online advertising

Beef Up Your Local SEO With an Offline Boost

Last Updated: March 24, 2016

We’re always harping on you about what you should be doing online to help your business’s search engine optimization efforts. But we sometimes forget to mention what you and your fellow business owners should be doing offline. You know—in the real world.
Thankfully, seasoned SEO consultant Marcus Miller is on it. He wrote a wonderful article recently discussing how you can supplement your local SEO with offline advertising.
Titled “Local SEO Beyond the Browser,” Miller’s article dives into the importance of keeping your company present in the minds of your desired customers. This can be done through flyers and ads, storefront signage, company vehicle decals, business cards, and even social media. For consumers, seeing your ad will stimulate a want or need, which ultimately drives them to seek you out online.
Often, seeking you out online equates to a Google search. And, as we all know, the local search space tends to be over-saturated with businesses in the same category. So, instead of depending on the statistically small chance your business will pop up in a search for “plumbers in Phoenix,” promoting yourself offline will keep you steps ahead of the competition. That’s because, when people go to research local plumbers in their area, they’ll recall seeing your flyer last week and google your company specifically.
However, Miller points out that this doesn’t mean you can skate by without any local online advertising or search engine optimization. Rather, offline and online promotions should support each other. When that prospective customer googles your company name, you want them to see a lot of valuable, favorable information about you right away. Thus, you’ll need to do a good deal of SEO work to shine the most flattering light on your company. This is where business listing optimization, reputation management, and remarketing all come into play.
After all, once someone has googled you, it’s your job to convince them to hire you.
Miller’s bottom line?

The local businesses that will win the marketing battle in 2016 and beyond will connect the dots between the physical business premises and their digital profiles. Invest and commit in this approach, and your competitors will not know what has hit them.

For more specific offline and online advertising tips, check out the full article over on Search Engine Land. It’s a great read!

READ: Why a Team of SEO Specialists Is Superior

Last Updated: July 9, 2015

When searching for an online advertising provider, business owners must decide between hiring a single SEO professional or hiring a team of SEO professionals. As with any scenario, there are pros and cons for each side. However, according to Jayson DeMers’s latest column on Search Engine Land, “The Case for Niche SEO Specialists,” a team of SEO specialists is the best choice.

Essentially for DeMers, it boils down to whether you want a jack-of-all-trades operating on his own or a group of masters working together. DeMers calls solo professionals “generalists” because they have a well-rounded, generalized set of SEO skills. However, generalists don’t have the in-depth knowledge or precision that experienced specialists have. According to DeMers, since they haven’t spent a great deal of time perfecting any specific skill, it takes them longer to perform tasks and keep up with the field’s latest advancements. Due to their lack of experience, they’re also not as quick to diagnose problems or create solutions.
On the other hand, a team of specialists will typically have a designated specialist for each task. Content writing, site designing, link building, social media maintenance, and local reputation management are each delegated to their respective specialists. This ensures that each task is executed efficiently and accurately.
DeMers concludes:

When you start using niche experts to execute your business’s SEO strategy, you should notice an almost immediate difference. You’ll worry less about your performance on individual tasks, and you’ll see a bigger picture perspective on how everything else ties together.

Prospect Genius is proud to be such a team. We have separate writing and development teams driven by talented specialists who know the ins and outs of their niches and can perform their jobs with total precision.
Read the full article for more details.

This Glossary of Local Search Terms Is a Lifesaver

Last Updated: April 10, 2015

Think back to the last time you spoke with your Internet marketer or read an article about SEO. Did you find your head swimming in tech jargon? Did you feel like you needed the Rosetta Stone to translate half of what they were talking about? Don’t feel bad. The world of online advertising can be somewhat insular and, because it’s so complex, it’s almost as if a whole new language has developed around it.
Thankfully, the experts at Moz recognize the effect that SEO-speak has on the average consumer. They put together a comprehensive glossary of local search terms to help small business owners better understand what their marketing providers are talking about.
Some of the terms, like algorithm and visibility, are widely used and already familiar to the majority of Internet users. However, many of the other terms in the glossary will be new to readers. For example, do you know what long-tail keywords are? How about rich snippets? Structured citations? You get the idea. The glossary even identifies important brand names to know, including Google AdWords, Acxiom, Localeze, SuperPages, and Picasa.
Do yourself a favor and bookmark this glossary. Try to commit some of the most popular terms to memory and keep it handy for the next time you find yourself talking to a local search marketer.

Are You Spending Your Online Advertising Dollars Wisely?

Last Updated: February 15, 2024

Throwing Money Away

Are you getting your money’s worth from your online advertising expenses?
That’s the question many business owners should be asking themselves. You already know that having a web presence is crucial and that hiring an online advertising professional is worth the investment—but are you making the right investment for your company? Once you’ve decided to hire a provider, it’s a little more difficult to figure out if you’re actually getting the best return possible.

What Are the Options?

There are advertising options for every budget, and they can be categorized into a three-tier system of pricing.

Top-tier providers are suited for large, competitive markets and undefined geographic boundaries, and are therefore very expensive.
Mid-tier providers are perfectly serviceable for niche markets and narrow geographic boundaries, and are therefore more affordable than top-tier providers.
Bottom-tier providers are entry-level online advertisers who provide one-size-fits-all marketing, and are therefore considerably cheap.

To simplify matters, we’ll use general terms and average rates to discuss the advertising providers in each tier (as specific services and price points vary from provider to provider). Obviously, the tier that you’ll want to use will depend on your company’s marketing budget as well as its needs. At the end of the day, you want to get the best possible online advertising services that you can afford for your business.

Top-Tier Providers

In this tier, clients have a range of advertising options to choose from. However, the two most prominent options are premium outside marketers and in-house marketers.
OUTSIDE MARKETERS
Premium marketing services from outside providers generally cost around $10,000 per month or more. Not surprisingly, these services are typically reserved for large corporations that have broad national or international campaigns. Regional campaigns (in New England or on the West Coast, for example) with a more focused market will cost maybe half, but that’s still in the ballpark of $5,000. Regardless, let’s use $10,000 as the baseline price. That adds up to $120,000 spent on Internet marketing services in one year.
So, what are you getting for $120,000 per year? You’re paying for high-end, 100% customized services from a small firm that only takes on a handful of clients at a time. You’ll get personal attention at all hours of the day. Your hired specialists won’t have tons of data points to work from, given that they typically don’t focus on more than a few clients in a given year, but they’ll still be able to draw on experience from previous and other current clients in order to evolve their approach when necessary.
IN-HOUSE MARKETERS
The other top-tier option is to hire an in-house team that performs numerous online marketing activities for your company. This will involve hiring at least one promotions specialist on a yearly salary that falls between $50,000 and $55,000. (Keep in mind, costs for in-house employees go beyond salary; you must also account for health benefits, personal equipment, and other overhead costs.) However, if you want an efficient marketing team, then you’ll want to hire a couple of additional specialists, as well. If you hire just two promotions specialists, you’re already looking at a yearly cost of $100,000 to $110,000 in salary alone.
What are you getting from your in-house marketing team? You’re getting a team that, by definition, is under your employ and therefore at your beck and call. Attention to your campaign can’t get more personalized than that. However, this team is only working on one campaign, so it won’t have the benefit of A/B testing and multiple data points that come with an outside provider who has many different clients. This means they may not be able to spot trends in updated search algorithms or test new techniques with as much confidence.
THE WINNER
With the average costs of both options being relatively equal, we’d say that premium services from an outside provider will get you the biggest bang for your buck. However, they’re both viable and effective options.

Mid-Tier Providers

On the other end of the spectrum, mid-tier providers are for local businesses that are marketing to a niche audience in a restricted geographic area. These are plumbers, electricians, handymen, and similar businesses. Prospect Genius is a mid-tier provider.
This type of provider may cost between $300 and $500 per month. With these providers, a campaign is roughly 20% customized, with the remainder following a standardized procedure that’s used for all other clients. Although the vast majority of small businesses have similar advertising needs and face similar issues, mid-tier providers will work with clients to tailor campaigns as much as possible within the framework of their program. These kinds of campaigns are effective because small, localized markets aren’t very competitive and don’t require as much legwork to get off the ground.
What are you getting for $300 to $500 per month? You get all the online advertising essentials: a fully functional website with custom content, Google+ Local optimization, directory listings, social media exposure, and (usually) performance reports. Mid-tier providers typically work with hundreds and hundreds of clients who all have similar needs, so they’re exposed to a high number of data points that allows for accurate A/B testing. This means they will be able to detect patterns with different search engines and continually test new techniques to create the most effective strategy possible.
With mid-tier providers, there’s also plenty of room for clients to grow. Typical mid-tier providers will offer a wide selection of campaign upgrades and add-on features that clients may take advantage of at their own discretion. Popular expansion features include social media updates, blog posts, and pay-per-click (PPC) ads. Clients usually start out paying for the bread-and-butter package, but over time they might like their campaign’s results so much that they want to add to it to make it even stronger.

Bottom-Tier Providers

Otherwise known as “one-size-fits-all” marketers, these providers cater to small, local businesses who don’t wish to spend much money on advertising. You’ll find a lot of snake oil in this tier. These providers usually cost about $100 per month because their services and strategies apply to every one of their clients with little to no variation whatsoever. They sell the same exact product to every single client, which is how they keep their costs down. Some of the better known providers in this category are Yodle and 99 Calls.
Well, $100 a month sounds pretty cheap! But what are you getting out of it? You’re getting a one- or two-page website that’s identical to many of the provider’s other clients, as well as written content that’s been outsourced to a non-native English speaker. What’s more, most of that content is duplicated from one client to the next, with only minor details like company name and location changed. (As we all know, Google penalizes duplicate content.) But, in a way, their practices make sense: With $50 of your $100 going to overhead costs, and another $25 going to profit, these providers only have about $25 to actually spend on your campaign per month. They’re doing all they can afford to do.
Unlike mid-tier providers, who not only offer room for customization but also room for growth, most bottom-tier providers don’t offer any expansion features. What you see is what you get. The providers that do offer expansion features essentially just upgrade you to a campaign similar to a mid-tier one. In these cases, where they clearly have the resources to provide you with a better service, they should have just sold you the right solution from the start.

Go for the Best

When selecting an online advertiser, you should apply the same logic that you use when you’re selecting tools for your trade. When you go to the hardware store to purchase a new tool for your plumbing or remodeling business, do you buy the cheapest tools—or do you buy the best tools? You shouldn’t spend beyond your means, but you also shouldn’t skimp on quality, either.
Whether you’re currently in the market for a new online advertiser or you’ve been using the same one for years, keep this in mind: You get what you pay for.

SEO Can Take Months: A Hard Lesson in Planning Ahead

Last Updated: February 15, 2024

Back in 2008, Bob got laid off from his full-time desk job during the economic downturn. Frustrated with the corporate world and itching for more independence, he decided to strike out on his own and do something that he loves: working with his hands. He always had a strong work ethic and often found himself cutting down trees and planting bushes for friends and family, so he figured, “Why not open my own landscaping business?”
The following year, Bob made a minuscule living while his wife’s nursing job covered the majority of their household expenses. That’s usually how the first year of owning a brand-new business goes. Over the next several years, he tried out some advertising on his own to boost his business. He made a small website and a Facebook page, posted flyers, and distributed his business card. Business picked up a little bit, but it wasn’t enough.
Four years later, in 2012, his wife told him that their finances were getting too tight and that they needed to be saving more money. After all, they wanted to be able to send their kids to college some day soon. Bob’s phone still wasn’t ringing much come springtime, when he should have been getting slammed with landscaping jobs, so he hired an online advertiser. The advertiser, realizing that Bob needed jobs immediately, fixed Bob up with an expensive pay-per-click (PPC) campaign and promoted Bob’s Landscaping on various business directories and social media. As a result, Bob’s phone did ring with more jobs; however, the jobs weren’t pouring in like he’d hoped, and he found himself having to book jobs with flaky customers who often cancelled their services at the last minute or wound up not being able to pay in full. Not only was Bob frustrated, but he was also hemorrhaging money.
Finally, at the end of 2013, his wife’s voice of reason chimed in. She told him that they couldn’t keep losing money every year: There was college tuition and a mortgage to think about. He would have one final year to turn the business around, or else they would have to shut it down for good. This agreement lit a fire under Bob, and that very same night he started researching other advertising options. That’s when he came across search engine optimization, or SEO.
The next morning, he found and called a reputable advertising provider, who explained that SEO usually takes about three to four months to start producing measurable numbers of leads. That meant Bob’s Landscaping would start receiving good quantities of leads right around April—the start of Bob’s busy season! He signed up and, sure enough, come springtime, Bob’s phone was ringing off the hook. This time, he was able to book contracts early in the season with reliable customers who actually planned ahead. This was the type of customer he’d always wanted but was rarely able to find. Even to this day, instead of having to take any flimsy job that comes his way, he’s able to cherry-pick those enviable customers and turn down jobs that don’t seem worth the service call. His company’s finances are on the upswing, and he’s been able to keep his doors open ever since.
In short, Bob is exceedingly glad that he set up his SEO during his business’s downtime.

The Early Bird Gets the Worm

That’s the moral of this story: If you want to become like Bob and be able to cherry-pick quality customers, then you need to plan your advertising well in advance. By giving yourself a good three months for your web presence and SEO to ramp up, you won’t miss out on those valuable, early contracts. Plus, those early jobs could easily become lifelong customers if they’re satisfied with your work.

The Sooner You Act, the More You Save

When you plan your advertising in advance, not only will you get higher quality leads, but you’ll get them for a much better price. That’s because you won’t have to go into an advertising frenzy at the eleventh hour in order to get enough leads to sustain you through your busy season.
For example, let’s say you want to get 50 calls per month from May through July.

If you sign up for SEO in January, you’ll be able to reach that goal and pay roughly $300-$500 per month.
If you sign up for SEO in February, you’ll be able to reach that goal only if you also add a small-scale PPC campaign for one of your services. This will cost you roughly $600-$800 per month.
If you sign up for SEO in March, you’ll be able to reach that goal only if you also add a full-scale PPC campaign for at least two of your services. This will cost you roughly $900-$1,200 per month.

Take a look at the table below, which shows how much extra you’d have to pay if you waited to start advertising in February or March.

In other words, if you sign up for SEO in January in anticipation of the coming spring’s busy season, then you’ll end up paying the lowest price—and you’ll probably land the better customers to boot!

Learn From Bob

This year, don’t go through the hardships that Bob went through. Take a lesson from his story and skip straight to your happily-ever-after.
Note: Though based on very real experiences of several of our clients, “Bob” is a fictional character presented here for instructional purposes only.

Prospect Genius

Beef Up Your Local SEO With an Offline Boost

READ: Why a Team of SEO Specialists Is Superior

This Glossary of Local Search Terms Is a Lifesaver

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