Google Places is a great service that allows businesses to gain exposure on the Google Search Engine Results Page (SERP). Businesses can increase their rank on the SERP by providing content that Google views as adding value for its users. Google deems a variety of content as value adding, including business hours, street addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, business descriptions, photos, videos, and blog posts. The content that Google assigns the highest trust and authority to are customer reviews.

Finebloom & Haenel does a great job of effectively using all of the content above to provide value to its current and potential clients. Here’s an example of the NAP.

They have photos of their attorneys, informational videos, walkthroughs of the offices, 24/7 phone lines, self-published books on the dui process, and much more. At one time, Darren Finebloom and David Haenel even had a weekly radio program to provide education to listeners about traffic laws. The point is that it is important to think outside of the box when it comes creating content for users and customers. The most important question to keep in mind when creating content is “Does this provide additional value to the user?”

Providing content with value is not only good for improving a business’s rank on the SERP but is also a great marketing strategy to implement regarding a company’s interactions with its customers. Businesses can build trust and authority by constantly employing the principle of value-added interactions, both online and offline. As a rule of thumb, the best offline marketing practices translate into the best online marketing practices.

Search Engine Marketers differ vastly in the ways they look at SEO and the techniques they use to improve ranking. It is important to employ strategies that are not deceptive and strive to achieve long-term results. Far too often people try to figure out ways of tricking the algorithm that Google uses for determining which order to rank websites. While these strategies may work for quick results, Google is constantly updating its algorithm to sort through these deceptive practices.  A website that is ranking at the top of Google’s SERP may drop off it complete after one of these updates. Therefore, it is best to use methods that are ultimately adding value to the users.

Abraham Lincoln once said, “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening my axe.”

For all businesses, including your own, acquiring online reviews can offer tremendous value to you, your prospects and your online marketing initiatives.  Reviews are a form of direct feedback that you can use to formulate and implement changes to improve your business, whether you run an internet marketing agency or a national courier company.

Reviews offer credibility and authority that you’ll never be able to achieve from your website alone; no matter how many testimonials are on your site. If you haven’t received any reviews on sites such as Google or Yelp, that says something. It’s important to give clients and customers the opportunity to rate your company.  Search engines, such as Google, Yahoo and Bing will take notice of these things. 

A review is an evaluation of a publication, such as a movie, video game, musical composition, book; a piece of hardware like a car, home appliance, or computer; or an event or performance, such as a live music concert, a play, musical theater show and finally we’re here to talk about reviews for businesses, such as restaurants, dry cleaners, apartment management companies, mechanics, doctors, day spas, limousine services, law firms, and other brick and mortar businesses who lose and gain customers daily based on their past and current customers’ opinions.  Reviews can be left on Google Places pages, Yelp and Yahoo! just to name a few.

There are many reasons that reviews benefit a local business.  While considering online or internet marketing principles, reviews accomplish three things; Ranking, Conversion, and Service area. There are many misconceptions about how reviews influence ranking, many don’t consider the importance of conversion.  Finally, reviews solve a very common problem among many types of businesses.

Getting customer reviews is an important step to improving your rankings in the Google Local Business Results. Ask your customer or client to leave an online review anytime someone compliments your product or services. Implementing a customer review policy in your company could dramatically improve your rankings.

Consumer reviews are written by the owner of a product or user of a service who has adequate experience to comment on whether or not the product or service delivers on its promises. An expert review refers to a review written by someone who has tested several peer products or services to identify which offers the best value for money or the best set of features. A bought review is the system where the creator (usually a company) of a new product pays a reviewer to review his new product.

Algonquin, IL, April 7^th, 2011 – Comprehensive Courier Solutions and Local Marketing Source are thrilled to announce the launch of a Scott Gallagher’s new Accelerated Program for Local Internet Marketing. The course aims to introduce students to the huge world of local internet marketing and to teach the techniques and methodologies that are required to craft a successful career in this area.

Scott Gallagher is a proven local internet marketing expert and the mind behind this new program that is available from Local Marketing Source. As a teacher, it is hard to beat the first hand experience that he has through his own marketing firm, Comprehensive Courier Solutions (CCS). CCS is a proven and successful local marketing company that has produced a long list of satisfied small and mid-sized business clients. What Scott has done is taken the tools and knowledge that he has accumulated from his time with CCS and channeled that experience into this new course offered by Local Marketing Source.

There’s no question that Gallagher’s techniques work, as countless customers that have worked with CCS have been proud to come forward and offer testimonials stating that their work with CCS and Scott has helped their local companies get to the top of the search engine rankings for their targeted keywords. Aside from this, the students that have already taken advantage of Gallagher’s program through Local Marketing Source are reporting remarkable results.

Gallagher has demonstrated a talent in the field of local marketing and is trying to bring that skill to his students through this course. The result is a field of students that have the talent to help their local business clients increase their page rank and profits.

The program that Local Marketing Source is presenting is a six week program. This innovative program combines recorded video instruction with live question and answer sections on a weekly basis. The hands on instruction from Gallagher and his staff ensure that each student gets personal attention so that they can make the most out of their time in the LMS course. The course provides worksheets for students to work through in a step by step fashion so that they can be assured of success when following the formula that Gallagher has created in the course.  Find out more about Scott Gallagher here: www.scott-gallagher.net

For more information on this course or to find out about how this course can help you move forward with local marketing efforts, visit LMS at www.localmarketingsource.com.

ABOUT CCS, LLC – Comprehensive Courier Solutions, LLC is a leader in providing marketing solutions to small and mid-sized businesses. Their partnership with Local Marketing Source helps to educate and empower businesses and individuals to excel in local online marketing efforts, thus generating additional traffic and revenue. To learn more about CCS, please visit www.theccsolution.com.

In the world of internet marketing there have been some bugs in the Google Places system lately which have been recently addressed by Google. Chiefly, these have all had something to do with the review system. One of the primary problems that this bug had caused was that users who wished to remain anonymous were not being allowed to write a review. However, this appears to have been fixed as a “publish” button has reemerged and appears to be working for those using a nickname.

As an SEO firm we know that when anonymous user nick names first came on the scene, it was not possible to view their review histories. This seems to have been fixed, as at least some users that are using anonymous nicknames can now have their history viewed. If anonymous users do not have a nickname though, it appears that their history can still not be viewed.

If an anonymous reviewer leaves a review, it does not display on the Places page. Instead, it is only visible in their review history. This doesn’t appear to happen for all users, but only for some. Google does appear to be making strides towards working all the kinds out of their Review system within the Places program, but there also appears to be work left to be done in this regard.

There are other changes afoot at Google as they try to as always to improve their services. Reports are stating that the telephone method of verification for Google places is being phased out in favor of postcard only verification. It is unclear if this is a change for some users only, or if we can expect to see it implemented across the board.

There are a few other small news items. It appears that the problems that arose with TripAdvisor reviews are not quite finished yet. TripAdvisor had previously blocked their reviews from appearing in Google places, and may be doing so again. There was a link for some time at the bottom of Google Places pages that allowed for users to “Report a Problem” if something was not working properly. It appears that the button has vanished for the time being, although there is no indication as to whether or not this is a permanent or temporary change. Finally, some users seem to be seeing a new, or rather old, display in the search results. Some are seeing old style 7-pack displays, but there appears to be many different display methods that may activate based on the search done.

During the 10^th annual Small Business Forum, Chris O’Neill , the Managing Director for Google Canada, addressed the audience by highlighting some of the steps that all small businesses, Internet Marketing Agency and would-be entrepreneurs should be taking to expand their business and build a broader customer base.

With the holidays upon us, take a moment to review your business practices and make sure that you have all of the online tools available in your arsenal. These online tools will help you take advantage of the heavy holiday shopping season and grow your customer base long term.  This is equally helpful for an SEO firm as it is a smal business.

Online Presence – Local businesses have yet to take advantage of the power of the web.  When shoppers are looking for local businesses they will often search online. This makes it important for local businesses to have an online presence. Having an online catalog of products you offer will give potential customers a way to shop before hand, leading them right to your doorstep ready to purchase. Google Webmaster Tools provide a free and easy way to make your site more Google friendly.

Free Marketing – Google is the most commonly used search engine when would be shoppers are looking for a particular business. By having an entry for your business in Google’s free Google Places business listing, you have a listing where customers can quickly find out where you’re located and how to contact you. You can use this listing to post coupons, sales, and reviews to build rapport with customers.  You could easily implement an email marketing campaign with your existing email list.

Who’s Looking for You? – One of the keys to successfully marketing online is knowing your customer. The web provides a unique way to observe customer behavior through analytics. By answering such questions as “How did they get to your website?”, “What search term did they use?” and “Which pages did they visit?” you’re being given a window into your customer’s desires and shopping habits. Google Analytics is a tool that provides this information and gives the local business owner insight that would otherwise remain unknown.

Paid Online Advertising – As is the case offline, you can pay for advertising online with the use of Google AdWords.  This tool allows you to reach customers searching for specific terms when shopping online. Depending on your budget, you can have your ad appear on the first page of the resulting pages, giving your business more exposure.

Utilize the Cloud – One of the largest costs to many companies, IT expenses can not only break the bank, but they can take focus off of what your business is about. By using applications in the cloud, your employees can share and store documents whether in the office or on the road. With Google Apps, your employees can focus more on growing your business instead of IT issues. The Google Apps suite of online products is free to get started!

The end of the year has crept up on us once again and we all know what that means; the holidays are right around the corner and the dawning of a new year quickly follows. Christmas is a time of joy, a time to give wholeheartedly and a time to appreciate all of the things that we may often take for granted. It is a time to reminisce, to laugh and to love. The New Year signifies new opportunities, new goals, new relationships and new beginnings. Through each of these, we can grow and prosper, giving us even more to be thankful for in 2011. 

Here at CCS Internet Marketing, we feel that it is important to reflect upon all of the wondrous blessings that have been bestowed upon us. Our customers, business associates, friends and family have each played a major role in the success of our company and we want you to know that we consider each one of you a very special blessing. It has truly been an honor to serve you throughout the past year. We deeply appreciate your business and your continued loyalty to CCS Internet Marketing. 

This is why we are please to give you a valuable gift.  Download a free educational report here and learn how to slash your advertising budget and while getting more leads and customers!  This is very valuable information and we are giving away to your for free!  Consider it a gift from us to you this holiday season.

Download Report Here

Happy Holidays!