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your-business-using-local-search
Local Search Statistics and Small Business : Promote
Your Business Using Local Search
Wed, 04/28/2010 - 19:32
Local search is changing the game for those looking to market locally online, particularly small businesses.
Whether using local search marketing or local SEO, the resulting impact on traffic and sales - online and
off is impossible to ignore. Get it right and you might corner you local market, get it wrong and you'll be
left in the dust.
In any event, here are some startling statistics about local search:
**97% of American internet users use the internet to shop of which 57% characterize their behavior as
shop online, purchase offline (NPD Group)
**90% of online commercial searches result in offline bricks and mortar purchases (proprietary research /
comScore)
**82% of local searchers follow up offline via an in-store visit, phone call or purchase (TMP / comScore)
**80% of budgets are spent within 50 miles of the home (DMA / proprietary)
**74% of internet users perform local searches (Kelsey Group)
**73% of online activity is related to local content (Google)
**66% of American use online local search, like Google local search to loc
**61% of local searches result in purchases (TMP / comScore)
**54% of Americans have substituted the internet and local search for phone books (comScore networks)
**35% of all searches are local (DM News)
**25% of internet searches have a purely local, commercial focus (Kelsey-Bizrate)
What's most impressive to me is that 90% of online commercial searches result in local offline purchases
and 61% of all local searches result in a transaction. Is this an opportunity you can afford to miss? More
precisely, what you need to ask yourself is, when local customers search for what you sell, do they find
you?
So many local search statistics, but what do they mean
for the local business search?
Really what all those statistics mean is that finding businesses locally is becoming an internet driven task.
Thanks to local search tools, real local businesses are increasingly visible to local customers online. As a
result, the internet is now driving local sales as well as e-commerce. And as consumers continue to move
online, their reliance on online tools to perform searches for local information, local businesses and
everything else local will only continue to grow.
And what about that conversion rate? 61%. Almost 2/3 of customers using local search will go on to buy?
Is this an opportunity that any local business can pass up on?
Does a high local search conversion rate really make
sense?
When you think about it, a high local search conversion rate makes perfect sense. Most people are not
going to look for a local restaurant, plumber, accountant, or anyone other local service that matter unless
they plan on using it. When people search for a local seller, they are more than likely motivated to buy The
question again becomes, will they find you?
Harnessing local search : Local SEO
So at this point you may be asking yourself how you can latch on to the inertia behind local search. Its
pretty simple – one of two ways. A) Local SEO -or- B)Local Search Engine Marketing. My preference is
local SEO. Often “localized” keywords face much lower competition and less sophisticated competition –
making it easier to grab top positions and click share. And its pretty simple – find popular keywords, add a
local identified (state, city, town, etc.), check search volume, optimize and grab traffic. Not rocket science...
The bottom line?
Local search is here to stay. It is a trend that ,if embraced, can significantly fuel the growth of your local
business. It can open the doors to every customer located within the area you service at little or no cost. So
then, what are you waiting for? Local search is changing the game for businesses looking to market locally
online, particularly small businesses. Are you in?