At Softline we work with allot of small and medium size business's so we are quite familiar with the fact that there audience may not be as geographically diverse as larger companies. In fact, a common question that comes up in our conversations with prospective clients is " Why should I do SEO when my clients are local? ". Thats a pretty good question and opens the door into a short discussion about Local Search Engine Optimization trends and how its become much easier to optimize locally and really target an audience.
Local optimization of websites has picked up steam as of late. While the concept is nothing new the technology that allows marketers to more effectively target their audience has improved considerably. You may think that Google, Yahoo, & MSN are leading the way on this but you will be amazed at the number of specialized search engines that have popped up that while by them selves have very little market share in search, collectively have a lead on Google, Yahoo, or MSN. These smaller search engines are designed specifically for the local market and have been gaining surprising traction. The top tier search engines havent been standing still either and have started to improve their own local search abilities with Google leading the charge.
So why is it important for small business to look at SEO? Now more than ever all business's small and large are looking online to drive more sales and traffic to their stores and websites. The fact is that more and more people are going online to search for local business versus using the big yellow book and at this point in the game its not a matter of not being able to afford SEO services its simply something you have to do to stay in line with competition.
At Softline we specialize in local optimization services for the Southern California area since this is where we are located but have clients nationwide that we will with targeted services. The hardest challenge is always showing a small or medium size business the value in this type of marketing and why they should consider it. We have found that a multi-tiered approach to optimizing locally has worked the best utilizing organinc SEO for long term results and Paid Search management for short term traffic and sales.
So with that said Local SEO services are kicking into high gear and many more companies are looking to this service to increase their company's visibility. Online marketing makes sense and diverting some of the marketing dollar to online which provides a truly measurable way to see results is a smart move.