David Mihm, provider of exceptional web design and SEO services, has completed Volume 2 of his Local Search Engine Rankings Factors guide, and there’s a ton of great info any local business can use.  With the help of a host of SEO experts, David has compiled a great report that contains expert opinions on how different on-page and off-page factors affect your business’ local search rankings in Google, Yahoo, and other search engines.

Spend some time getting to know the different factors, and then take as much of the advice as you can and implement it for your local business.  There’s a lot of info to cover in this report, but it’s well worth the time to read these experts’ opinions and to implement at least a few of the items.  For my money, the most important ideas are:

• Claim your local business listing
• Associate your local business with the proper categories
• Put your keywords in your local business description
• Put your keyword in your local business listing title (if possible)

Check out the guide, and let me know if you have any questions…

And thanks David and Contributors!

I received an email from someone who is looking to update their website this past week, so I took at look at their existing site.  And what I saw really made me angry, especially from the perspective of search engine optimization.  Their existing website was a horrible example of what works for SEO today (especially for local businesses), and in my opinion, is just another example of lazy website design and implementation.

So, in order to help other local businesses find the right company to work with so they can have some success with local SEO, here are the top five things you should look for when searching for a website design company.  And, I’ll use this website as an example (without mentioning domain names to protect the innocent).

• Meta Tags: On this site, the only meta tag being used is the Title tag.  There are three different meta tags that should be used (at a minimum) to make your site more appealing for search engines – the Title tag, the Description tag, and the Keywords tag, with the Title being the most important.  You can check out the usage of these tags by viewing the page source for a page.  In Firefox, it’s under the View tab.  The Title tag will be near the top and you want to make sure it is desriptive of the main keywords for your business.  So, for example, if you are a realtor in Pepperell, MA, you would want to have that in your Title tag at a minimum.  In addition, the Description tag is used by search engines as the description for your page.  If it’s not there, the search engine will pull some text from the page, which may not be very targetted for what you are trying to accomplish.  Finally, the Keywords tag just gives you one more opportunity to let the search engines know a little more about the content on that page.  NOTE: Every page should have targetted Title, Description, and Keywords information – don’t use the same meta tags throughout the entire site.

• Google Local Business Listing: When I searched for this business in Google, they did not show up in the Google Local Business listings (those listings next to a map at the top of the search results when you search geographically) until the third page.  Businesses in surrounding towns showed up before them!  There’s a few reasons, but the biggest is that they have not claimed their listing.  You should always make sure you own the listing and its easy to claim by clicking on the listing for your business and then clicking on the “Business Owner?” link on the top right of the listing.  In this case, the address is wrong, and the only review they have associated with the listing is a 1-star negative review.  I know the business, and they have hundreds of satisfied customers.  If they claim the listing, they can make sure they have some of their satisfied customers post reviews.

• Incoming Links: When I did a quick search for links coming into the site (by going to Google and typing “links:www.domainname.com”) it came back with seven links – one of which was from their own site, and the rest were just garbage.  With the number of great directories out there, and the number of businesses that this company interacts with, there’s no reason not to have a lot of links coming back to the site.  Sites like www.yelp.com and www.insiderpages.com offer free listings for businesses, and an opportunity for customers to rate the business.  And, since they have a ton of satisfied customers, they can ask them to rate their business on these sites, improving their standing with Google and other search engines.

• Good Content: Finally, the content on the site is plain vanilla.  When you create the content on your site, you need to think not only of the search engines, but how visitors will interact.  Determine what is it that they are searching for in looking for a business like yours, and tailor the content for them.  And make it easy for them to find it on your site.  If you have some flagship content, make sure they can see it on the home page, and probably every other page.  Become the most valuable resource for information about your type of business in the community, and you start to build your online reputation, and that results in offline reputation as well.

After seeing this site, I’ve decided I’ll put up some tutorials on how to handle each of these issues.  Today, there’s no reason why  any website design company you choose shouldn’t be making these types of suggestions from the initial meeting.  And, you should be checking their portfolio of clients to make sure that they are following these basics – if they don’t have them covered with existing clients, there’s no reason to believe they will be able to do the right things for you.

If you have any questions or comments, let me know.  I’d love to see your thoughts, and suggestions, and am going to do my best to make these tutorials valuable for you and your business.

I just came across this video from Google about real-time search (and you’ll see what I mean after watching it):

With this new search feature, local businesses have even more incentive to get engaged with social media in the right way.  As soon as this goes live on Google on a large scale, people will be seeing what other consumers are talking about.  And you want to make sure when they talk about your business, it’s in a positive way.

Here are some tips that could help you get to the front of this new Google real-time search feature:

• Make it easy for your customers to interact with you in the social space.  Make sure they know about your Twitter and Facebook accounts (or get accounts if you don’t have them) and make an effort to keep content fresh and relevant.
• Offer exclusive benefits for interacting with your social media spaces.  You can provide special offers or discounts for following your Facebook fan page or re-tweeting a promotion on Twitter.  Make it relevant and fun, and don’t waste their time with heavy-handed promotions.
• Deliver outstanding, noteworthy customer service.  Every interaction you have with a customer offers the potential for social media interaction.  If you deliver customer service that makes them stand up and notice, they just may post on their Facebook account or Twitter it to their friends.
• Respond to customer complaints quickly.  In the social media ecosphere (I’m running out of names!), bad news travels very quickly.  Make sure you monitor your brand and try to make things right with disgruntled patrons.  Your interaction will be tracked and your response is critical.
• Have fun! This is the most critical part of a social media “strategy.”  Social media is different than other forms of marketing, and you need to have a more personal face when interacting.  Pretend you’re talking to someone in front of you, and a lot of the anxiety goes away.  Don’t be afraid to make fun of yourself and your business, and keep it lively.

The new Google real-time search bears watching.  For those companies who have embraced social media and use it as a way to truly interact with their customers (or better yet, communities), real-time social media search could help boost traffic and deliver increased revenues.  And, it could be a lot of fun.