Scott Gerber is the founder of the Young Entrepreneur Council, a nonprofit organization that promotes youth entrepreneurship as a solution to unemployment and underemployment. The YEC provides young entrepreneurs with access to tools, mentorship, and resources that support each stage of a business’s development and growth. You want to deliver marketing content that packs a punch and drives sales, but you don’t have a lot of money to spread around. You might want to consider geo-targeting, aka location-based marketing.
Five years ago “checking in” was unheard of. Today people battle to be Duke or Mayor on sites like Yelp and Foursquare. Marketers, business owners and consumers agree, less area is more.
Still, location-based marketing isn’t about jumping on a bandwagon. After all, geo-targeting can be daunting, even for the web-savvy. Should I reward check-ins on Yelp, Foursquare or both? Where should I target my marketing efforts? How long before I can expect results?
Check out these 13 tips for leveraging geo-targeting from successful, young entrepreneurs that have already tackled these questions, and more.
1. MarketMeSuite
Utilizing this software, you can set up searches for the keywords and phrases most relevant to your business, and geo-target the results. This allows you to spend your marketing dollars wisely, targeting only customers looking specifically for your service/products that are in your area of business.
- Anthony Saladino, Kitchen Cabinet Kings.
2. Get Someone on the Ground
You’ll want data, and in many cases that best data you can have will come straight from a local (or locals). Find connections with the right demographic in the right area, and ask them questions, have them conduct research, and then enjoy the advantage you have over your online-data-only competitors!
- Colin Wright, Exile Lifestyle.
3. Enhance your SEO with Geo-Targeting Tactics
Drive cost-efficiencies and improve ROI for your next search engine marketing pay-per-click campaign by running targeted IP address beta tests with Google Adwords. Offer compelling localized deals and incentives to test your effectiveness.
- Erica Nicole, YFS Magazine: Young, Fabulous & Self Employed.
4. Localize Your Website
Buy the domain extensions for countries that you’re marketing to (.co.uk for the UK, .ca for Canada, .com.au for Australia) and set up localized sites that transact in local currencies. Prospective customers will feel much more comfortable purchasing in their local currency, from a website that they feel is specifically intended for them.
- Matt Mickiewicz, 99designs.
5. Make People Feel at Home
When you begin to market to geo-targeted customers, don’t send everyone to the same page on your website. Make people feel at home by creating a section of your site for each area you’re targeting. Small things like an image of a city skyline of the target area can go a long way and make people comfortable by seeing things they already relate to.
- Ilya Pozin, Ciplex.
6. The Tweets Next Door
NearbyTweets is a great website whereby you can see what people are talking about in any city. Just search for something relating to your business and begin engaging in some meaningful conversation. If you own a fro-yo business and someone is talking about yogurt or ice cream, try asking them what their fave flavor is, or invite them to try a new one you just introduced.
- Benjamin Leis, Sweat EquiTees.
7. Look Good on Mobile
When it comes to geo-targeting, it is all about mobile. Research shows in two years mobile devices will account for over 50% of web traffic. When people are in a specific location, they will search for what they want. Make sure you can be found and your site is mobile friendly. Think about big buttons, easy navigation and simple forms.
- John Meyer, 9 Clouds.
8. Get Good at Free Tools
From a search standpoint: Facebook. Twitter. YouTube. All of these things come up page-one of Google search results if you use them correctly. Instead of spending a bajillion dollars on a paid text ad program, focus on doing really well on the free tools with a lot of Google juice. How many sponsored ads have you clicked on lately when you’re on Google? Exactly. Organic search results are king.
- Sydney Owen, 3Ring Media.
9. Facebook Ads: A Favorite for Geo-Targeting
Facebook advertising can be a very cost-effective and efficient way to geo-target and market to your customers. It is also a great tool for customer research. You don’t even have to launch a full campaign to make the most of the tools. Within the FB Ad setup mode, you can determine your actual reach based on demographics, interests and more.
- Shama Kabani, The Marketing Zen Group.
10. Use Geo-Targeting for Low-Cost, Impulse Items
Geo-targeting works particularly well for local businesses that sell low-cost, impulse items. You can now let prospects know about your offer when they’re in the vicinity, but no one is going to pop in for last-minute car or legal services. Think about what you can offer prospects on the spot — like a cup of coffee, an ice cream cone or a 15-minute sample massage.
- Laura Roeder, LKR.
11. Geotoko
Using geo-targeting gives you a deeper insight to your customer base and engages them in something a bit more personable than the traditional flyer or print ad. Coupling geo-trends with social media allows a personal conversation with customers that you wouldn’t be able to have with traditional media. With the recent acquisition of Geotoko by HootSuite, we bring together the best of both worlds.
- Ryan Holmes, HootSuite.
12. Scoutmob & Dealmap
In the bar and restaurant industry, we’ve been teaming up companies like Dealmap and Scoutmob to geo-target potential customers with instant offers for certain specials at the bar, in hopes of steering them into our doors on their way to a competitor.
- Michael Sinensky, Village Pourhouse.
13. Tweak Your Offers
When you create location-specific offers, you’ll likely get a better conversion rate. But why stop there when you can test different ways of presenting these local offers? Track the number of calls to your number, and see if changing the headline to include the city/state improves conversions.
- Nathalie Lussier, Nathalie Lussier Media.
Image courtesy of Flickr, Joshua Kaufman
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