How has Google Carousel impacted your local search traffic? Much like Aaron Weiche’s blurry Bigfoot analogy (ask him about it next time you see him), Google Carousel results are a tad blurry. At first glance, the change appears to result in a drop in Google local traffic. Granted, these are only two examples (from restaurant…
A few weeks ago at Local University Advanced, I led a lab session session focused on local search analytics and how to better utilize advanced segmentation. We had great questions (as well as awesome suggestions) from an audience very eager to take a deep dive into local analytics. We could’ve easily taken another hour to go…
With the official sunset of Google Reader yesterday, I thought I’d pay a simple homage with a few stories that have come across my screen in the last few months I’ve not yet had time to comment on. The Social Media Reality for SMBs Small businesses who’ve done more than dip their toes into the…
Last week I published a post where we recorded 10 random people’s reaction to Google Local Carousel results. I really found some great takeaways by looking at qualitative instead of quantitative behavior of searchers. After the study though, I wondered what the Click Through Rates of Carousel might be. In our study of 10 we found only…
Since the dawn of Local Search, getting meaningful support for problems with local business listings on Google has been hit or miss. For a long time, the attitude seemed to be that a free product didn’t warrant any support, but the problems that so many SMBs experienced with their listings were so dire that it…
Not a week goes by that I don’t see one of my friends/contacts on Twitter complaining about the state of restaurant websites. Poor usability and hard-to-find information are usually the big problems — specifically, either the lack of a current menu or a menu that’s only available in PDF form. That’s a real problem because,…
We just finished a LocalU seminar for people attending the MidAtlantic Innkeepers Conference, a regional conference dedicated to helping and training operators of inns and B & Bs. We conducted a survey to help these folks better understand how people were finding them. You can download a copy of this report in PDF format here.…
A reader recently sent in this question that’s relevant to service providers that work from home: I know that for local businesses that do not have an office Google requires that the address be hidden on Google+ Local. In light of this, what is the correct way to list the business info on a website…
We frequently get the question: How can we get Local U to come to our city? There are two common ways to make this happen. 1) A broad partnership with local chambers of commerce, business support groups like the SBDC & SCORE and local marketers. In this scenario, we are usually contacted by an enthusiastic…
A couple weeks ago at Local University Austin, I posed the following questions during my presentation: 1) How many of you have analytics installed on your website? (Answer: About 25%) 2) How many use analytics to make marketing decisions? (Answer: About 5%. “Ouch!”) 3) How many want to take advantage of analytics awesomeness to help…