The Importance & Impact of Google Ranking on Local Small Businesses

If your town or city is anything like mine, you see them all over the place … “For Sale” or “Going Out of Business” signs.  Those signs make me sick to my stomach.  Why?  Because America needs local small businesses to thrive for our communities to survive.  As more businesses go under, that creates a nasty ripple effect in the local economy because fewer people are spending money. So what does this have to do with Google? – EVERYTHING! Most of the local small to mid-size businesses that are fighting to stay alive right now are the same ones that have done a poor job of embracing advanced online marketing strategies over the last 10-15 years.  Simply put, having a website isn’t enough.  You have to know how to make it “findable” to people who are actively searching for your goods or services at the exact time when they want what you have to offer.  And if you cannot take the time to learn how to properly do that for your business, and you want your business to still be in existence 3 to 5 years from now, then you better hire someone to do it for you – pronto.  (The good news is, these days it doesn’t cost an arm and a leg to accomplish this, but it does require consistent & ongoing work to be done on your behalf.)

Question: How much difference do you think it would make if your website showed up on the 1st page of Google whenever someone was actively searching for your goods or service?

Answer: A whole heck of a lot!
Take a look at this graph*, to see what I mean …

* Graph & Statistics courtesy of AOL

Let’s say you owned a roofing company in Macon, GA.  A prospect noticed a leak in their ceiling last night in the middle of a thunder storm so they go to their computer to find a local roofer to inspect their roof. (Just in case you haven’t heard, 87% of folks do NOT use the yellow pages anymore … they would rather “Google it” than look it up in some yellow book. – And those figures are from 2009!)

After the potential customer Googles something like “Macon Roofer”, a list of roofers show up on their browser. (NOTE: The local map listings are important too, but for the sake of this discussion, I’m limiting our discussion in this post to how much traffic you’d get if your website showed up within the top 10 organic results.)

If your website shows up in the first position of the first page of results, approximately 42% of people searching for a Macon Roofer will click through from Google to visit your website. On the other hand, if your website shows up somewhere on page 2 of the ranking results, you’ll only get approximately 10% of the traffic you could have gotten. In other words, the further down in the rankings you are, the less visible you are to your ideal prospective customers.

Now, it takes time and effort to get top Google rankings, but it’s the difference between being “findable” or “invisible” — and that is what can make or break your business.  One word of caution though, if you decide to hire someone to help improve your website’s Google ranking, RUN AWAY from anyone that promises to get your website ranked on page 1 of Google within 1 week.  Sometimes it happens that quickly, but that is extremely (unless they are using tactics that Google frowns upon, which can lead to your website being dropped to the very bottom of the search rankings (and I guarantee you that no one will find you on on page 598!)

For all you “DIY” entrepreneurs, there are a ton of resources available to help you learn what you must know to get the job done, but it will take a strong commitment and a considerable amount of time to learn it and do it, so I would highly suggest you consult a professional online marketing consultant first, so you can develop a custom strategy tailored to your specific business & market.  Liz Day, founder of Bee The Buzz Online Marketing, offers complimentary consultations & is very thorough with her evaluation & recommendations. You can reach her at (770) 826-7458.

If your business needs more customers, you need to be more “findable” on the internet.  We can help you with that. An effective marketing strategy begins with getting your website ranked on Google, so MORE people who want & need your products/services can easily find you. How you should go about accomplishing that task depends greatly on many factors, some of which are: how competitive your market is, who your ideal target customers are, how long your website has been around and how well your website converts visitors into customers or leads.  Again, this is why it’s such a good idea to consult with a professional marketer before proceeding with any online marketing plan – even if you intend to do it all yourself.

Bottom line … when it comes to your Google ranking, you simply cannot afford to get it wrong or end up at the back of the pack!  Statistics like these don’t lie …