Trending December 2023 # Local Discovery Market Continues To Grow # Suggested January 2024 # Top 16 Popular

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As people begin to rely on services and apps to help them navigate the world around them, local discovery is going to get a lot more crucial to search marketers who are wanting their business to be found online. As Boris Zilberman mentioned back in January, consumers are looking to be “immersed in their platforms” and are looking for a service that can provide them with what they want, right away.

While Google Now and Siri are focusing on giving users a wealth of information that comes from both their personal (“What time does my flight leave Friday?”) to the informational (“What is the best place to get sushi near me?”) queries, local discovery services are providing users with things to do around them, even if the user doesn’t know what they want (“What can I do Friday night?”).

Local Discovery Apps and Services

Services like Sosh, which just received $10.1 million in funding according to AllThingsD, use personalized recommendations to give users a list of things they can do around them, based on their interests. Sosh claims it is a “personal concierge for your life,” which is exactly the type of platform immersion Zilberman touched on in his January piece. Users are expecting their technology to help them organize their life and keep them entertained.

Sosh gives event recommendations based on location, user demographics, behavior, and friends. It is currently only available in New York City and San Francisco, but there are several other local discovery services that promise to find users something fun to do.

Instead of solely focusing on location and preset personal preferences, discovery app Gravy also asks users what they are in the mood for.

This helps users narrow down what they are interested in without knowing specifically what they are looking for. Gravy is also available in most major markets; including Kansas City. Besides their mood filter, Gravy also lets you see trending events nearby and allows you to sort by event type, if you’re not into choosing by mood. One of these “channels” is Free & Discounted, which is a great option for students, young professionals, and others on a budget. Local discovery’s hottest market is currently those aged 18-40. AllThingsD reports that in the 21-41 age demographic, one in six people are using Sosh in San Francisco.

What Does This Mean For Marketers?

Local discovery is another niche that marketers need to make sure their businesses’ events are being found in. Sosh and Gravy let anyone submit events to be included in listings, and both services use a mixture of online calendars, newspapers, RSS feeds, and other online event sites to curate their recommendations. Sosh has one city curator for each city in a salaried position who works on personally finding events and activities to add to the site. It also has tastemakers in each city, who are local influencers that highlight events.

To step up your local discovery game, be sure to have a well-optimized website for both mobile and web, an easy-to-access event calendar, and a steady presence on all popular event calendars, business listings (especially Google Maps) and review websites in your local area. SuperMedia reports that missing business listings cost local businesses up to $10.3 billion annually due to lost revenue. Businesses need to realize that local discovery will be a combination of social and algorithmic suggestions, and be proactive to make their local search presence as strong as possible.

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With New Swiss Host, Wikileaks Continues To Publish

After being effectively booted off the Web by its U.S. domain name system (DNS) provider, the whistleblower website WikiLeaks has managed to reemerge on the Swiss domain, where it continues to publish classified cables detailing the activities of U.S. diplomats around the world.

EveryDNS.net, a group providing free domain name services, terminated WikiLeaks’ service followed what it described as a severe distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack.

On Monday, chúng tôi informed WikiLeaks that it would terminate its service in 24 hours owing to the attack, which it claimed violated its usage agreement for disrupting other domains that use the service.

“EveryDNS.net is not taking a position on the content hosted on the chúng tôi or chúng tôi website, it is following established policies,” chúng tôi said in a note on its site. “No one chúng tôi user has the right to put at risk, yesterday, today or tomorrow, the service that hundreds of thousands of other websites depend on.”

Then, Friday afternoon, WikiLeaks said its site was back online with Web addresses in the German (.de), Finnish (.fi) and Dutch(.nl) country code top-level domains.

WikiLeaks’ troubles with its DNS provider come as the latest fallout from the publication of the massive cache of secret diplomatic cables that began on Sunday, a move that elicited harsh condemnations from the Obama administration, and an announcement from the Justice Department that it is pursuing an investigation into WikiLeaks and its founder, Julian Assange, an Australian citizen believed to be in the United Kingdom. British media outlets have reportedthat authorities are expected to arrest Assange within days on unrelated rape charges he is facing in Sweden, in addition to numerous potential criminal charges in various countries pertaining to the publication of stolen documents.

In the meantime, WikiLeaks has lost its hosting service in the United States after Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) dropped the site from its Amazon Web Services cloud-based storage platform, claiming that the organization violated its terms-of-service agreement, which stipulates that customers must “own or otherwise control all of the rights to the content.”

Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Ct.), the chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, praised the move, saying that he would be pressing Amazon for details of its relationship with WikiLeaks.

“I call on any other company or organization that is hosting Wikileaks to immediately terminate its relationship with them,” Lieberman said in a statement. “Wikileaks’ illegal, outrageous and reckless acts have compromised our national security and put lives at risk around the world. No responsible company — whether American or foreign — should assist Wikileaks in its efforts to disseminate these stolen materials.”

Amazon, for its part, said that its decision to take down WikiLeaks was its own, disputing speculation that it had been acting at the behest of the government.

“There have been reports that a government inquiry prompted us not to serve WikiLeaks any longer. That is inaccurate,” Amazon said in a blog post.

WikiLeaks responded testily, again by Twitter.

“If Amazon are so uncomfortable with the First Amendment, they should get out of the business of selling books,” the group said.

Kenneth Corbin is an associate editor at chúng tôi the news service of chúng tôi the network for technology professionals.

How To Find Influencers For Local Seo

For the vast majority of companies, it doesn’t get much better than a local influencer. Certain global influencers can have a reach that would help just about any company (Mark Cuban comes to mind), but by and large it’s the local influencers who can really bring conversions to your website. This is not only because local influencers are closer to the action—and in many cases more trusted—but they’re also easier to connect with from a company standpoint.

It takes a lot of effort and trust to build a relationship, but when it comes to those in your community you have a lot more ammo to work with. What do I mean by this? You have more in common, less competition, better mutual connections, to start. The hardest part is finding these influencers in the first place.

Who are Local Influencers?

Influencers, in general, are people who have a lot of reach and trust with your target audience. Over time they have proven themselves to be credible, so they are not only highly connected to your audience (and therefore have a large reach), but they’re trusted and persuasive. If you have an influencer on your side, they can help get the word out to the right people better than you could have done on your own because they have this reputation. Celebrities are the most obvious influencers, but of course every industry has their own smaller “celebrities” who have similar power.

A local influencer is exactly as it sounds—someone who influences your local audience. Just as local SEO is more targeted with less competition (and therefore more successful for a business), local influencers can be as well.

How Local Influencers can Affect Your Local SEO

In one sentence, local influencers can help improve your local SEO by getting the word out to a targeted audience through social sharing, natural links, and traditional mentions.

The idea is that the good publicity from such a reputable source will help spread the word—helping your company earn more natural links, more reviews, etc.—so you become more authoritative in your niche. The more authoritative you become, the higher Google will rank you on local search and the more visibility you will get. It’s basic SEO logic, which you can learn more about here if you’re unsure how SEO works.

First Step: Know What a Local Influencer Looks Like for Your Business

Before finding a local influencer, you need to be able to decide what makes someone a local influencer for you. There are sure to be a few obvious names in the industry, but oftentimes there are influencers out there that you actually have to find (and not just “know about” automatically). To understand what a local influencer means to you, create a list of what criteria that person should meet. This criteria will essentially be characteristics that can help your company reach its goals.

A few ideas include:

Having an up-to-date blog with quality content

Experience in the industry

A large number of quality followers on their social media accounts

Connections with the press, community events, etc.

Once again, this is not a one-size fits all approach. It’s up to you to determine what “local influencer” means in your industry, with your audience, and for your specific business. Spend some time asking yourselves these questions and creating a list. Once you do, you’re ready to go out and find the right people.

How to Find Local Influencers

Below are different ways, places, and tips for finding those local influencers who will help you improve your local SEO:

Go to Local Networking Events and Conferences

As a local business you’re likely attending these functions for networking purposes anyway, so this one is a no-brainer. This is not only the perfect place to meet local influencers and start to create a relationship right away, but pay attention to what’s being discussed. Is there a name or two that you’ve heard more than once? If so those may be good people to research and learn more about.

It’s also a great idea to be very candid at events and not only try to meet and hear about influencers, but actually ask who everyone sees as an influencer in your industry. Take your own mini poll and mention that you’re looking to expand your network—you’ll be surprised at just how open people are to helping.

Ask Customers how They Found You, and Include “Influencer” as an Open Option

Whether it’s on a Thank You page, job application, or just before an appointment, a good local business will have a survey or drop-down menu asking how someone found the company. The choices are usually Internet, Job Board, Yelp, Social Network, Friend, Newspaper Ad, etc., but you don’t often see an option of “Influencer”.

While you may want to use the term “celebrity”, or something more generic, add this as an option and then leave a space for your customers to tell you who exactly taught them about you. This is a great way to get a direct list of local influencers that you can then check out on your own using the criteria above.

Do Your Research on Social Networks

I recommend starting with Facebook and then working your way to LinkedIn and Twitter. Make sure that the influencer has a strong presence on all three networks and make sure that you have mutual friends and followers. The more mutual connections you have, the more of an influence someone is to your audience specifically.

No matter what network you’re searching on, however, it’s important to always look at the content and quality of followers. Make sure they are frequently posting quality content, as a large number of followers doesn’t always mean they’re a trusted source. If a lot of the connections aren’t active (a quick way to do a check is to see if they have a lot of followers without pictures), that’s also a red flag.

Use a Tool Such as Followerwonk or Buzzsumo

There are many different social media tools out there that specifically work to help you find influencers in your niche (it’s usually up to you to determine if any have a local connection). Moz’s Followerwonk is a great option for Twitter. It not only helps you see information about your own followers and posts, but it will try to find the best people out there to share your content (aka influencers) based on Twitter analytics.

Below is a screenshot example I took using the tool. As you can see, I typed in “Memphis digital marketing” to see if there was anyone on Twitter active with those keywords. I got a few ideas and have a lot of their information right there ready to go. I can now use those names and do more research to see if they’re the right people to work with.

The Pro option for the tool ($99/month) even has a tab specifically labeled “influencers” there to give you ideas, so that’s the way to go if you have the budget available.

Extra: What About Google+?

Google+ Ripples got a lot of press a year or so ago when it came to finding local influencers, but as of March 2023 they have been discontinued. However, that doesn’t mean that Google+ is completely out of the game. Even though their specific tool for finding influencers is gone, you can still use the network the same way you would the networks above. Look at your analytics and see if you notice anyone sharing your content and then do your research. You may always want to try looking at your competitors’ pages to see who their influencers are.

Ask Your Loyal Customers in Person

Last but not least, a great way to find these people is to actually ask your loyal customers. Even if your customers aren’t all local, still send out an email letting everyone know that you’re looking for new opportunities. It’s really as simple as that. Even getting one name can be a good lead into working with someone new.

Again, you don’t have to say “influencer”. In fact, you don’t have to mention wanting to find people at all. Ask your customers what blogs they read, where they get their news, what events they attend, etc. This will be a good lead into finding the people who can help you.

Your Next Steps

As discussed above, finding local influencers to connect with is half the battle. The other half is knowing how to reach out, make an impression, and create a lasting relationship so you can both help each other when it comes to online traffic and your audiences.

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How To Use Local Data Aggregators To Cost

Updating and managing your online business directory listings (aka ‘citations’) across many directories is both a time consuming and tedious process.

In a recent survey of local SEO professionals by BrightLocal, Citation Management was voted the MOST frustrating task SEOs had on their to-do lists!

So it’s not surprising that Citation Management is the #1 task that SEOs outsource to third-party services like BrightLocal.

Incorrect Business Contact Information is a Major Problem

Having business listings which contain incorrect contact information is a big issue that causes concern among business owners and frustration for consumers who are trying to find out more information about a business.

In fact, this problem is so common that it affects almost every ‘local’ business that has an online presence.

And this problem multiplies every time a business moves location, gets a new phone number or changes their name (i.e. through rebranding, merger or sale.)

The consequence for business owners is two-fold:

Incorrect business contact information can lead your customers astray, directing them to an old location, prompting them to call a dead number and making them frustrated.

It hurts your Google ranking on local and map results. Google scans the web for information about your business. Google’s mission is to give searchers correct and accurate information and when it finds conflicting details about your business, it reduces the trust they have in your business — which impacts your ability to rank high in local search.

Local Data Aggregators are a Primary Source of Business Information

One of the biggest sources of business data are Local Data Aggregators (LDAs).

LDAs are companies that gather data about local businesses and then sell or distribute that data out to a network of third-party online business directories, mapping services, GPS services and mobile apps.

These LDAs are often the source of old and/or incorrect business information. And because they distribute their data far and wide, their impact & reach is huge.

By correcting your business listings with each LDA you can get your correct business data distributed out to their full network of online directories, GPS services, mobile apps etc.

Big Four LDAs in USA

In the US there are four major local data aggregators. Each of these data aggregators has a different distribution network (although there is some overlap) that ensures your business’ data is correct in as many places online as possible. To get the best coverage you should update your information with all four LDAs:

A Big Time Saver. But Still Not Perfect.

If you wanted to update your data directly on every online business directory, mapping service, GPS and mobile app, it would take you hundreds of hours of pain-staking research and effort.

Updating via LDAs is a big time saver, but it still takes a few hours and an understanding of how LDAs work to ensure its done correctly.

But help is at hand in the form of services that allow you to update all data aggregator information from one simple account.

Save Time and Money on your Business Listing Management

Services like BrightLocal let you input your data one time and then they update all four LDAs automatically for you.

BrightLocal also provides free updates for 12 months. So if you move locations or change your phone number, you can get your updated details distributed to the LDAs and their networks — free of charge.

So what’s the catch?

Well, to use BrightLocal it costs US$55 to submit to all four LDAs. This is a one-time fee and covers you for 12 months of updates to each of the four aggregators.

Comparison of Similar LDA Services

To help you fast track your research, the following table compares five of the most popular services that distribute to LDAs.

Service Infogroup Localeze Factual Acxiom Cost BrightLocal ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ $55/year Yext x x ✓ x $499/year Whitespark ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ On Request MozLocal ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ $84/year Advice Local ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ $100/year

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The Guide To Digital Branding For Local Businesses

Whether it’s the strategic partners, customers or employees themselves, digital branding relishes the all-encompassing feeling of a digital businesses profile

Digital Branding, as a term, has been coined as the cornerstone of modern marketing technique, where various digital channels and assets are used to communicate a brand’s positioning in the ecosystem as part of the multi-channel brand communication or engagement programmes.

The competition across nearly every industry is becoming more fierce by the minute.

For this very reason, developing an identity for your local business and devising a plan to reach out to your audience has never been more important than it is today.

Your local business no longer needs intermediaries in order to have a direct interaction with customers. With the onslaught of digital branding, a message well-delivered has the potential to impact real-life experiences that can be transmitted through multiple networks.

Download our Premium Resource – Brand vision and identity playbook

This playbook will enable you to define your approach, branding expert Debbie Inglis explains a structured approach to review and define your brand identity to make it more appealing to customers.

Access the Brand vision and identity playbook

However, we noticed that so many companies fall down in creating a solid digital branding strategy, the reason being the lack of cohesion within their various digital activities.

For instance, they may have paid one company to build their website, hired an employee to run their social media in-house, leases a 3rd party to do their SEO, and promised one of the owner’s cousin to do their PPC.

There’s so much lost in translation that it often becomes very difficult to maintain a centralized brand and marketing strategy.

95% of businesses claim that they have an in-hand branding strategy. But extensive research speaks otherwise, it appears that only about 25% are consistently executing their brand strategy. While only 60% of the content produced by these businesses conforms to any kind of branding standard. Broadly, more than half of their marketing efforts are “freestyle”. They start with “Let’s try this”, ”Oh, that looks like a good idea”. Now, you know the drill.

Here are four key areas that you need to work on to set up a solid branding foundation:

1. Fabrication of homogenous Creative Assets

When it comes to the literal understanding of branding, branding is anything that helps your target customers instantly recognizes your company. Traditionally, your brand has all the creative assets in place like:

Company Name

Logo

Fonts

Color schemes

Advertising methods

Message

If you are consistent with these basic branding components, it is more likely to have customers recognize your brand. A brand not only defines your company, it also decides how people will perceive the message that you intend to impart.

You can be the best quality, a customer-oriented company out there, but if people fail to see you this way, you need to put some extra efforts in your brand.

This is branding 101. Business leaders have long known that branding is the key to success in any industry. For example, The Death Wish Coffee Co., billed itself as “The World’s Strongest Coffee,” plays around the “death” angle to resonate with its brand message of being “World’s Strongest Coffee”. They gave a simple yet evocative branding to their product and positioned the product in terms of an entire segment of the coffee market that doesn’t care about taste—they just want to feel awake.

2. Having the right User Experience in place

If the website is slow, not mobile-friendly or is hard to navigate, this impacts how your potential customer perceives your brand. You won’t bag a sale, and maybe they won’t ever come back to test your service. Therefore, a responsive website is the centerpiece for all marketing efforts leading to the digital branding of small businesses.

When you talk of a good user experience, Brass Lantern Inn proves a good example. The layout of the website is filled with photos and videos that take you around the property while contributing easy navigation. The Brass and Lantern Inn’s website appeals impressive both on desktop and mobile. It offers a user-friendly reservations system and integrated features like maps, weather app, and gift certificate purchasing. Visitors to the website have an easy user experience, making them more likely to complete a booking on the website.

3. Making Your Site Visible in Search Results

Google uses a preset algorithm to rank websites in the search results. The quantity of reviews is important as a signal for Google regarding the popularity of your business from third-party independent consumers. While 90 percent of consumers would skip reviewing if asked, only seven percent have been consistent on their reviewing activity. So, on your part-ask for reviews not only on Google but also on Yelp, TripAdvisor, Yellow Pages sites and other similar directory listings.

Tip: You can wield SEO strategies to achieve these high rankings in searches.

4. Focusing on Social Media Branding

If you want to make people aware of your brand then there is no better way than social media. Social media has turned out to be one of the most effective tools to market your brand and stand out of the crowd.

The basic idea behind social media branding is to boost brand awareness by consistently using the right methods to engage with your target audience across various social media platforms. You can leverage the power of social media branding to build a robust network of fans who are not just loyal to follow your brand but also get motivated to buy from you.

Let’s take an example of a small Michigan-based company, Repair Clinic, which has a local business store for sales, whilst providing videos to repair parts and accessories virtually on their Youtube Channel. They have leveraged the power of social media to provide value to their followers. Their videos just help educate their audience, they provide a veritable treasure trove of optimized content which brings in new traffic via organic search listings.

Conclusion

In sum, the process of building your brand should permeate all your marketing campaigns and strategies. You can get the most out of your branding efforts, by being consistent. Start with developing a style guide and clear branding strategy. Follow this guide across channels to increase visibility and evoke positive feelings toward your brand.

How To Grow The Business – Key Insights For Smooth Transition

You know when your business should expand internationally. Expanding your business internationally can present many opportunities, potential customers, as well as obstacles.

It helps you grow your business and also allows you to understand the global market. If you are looking to make your mark on the world, now is the right time to do it.

There are many things to consider when expanding your business internationally. Multilingualism isn’t enough. You also need to be able to take your business to a country that meets their requirements. It should be useful and serve a purpose.

Here are some questions to ask before you start:

Is my product likely to sell in the targeted culture?

Are your customers familiar with the products or services you offer?

Are you positive it will work in this country?

How does the infrastructure look?

How to Expand Internationally: Keep your Business Purpose Alive

It is important to fully understand the potential of your brand in its current market and national version before you expand it internationally.

You may have difficulty expanding your business internationally if your brand strategy doesn’t meet the mark. Understanding your customers is the first step to understanding them abroad. Your brand is what will make or break your business. This includes product packaging, website design, customer service, and who your ideal buyers are. You need a solid strategy that can work for all of these.

Also read: Top 10 Job Search Websites of 2023

Do not forget about Cultural Barriers and Language Barriers

There are many obstacles to overcome when you try to enter a foreign country. Two of the most important obstacles are language and cultural differences. These two issues will require you to adapt your marketing and branding strategy to appeal to your customers differently and highlight their culture.

This means that even if your office is new, you need to think about the culture of the office. Work/life balance can be different in every place, so you should make decisions that are based on that.

Language barriers can make it difficult to communicate with others when you are there. This can be avoided by learning a foreign language. This shows respect for their culture and values. It also helps to build meaningful relationships.

It is possible to identify the language spoken in your area and how long it will take you to learn it. You can then create a plan and start learning the language to help you move your business forward.

Focus on the market needs that your business can solve

Global does not necessarily mean that the whole United States is your target country. It all depends on many factors. Some regions are better markets for your product.

These are some tips to help you choose which areas to focus on:

Is there a need for my product/service in this area?

These are just a few of the many options available to you. You can also choose the areas that matter most to your business and pinpoint the best places for your product.