A friend of mine once told me of his experience in searching for a local business. He is just back from abroad on a vacation. He wanted to buy plywood for some interior work in his home. He reached in the town and searched on the Google Map for Plywood Dealers ‘near me’. Only one plywood dealer was available. He couldn’t believe that only one plywood dealer was available in the town and out of curiosity, he walked around and found about 10 small and medium shops that sell plywood in different parts of the town. A few are exclusive dealers in plywood and related products, and some are hardware shops that also sell plywood. See how the presence online gives an extra edge to the local business.
He is not alone who searches for a local business online. These days more and more people resort to online medium to find local businesses. While Google Business Page offers good visibility, there are other options too. There are local search engines like Justdial in India. There will be such popular search engines in your locality too. Creating profile pages with all the information and keywords on these digital media will be an additional source of leads and business for you.
You are present in the real physical world. But what about the digital world. You have to show your presence in the digital world too. Now people are in the digital world. Here is where you are discovered by the people, your potential customers. Not only your potential customers, but even your customers also need to see you alive in the digital world. It is how they keep coming back to you.
In situations like that we have seen during Coronavirus pandemic, in extreme climates or such other circumstances, people are more cautious and try to avoid going out unnecessary. They will do a local search to find your contact and talk to you before they step out of their home to see if the items, they are looking for are available and you are open. If you are not present and visible online, you will lose out to your competition.
Take your business to the digital world. Build a digital presence!
Website
Even if you don’t do business online, a website is required to talk about your business to the outside world. It becomes a reference point for the people to check about you. Let others know what is available to you and what is happening with you. Provide information about your products and services, and how to contact and reach you. This is the basic minimum information you should have on the website. If you can update the latest information, offers, and other news, it would be great. Having a website improves your credibility for a stranger or new potential customers.
Social Media Presence
Then you need to be present in social media. A page on Facebook and Instagram to the minimum. This is where people live every day. At least a page to tell you are existent. If you can update it frequently, you can live in their mind. Make your customers feel that you care. Post seasonal greetings and occasional news. You can use these pages to keep your customers updated about the new products and services. You can post a piece of information and knowledge occasionally that may be interesting to your customers and followers.
Local Search Engines
Then you need to be present and visible in the local search. Google Business Page, local search engines like Justdial are some of them. When people search for goods or services in the locality, your information should come up. They should be able to contact you just from there, they should be able to navigate to you right from there. A page on Google Business Page would show your information in the Google Map which is handy to the people.
At least have the presence all the places online as explained above. It would be great if you could make posts regularly but be cautious – being too frequent or irregular may not be a good idea.
Don’t miss the additional source to generate business. There is an influential crowd out there online.
For a free consultation, contact us:
contact@paddyhill.com
+91 7560861700