’s insanely easy to prove them wrong. To do this, we submitted a scan of Prospect Genius via our Yahoo listing (Yext and Yahoo are partners). Yext then sent us a report of our very own, which claims, among other things, that our Google listing is missing. Watch what happens below:

In the video, you see us:

Highlight where the report says our Google listing does not exist.
Navigate straight to our Google listing, which obviously does exist.
Do the same thing again with our Whitepages listing.

(We could’ve easily gone into every single listing, but we wanted to keep this video short and sweet.)
To run this check for your own business:

Choose any of the websites where Yext claims you aren’t listed.
Go directly to these websites.
Search for your business name or phone number.

And, to be clear, Yext isn’t the only company that sends out these kinds of free website reports. However, you can use the easy steps above to fact-check virtually any report you receive.

Always Be a Skeptic

Sadly, scams are everywhere. Small business owners in particular are bombarded with sketchy e-mails and solicitations every day. If you take away anything from this blog post today, it should be to remain skeptical at all times.
If you receive an e-mail offering you anything for free, it’s most likely a scam. And if you aren’t quite sure about its validity, just do a couple minutes of due diligence. Take a second to double-check it yourself. Don’t automatically take their word for it.
And whatever you do, never give your log-in information to unknown parties.
Armed with all the information above, you should be in great shape to protect yourself from any free website audit scam that comes your way. Good luck, and stay safe!

Why You Need High-Quality Images on Social Media to Build Trust

Last Updated: February 15, 2024

It’s no secret you need photos and images to fill out your website. After all, who wants to look at a website that’s 100% text? This is one of the reasons we’re always asking our clients to send us pictures of their business. Whether they’re group shots of the whole staff, pictures of your storefront or office building, or photos of your company truck on various job sites, you need to populate your website with pictures so visitors are more likely to trust you.
However, pictures are equally important outside of your website. From Google Maps listings to Facebook pages, and all the business directories in-between, there are a whole host of places you need to display high-quality images of your business in order to attract customers.
You see, with the way local search operates these days, it’s not uncommon for people to find and call a local business without ever visiting their website. Often, they get all the information they need from Google, Facebook, or a directory like Yelp. Therefore, it’s critical to establish trust on all of these popular channels with an assortment of high-quality images.
So what kinds of images do you need on your directory listings and social media pages, and why? Keep reading to find out!

A Profile Picture Shows Customers You’re a Real Business

When someone does a local search and sees your company’s page or listing in the search results, one of the first things that jumps out is your profile picture. If you don’t have one, users are likely to look past your listing. Why? Because you won’t look as established or as credible as other businesses that have a professional-looking photo next to their names.
When people are searching the web for local businesses, they’re essentially searching for a company they feel they can trust. As we all know, the Internet has a scam or rip-off around every corner; people are rightfully wary. That’s why you need to prove your authenticity from the get-go with a recognizable profile picture (think: your logo, a company truck, a shot of your storefront, or a team picture). Right away, a profile picture helps you demonstrate that you are, in fact, a real business and not some fly-by-night operation.

A Logo Demonstrates Your Value and Professionalism

Ideally, you’ll have a logo to use as your profile picture. A logo acts as your company’s identity—a quick visual aid people will remember when they think about you. It also shows people you’re not some slapdash operation, but rather, a savvy business that took the time to think about its identity and presentation. As a result, customers will associate a higher value with your business.
So, if you have a logo for your business, use it for all of your profile pictures on listings and social media pages. Having it as your profile picture will demonstrate your value and authenticity right away. Plus, consistency across multiple channels will further establish your professionalism in customers’ minds.
If you don’t have a logo yet, have Prospect Genius’s talented graphic designer create one for you!

A Photo Gallery Makes You Stand Out From the Competition

Once users have actually clicked on your listing or social media page, they want to see what makes you uniquely qualified to meet their needs. This is where having an abundance of photos puts you above the competition. Show off previous jobs you’ve completed, share action shots of your team on the job, and “aww” us with adorable pets. In other words, highlight the unique personality of your company. Don’t be afraid to get a little personal.
As much as customers want to learn about your qualifications and service offerings, they also want to see the human side of your business. That’s what will distinguish you from other companies nearby that offer the same services.

A Cover Photo Acts as a Virtual Storefront

Lindsay Kolowich of Hubspot says, “Having a social media profile without a cover photo is like having a brick-and-mortar business without a store sign.”
The majority of social media pages and online directory listings now include cover photos. Cover photos take up a lot of space at the top of the page, so leaving this large section blank is not a good look. Instead, cover photos are a good opportunity to capture people’s attention and show off an important aspect of your business. Many times, a picture of your real-life storefront (if you have one) will work well here, because, again, it shows customers you’re a real place. However, you could also use this space to highlight your favorite service offering, a special discount, or a large group photo.
Bottom line: You need a high-quality image as your cover photo to captivate your audience and display more of your personality. Leaving it blank is not an option.

Photos Are All About Building Trust

Photos are especially crucial for local service providers like appliance repairmen, HVAC technicians, plumbers, and so on. In these types of trades, you travel to people’s homes and businesses to complete a job. This means people have to feel comfortable letting you into their building before they hire you. If your listing or social media page doesn’t prove to them you’re a real business, they’re not going to trust you. If they don’t trust you, they’re not going to call you for the job.
So, to recap, the ideal Google listing or Facebook page will have:

A professional logo as your profile picture
Quality photos of you and your team members on the job, as well as your completed work
A high-quality photo of your storefront
- Not a brick-and-mortar business? Use your company truck or van. It’s essentially your storefront on wheels.

Ready to submit more pictures for your website or off-page promotion? Need us to design a logo for you? Don’t hesitate to reach out! We want to set you up for the most success possible.

Client Testimonial: "Prospect Genius Is Genius" (VIDEO)

Last Updated: June 28, 2017

Nothing thrills us more than hearing from happy clients about how Prospect Genius’s services have helped them transform their business.
That’s why we were so happy to chat with Scott from Mackay’s Driving School LLC in East Greenbush, NY. We asked him about what kinds of business challenges he faced prior to signing up with us, what he enjoys most about our program, what kind of return on investment he’s getting, and more.
Watch as he explains how Prospect Genius helped him take his business beyond word-of-mouth and completely book up his schedule with local jobs:

Is Facebook Preparing to Take Over Google in Local Search?

Last Updated: June 22, 2017

We’ve lightly joked before that Facebook is the new Google. This is mainly because Facebook users are asking their social network for recommendations of local businesses rather than conducting their own searches on Google. However, as Wesley Young wrote in a recent article on Search Engine Land, Facebook has made several updates over the past couple of years that point to a greater focus on local businesses and places. In other words, it looks like Facebook is preparing to challenge Google’s monopoly on local search.
We’re all aware that Google uses a massive amount of data from its users to hone its algorithms and laser-target search results for each user. However, Facebook has a comparable volume of data:

With its huge base of users and volume of personal data on them, Facebook has great potential for helping users in their search for local products/services and helping businesses get found. All the components are there: millions of business pages, location data, behavior data, demographic information, social networks and engagement.

In other words, Facebook already has a tremendous amount of potential to compete with Google in the local search sphere.
Here’s a quick breakdown of how Young says Facebook is making moves toward a bigger emphasis on local search. We’ve reduced and simplified many of Young’s points, so please check out his full article, “7 Changes by Facebook That Make It a Real Local Search Player,” for more details. It’s an in-depth, insightful piece that’s definitely worth the read!

1. Better Location Accuracy

Young uses the example of his search for nearby Italian restaurants. He compares results from November 2015 and June 2017 (present). In 2015, Facebook search displayed restaurants from across the country and across the globe. Today, Facebook search displays restaurants within a two-mile radius and even arranges them on a local map, much like Google’s local search results.

2. Smarter Understanding of Search Terms

Facebook is now able to infer when a user is searching for a place or business rather than a general topic. It also presents “Places” listings at the top of the general search results whenever a place is relevant. At the same time, Facebook knows when you’re searching for a discussion topic or news item, instead. So it’s gotten much more adept at deciphering the context and motivation behind search terms.

3. More Detailed Search Results

Instead of barely relevant or minimally informative, Facebook business listings now offer as much detail as most Google business listings. They show profile pictures, full contact information, distance from the user, star rating, and whether the business is still open for the day. In other words, Facebook’s local listings give you all the same information you’d seek on Google.

4. Better Recall of Information

Facebook now keeps track of and remembers information about businesses and places that users have posted about or checked into. Not only does this lead to more accurate search results, but it also gives Facebook the ability to suggest search terms while a user is typing, much like Google does.

5. Use of Facebook Friends Within Search Results

Wisely, Facebook is using its mountains of social data to supplement local search listings. Now, Facebook Places listings may show you which of your friends have also checked in or posted about each business. Considering that many users already ask their Facebook friends for recommendations and referrals, this addition is brilliant. It’s essentially a built-in recommendation.

6. Greater Effort to Clean Up Business Info

If you checked in to a local place or business recently, you may have been confronted with a series of follow-up questions from Facebook—questions like, “Are this business’s hours from 8 AM to 9 PM?” or “Is this business located at 12 Main St.?” Facebook has been asking users to verify local business information in order to deliver more accurate results overall.

7. Addition of New “City Guides”

Facebook has a new feature that compiles and highlights popular spots in a specified city, based on its own social data. It will tell you which of your friends have visited that city, and then you can see which businesses each of those friends checked into. Again, this takes the idea of asking friends for recommendations and turns it into a local search feature.
So, what’s the takeaway for your local business? Make sure your Facebook page is completely filled out (including your exact physical location) and that you add as much detail as possible to your service descriptions. This will give you a greater chance of being picked up by Facebook’s ever-improving search function.
Good luck!

Prospect Genius