The Internet has now taken over how you find local businesses. Even though Phone books are still delivered to businesses and homes, the majority of people searching for a local business for a product and/or service will now search for it online instead of cracking open a phone book.

Search Engines have become our one stop information spot for almost everything we seek. Social media for local businesses have given business owners a chance to create a strong online presence even if they do not have a web site. Besides establishing your local listing in the major search engines, it’s also a great idea to establish online profiles with social media sites such as Yelp, Insider Pages, Localeze, City Search, Merchant Circle, Yellow Pages, and Super Pages. These are widely searched web sites with a high volume of users looking for various types of businesses near their homes or worl places. over 60% of all searches are geared towards finding a local business. So I say jump on the train so your business can catch a ride to success!

Combine your online business profiles on the web sites listed above with a properly formed local profile within the major search engines and your local listings will gain the strength it needs to show up when surfers are looking for your type of business. These social media profiles create “mentions” which the search engines use to determine the location of your business and determine how many reviews your business has reveived from customers or clients. The more accurate the information on your profiles are, the better they perform for you. Each online profile created should always have the same contact and location information. This helps to create the validety of your business. 

Social media has taken control of the wheel when it comes to establishing an online presence for you business and has made it easier for your company to be discovered. It also helps to eliminate the traditional costs of advertising your business. The great advantage to the new trend of advertising your business online with local listings is that you also establish a more targeted marketing effort as oppsed to marketing to the mases in hopes of weeding out the persons who are actually interested in what your business has to offer. Again, this saves you time and most importantly, money, that can go toward other functions of your business.

So when you open the doors to that brand new business, the first thing you want to do is begin to put your business in the right places so the potential customers and the search engines will find you.