Nowadays, people look for information on the internet before they go to a local store. This is because they want to read customer reviews, they want to see where the business can be found, and want to see what the operation hours are. Because of this, local marketing is a necessity.
You surely want to get more visitors to your local business but what should you do when you run a multi-location business? Things automatically change and your strategy has to adapt. Here are some ways in which you can do just that and you can localize your local brand marketing efforts.
Set Up Guidelines For All Locations
There need to be clear brand guidelines that are presented to all your locations. Then, all locations have to be kept accountable or they will not respect them.
If the guidelines are violated, in the long run, we will see very limited results when compared to what would be possible. Some things that should be considered when you set up your local marketing strategy for the multiple locations associated with your business are:
- Local businesses need permission to market the business at a local level.
- The local marketing strategy has to be respected whenever a campaign is launched.
- Branding resources should always be the same.
- The style guide of the business has to be respected.
- When doing work with digital marketing agencies, they have to all respect the same guidelines.
Build Regional Buyer Personas
The buyer persona that has to be used in one location is not necessarily the same one that has to be used in another one. With this in mind, whenever the buyer persona is created for a location, here are some things to consider:
- Local consumer identity.
- The problems the local consumers face.
- How the business can solve the problems identified.
- Can regional events, landmarks, teams, or idioms be used to personalize the local messaging used?
Take things one step further and create some local landing pages that are going to be used by the local offices. Keep in mind that you have to always resonate with the local audience to be successful. This is impossible without personalization.
Use Local Search Marketing
Always claim, create, and then optimize the local business pages you have access to with GMB (Google My Business), Bing Local, Yelp, and Yahoo! Local. Then, do the same with all the local directories in your industry.
The NAP of every single location has to be consistent in absolutely all directories, on social media, and on business pages. If there is incorrect or inaccurate information presented, the searchers are going to be confused. Also, local search ranking will be lower.
Build Location Specific Pages On The Website
This should be seen as the bare minimum to do but it is very important for multi-location businesses. And, unfortunately, so many large companies do not have this setup.
The reason why location-specific pages are needed is that they help to increase local rankings and they help people to find all the information they need to find your business. You can even consider setting up microsites for all the individual locations.
Optimize all the location pages created for search marketing with the addition of the business name, together with local address and local phone number.
Another bonus that needs to be highlighted is that when you set up these local websites it is just so much easier to get featured on the local maps. When a mobile user wants to get a location, it will be really easy to find your local office/store.
