You want to capture local business leads, but you’re worried about the cost.

Then why not give your business a boost with these FREE Local Internet Marketing tips.

Tip 1: Keyword Research like a Pro

Yes I’m afraid so keyword research, that old chestnut.

Why you ask; what’s keyword research got to do with my business?

Well the fact is that most visits online start with someone typing something into a search box.

You do want to improve your Local Internet Marketing right?

Then the trick is to understand what your prospects are typing in to find businesses like yours and use this knowledge to help them find you.

The following tips will get you started:

1. Start with a piece of paper and write down the phrases that people might type in to find your business.
2. Ask your friends and family for their thoughts, don’t laugh they’re only trying to help.
3. Combine the phrases with your main location phrase i.e. “Blue Widgets” becomes “Blue Widgets Bristol” and “Bristol Blue Widgets”.
4. Run the phrases through https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal (with exact match selected) pay attention to the “Local Monthly Searches” and download the data for future use.
5. You probably shouldn’t target phrases with very low or zero searches.

You can use this data as a starting point for everything else, from creating site content to enhancing your Google Places listing…

Tip 2. How to Add Your Business to Google Places

A listing in the Google Places snippet can be shown above the normal search results and best of all its completely free.

You don’t even need a website.

If you don’t have a Google Places listing you should get one.

If you do have a Google Places listing you should check to see that it’s up to scratch.

Even if you’ve never added a Google Places listing Google could still have constructed one from the data found about your business online.  It will almost certainly be incorrect so you should look at improving it.

For info on how to add or modify a Google Places listing see: http://www.google.com/support/places/

Verifying the listing via the telephone is usually the best way to go unless you like waiting around.

Once you have access to the listing pay particular attention to the following:

• Follow the rules set down by Google (see http://www.google.com/support/places/)
• Ensure that your business name is correct, don’t place your target keyword(s) in the business name field (unless the keyword is part of your business name) or you may get your listing rejected.
• Ensure your telephone is the correct local number (i.e. not 0800…, 0845… numbers)
• Include your correct web address (if applicable).
• Ensure that your address is correct.
• Include your opening hours.
• Double check the Map location.
• Add images preferably your logo first (Google by default chooses the first uploaded image for display in the results).
• Add any other detail that you can to make the listing look professional.
• Remember the keywords that you came up with in Tip 1, use these as a starting point to write a decent description (don’t stuff the description with keywords or you may get your listing rejected).
• Use the categories that Google suggests, don’t use custom categories (hopefully you will find ones that match/somewhat match the keywords you discovered in Tip 1).

Also see Tip’s 3 and 4 for more on optimising your Goggle Places Listing.

Tip 3. How to Add Local Directory Listings & Citations

Local Directory Listings and Citations can get your business found on the internet.

They can also improve the results for your Goggle Places Listing.

You can find places to list your business by searching for “[Your City] Directory” in Google

Warning! Beware Incorrect Details

It’s important to both Google and your prospects that your details are correct in these listings.

You can normally fix incorrect details once you’ve found them.

Modifying the following Google searches should uncover your incorrect listings:

• [Old Business Name]
• [Business Name] [Incorrect Detail]

Another Warning! Beware Paid Links

You may find paid listings being advertised while researching the above.

Paid links from the wrong sources can be problematic and can get you into trouble with Google; if you want to look at paid listings my advice would be to consult a reputable SEO.

Tip 4. Encourage Reviews! How to Enhance Your Reputation

One of the best ways to enhance your reputation is by getting online reviews.

Online reviews are also one of the best ways of improving your Google Places listing.

One obvious place to get reviews from is Google Places itself.  In addition many of the sites found during your research in Tip 3 will also allow reviews.

There are many ways to prompt / encourage people to review your business:

• Ask your fans on Facebook / Twitter (don’t be too pushy)
• Ask for reviews on your website
• Add review requests in your e-mail signature
• Ask for reviews offline

Remember to link through to the site where you want reviews to be posted.

Warning! Beware Fake Reviews

Google doesn’t like being manipulated.

Please don’t fake / incentivise reviews, you can land yourself in trouble if you do this.

Tip 5. Local Press! Going Offline to Get Online

Getting noticed in the local press is a great way to get your company noticed.

The fact that the coverage is offline is immaterial; lots of local papers have online counterparts.

If you don’t have anything to say, sit-down with a blank sheet of paper and come up with some ideas.

Leverage the differences that exist between you and your competition.

Find out how to write a press release (do a Google search) remember to include all of your business details in your release including; phone number, web address and business address.

Bonus Tips! 6 onwards…

Anyone can action the above tips and they are relevant to every local business (that I can think of).

The following bonus tips either cost money are difficult to implement, or require knowledge that you may or may not have:

• Build a Website
• Start a PPC Campaign
• Get on Twitter
• Get on LinkedIn
• Get on Facebook
• Start a Blog
• Figure out what your competitor(s) are doing and replicate / improve on their methods

How to Pay for These Local Internet Marketing Tips

These Local Internet Marketing Tips are Free.

If you liked the tips please share this article with your friends/contacts via the services below.

If you have any questions/comments post them below.

Choosing a Copyrighter to write appropriate text for your site is a minefield, you only have to post a request on a forum to be inundated with responses from a vast array of people offering this service.   You will then have to pick from a range of service providers; some highly qualified, some less than qualified and some over qualified for your needs.

The prices of the UK based freelance writer can vary dramatically from £15 (I’m not joking) to £300 for around 500 words but what can you expect when you hire these writers?  Obviously the quality of the text will vary greatly but not in my experience as greatly as one might suppose, the real factor in terms of the quality is down to the amount of research required to write a piece.  For highly technical pieces the text will not flow as freely, sources will need to be researched and correctly cited and some writers (even the more expensive ones) will avoid this work like the plague.  Other writers gravitate towards writing a string of keyword stuffed meandering sentences in a misguided attempt to cynically manipulate the search engines or their clients.

Now don’t get me wrong there are copyrighters that produce great work for £25 per 500 words but these writers tend to choose subjects that they are familiar with.  This article for instance comes easily to me I am hardly pausing between paragraphs and actually quite enjoying the process consequently it’s taken me about 45 minutes to write the above text, which is not a great deal of time and therefore more cost effective.

Guidelines for hiring a SEO Copywriter or Copywriting Service
So after some thought I have prepared the following guidelines for hiring an SEO Copywriter or Copywriting Service:

Write a Brief or Specification
Write a detailed Brief or Specification communicate what type of written work you require, the easier you make the process for the writer the better the price and the value that you will get back.

Get a Recommendation & View their previous work
Source your writer via a recommendation if possible and make sure that you have seen their previous work, is it similar to the content that you require, is it of a high enough standard?  If you can’t get a recommendation source a number of potential writers send them a full brief or specification and start the process of eliminating the unsuitable candidates.

Match the Subject to the Writer
Given the choice it is always best to match the subject to the writer not push an unfamiliar subject on to a reluctant copywriter or service provider.  If I wanted to write about Gloucester or Cheltenham I would hire a writer from these areas, if I wanted an article about cars I would talk to writers who are car enthusiasts.

Get the writer to suggest titles
Send the writer a selection of keywords and ask them to come up with titles and section headers so that you can then evaluate the potential before seeing the final written piece.

With SEO Copywriting Best Value is often the Key
You don’t need a battleship to sink a bathtub, and you don’t need an expensive writer to write about familiar everyday objects or services, the key is to source a writer who can offer you the Best Value for each project.

Quality over Quantity
One thing is for sure when writing online there are rules and the main rule is that it’s quality over quantity every time.   Rank chasing is not what good SEO is about, if your site ranks high up on the first page for a given search phrase so what if people click through to read the gibberish, will these people trust your site or end up buying from you?

This article is about 600 words long and took me around 2 hours to complete including the all important title tags and description some previous research was required.

What’s the ratio of Google.co.uk to Google.com traffic within the UK?  I have been searching for the answer to this question for weeks now.  I have conducted exhaustive searches on Google (which took all of 10 minutes) I even posted a question within the Google Support Forums and now at last I have found some data that goes some way to answering the question.

From experience I know that most UK based users are redirected to Google.co.uk by default, but I also know of other UK based users who have been using Google.com.

Finally my question in the Google Support Forums has lead to an answer supplied by Hitwise.

And the answer is:

Source: Hitwise

It now seems possible for UK businesses to submit to a third party site and thereby gain a local listing in Bing.

Bing Local Listings are similar to Google Local (or Google Maps) in that they can come up above the algorithmic (organic) search engine results when a searcher includes local place names in a search query, for example: “SEO Company Cheltenham” rather than just “SEO Company”.

Up until now I had assumed that Bing Local listing submissions could only be completed by US based companies, with the few UK based local search engine results being cobbled together from the listings on third party business directories.

All that changed after I read Matthew Elshaws’ Blog on ineedhits.com entitled “How to Setup a UK Bing Local Listing” where he talks about Daniel Dutton who has identified where Microsoft gets UK local business listings from, in his blog post entitled “Get Listed in Microsoft UK’s Bing/MSN/Live Business Directory”.

Anyway long story short if you are based in the UK and want to see if it works go to http://www.marketlocation.com/changereq/ and enter your company details.

Please note that this is rather speculative and it will probably take some time for results to be seen, so please no e-mails.  I have submitted my own site and put the word out about this and will let you know the outcome.

Justin March offers this set of instructions as ‘Guidance Only’. Therefore, Justin cannot be held responsible for any work carried out by YOU and/or ANY third party using the instructions.

I have been racking my brains trying to think of a truly wiz bang idea for my first official post on this blog; it suddenly occurred that too much thought = no work.  So I settled on coming up with a list of third party resources to educate and inform those who are about to hire an SEO or develop a website.

Google Webmaster Guidelines
The Google Webmaster Guidelines are a good place to start to ascertain Googles’ position on SEO and what to look for when hiring an SEO consultant.

Google Search Engine Optimisation Starter Guide
If you want to obey all of the rules this is an excellent overview of the basics.

The SeoMoz Beginner’s Guide to Search Engine Optimisation
The SeoMoz Beginner’s Guide to SEO is again an excellent overview of some of the processes used by SEOMoz a well respected company.

High Rankings Forum
Run by the famous Jill Whalen this is a great place to ask your SEO related questions.

Digital Point Forum
Another great Forum although unlike High Rankings I feel that often some of the less likely theories go unchallenged.

So there it is my first official post, more to come over the next couple of days whan I have a chance to think about some meatier topics.

At last I have taken the plunge and decided to launch a blog.  At present as you can see the blog is entitled “Musings of a UK SEO Consultant” although this may change depending on my mood and the way my business develops.