Dream Systems Media has been providing local search engine marketing for small town business owners for almost a decade and we wanted to share some of that history here.   We hope everyone enjoys using and viewing it as much as we enjoyed creating it.

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Since communication

Asking others, talking with friends and family

Asking the opinion of people that you trust has always been a staple of local search. Since people have been able to communicate, they’ve been sharing their favorite hunting spots, or fheir favorite coffee shops. Local business owners have been able to take advantage of this by making sure that their service/product is always the best around, thereby facilitating conversation about it.

Top 5 Native Languages Spoken Worldwide
Language
1. Mandarin
2. Spanish
3. English
4. Hindi-Urdu
5. Arabic

Native
845 million
329 million
328 million
240 million
232 million

Total
1025 million
390 million
-
405 million
452 million

Since Written Word

Walking/traveling & depending on signage

People have always traveled. We have also almost always needed something when we travel. One of the ways that we find things is by walking or driving, and looking for signage. Whether its a billboard, or a sandwich board in front of a local butcher, we depend on signage to inform us.

The US sign industry employs over 250,000
The Sign Manufacturing industry is worth
$11.7 billion
67% of US sign exports are bound for Canada & Mexico

1440

Reading printed word

With the advent of the printing press came the ability to print local advertising. Local advertising in newspapers & magazines have long been a staple of local search. The first yellow Pages directory was published in 1886, which featured business names and phone numbers, categorized by products and services. Whether you’re searching the classifides for something, reading about a local shop, or looking through the yellow pages, reading the printed word has been, and will be, a staple of local search

Worldwide Circulation of Top 5 Printed Magazines

Title
1. The watchtower
2. Awake!
3. AARP The Magazine
4. AARP Bulletin
5. Reader’s Digest

Circulation
42,182,000
41,042,000
23,721,626
23,574,328
17,000,000

Languages
194
84
1
1
21

Founded
1879
1919
1958
1960
1922

1915

Radio Transmission

In 1915, speech was transmitted from New York to San Francisco, and from Arlington VA to the Eiffel Tower in Paris. The marked the beginning of radio broadcasting, which allowed people around the world to hear transmitted human voices. This communication medium has also allowed people all over the world to listen for information that is beneficial, allowing radio transmission to be a viable search medium.

9 out of 10 people listen to the radio at least once a week

1926

Television Broadcast

On January 23, 1926, John Logie Baird gave the world’s first public demonstration of a mechanical television apparatus. Since then, TV has been a vital source for information for people all around the world. People often turn to television to find local information. Today, whether its a local news broadcast, or advertising, televsion continues to play a large role in informing local search patterns.

The Average American watches…

4 hours a day
2 straight months a year
9 straight years in a lifetime

1989

Internet

The first internet service provider, “The World” launches, opening the doorway for people all over the world to become connected to the internet. This was the firs step in making local search informative and instantenous.

Internet Users in the World by Region

Asia – 44%
Europe – 22.7%
North America – 13%
Latin Am/Carib – 10.3%
Africa – 5.7%
Middle East – 3.3%
Oceania/Aust – 1.0%

1995

Craigslist

Craigslist started by Craig Newmark as a way of staying on top of San Francisco’s busy arts and technology scene. It quickly became a way for people to both buy and sell items online, limiting the search area to their city/area.

60,309,277 unique visitors in November, 2011
Erotic Services ranks among the most popular categories

1999

Mobile GPS

The first instance of GPS being integrated into a mobile phone was the “Benefon Esc!” phone in 1999. Mobilizing GPS into a phone opened the way for phones all over the world to later integrate GPS as a key feature for local search functionality.

86% of all mobile phones sold in the US come with GPS capabilities.

2004

Google Local Launches

Google Local Launches in 2004 offering relevant neighborhood business listings, maps, and directions. This new local concentration gives local businesses the opportunity to have a strong web presence, connecting them ton individuals who are searching.

20% of Google searches are for local information

2004

Yelp Launches

Yelp launches in 2004 from an office on Mission Street new museum row in San Francisco. By contentrating on reviews of local places, Yelp becomes one of the most trusted sources for local search and reviews.

Reviewed Businesses by Category

Restaurants – 26%
Shopping – 24%
Beauty & Fitness – 9%
Arts, Entertainment – 8%
Home & Local – 8%
Nightlife – 4%
Health – 5%
Travel & Leisure – 4%
Auto – 3%
Other – 10%

2005 -

The Virtual Earth

Google & Microsoft both launch their own “Virtual Earth” applications, that combine local search with maps and arial photography, along with 3d buildings, and terrain. This is an example of local search ebing used in a different application.

Google Earth includes 1,288 shipwrecks including the Titanic in 3D

2005

Google Maps

Google Maps Released, featuring satellite views and directions. Google Maps quickly becomes one of the most trusted mapping systems on the internet.

Google Maps usage is 40% mobile, or 150 million users.

2005

Google Local on Mobile

Google Local available for mobile devices, including SMS driving directions. This step in local search allowed users to search and get directions on their mobile devices, no longer being tethered to their computers.

Google Maps Navigation has guided 12 billion drivers a year.

2007

Yahoo OneSearch Goes Local

Yahoo OneSearch begins doing local searches in 2007. Now search results in OneSearch also return local search results.

Yahoo owns 6% of the Mobile/Table search engine share. Google owns 91%

2007

Google Maps Place on iPhone

in 2007, Google Maps is placed on the iPhone. For the first time, users are able to search for what’s nearby, using a native application, and get search results shown within the context of a Google Map, on a mobile device.

1,389,000 iPhones on the market at the end of 2007

72,300,000 iPhones on the market at the end of 2011

2008

Google Android

Google’s first Android phone, the T0Mobile G1 is launched, with GPS and full Google maps integration to make local searches not only simple, but a natural extension of the Android mobile device.

By the end of the 3rd quarter in 2011, Android devices accounted for 53% of worldwide shipments.

2009

Google Place Pages

Google launches Place Pages in Google Maps in 2009. This is one page that organizes all the relevant information about a business, point of interest, transit station, neighborhood, landmark or city, in any part of the world, in one place. Place pages include details like photos, videos, street view preview, nearby transit, reviews, and related websites.

Google has generated nearly 40 million place pages that are waiting to be unlocked.

2009

Augmented Reality

Layar launches what they market as “the first augmented reality browser”. Augmented reality browsers allow users to use their device’s camera as a way to see what is near them. Yelp’s “Monocle” feature also acts as an augmented reality browser.

197,000,000 augmented reality capable smartphones are set to be in the global market by 2012.

2011

Siri

Siri, on the Apple iPhone 4s, lets you use your voice to command the phone to do things such as send messages, call, and yes, search. Siri understands natural language, and responds to your commands.

If you use Siri 10-15 times a day she would use about 18.5 – 27.7 MB of data a month.

2012

Foursquare Search Options Emerge

On January 12, Foursquare launched a new search option under the “explore” tab. This new option allows a user to search, then filter by locations that Foursquare recommends, places you’ve been to, places you haven’t been to, places your friends have been to, or just places that are offering specials.

Foursquare now boasts 1.5 billion checkins which feed these search results.

Local Search

I got distracted today and the result of that distraction is this post. I was curious about something dealing with local search and the SERPs – so I decided to do a little comparison. The four major search engines I compared are Google, Yahoo, MSN and ASK. I wanted to find out how their specific local programs compared to one another when searching for non geo-targeted terms? I wondered if I would get any usable results without using a geo-modifier? The following screen-shots are going to explain the title of this post much better then any of my words can. I am also pretty sure that including ASK as a major search engine is a choice I will regret later on, but then again it is the official search engine of NASCAR (and that’s got to count for something, right??)!

I have been a huge Google Local fan for what seems forever, and this post is all the proof I need to know I need to keep using it. I have also been a huge fan of local online advertising, and in many of my posts I share local advertising techniques. I do not know why it is so hard for businesses and other SEOs/Internet marketing firms to remember to include the simple local programs that are offered – for free!

As I was comparing some of the local results with various search engines, I thought it would be interesting to see when local advertising results appear when non geo-targeted phrases are searched. In other words – lets say you live in Arizona, and are looking for a custom pool builder, but instead of searching for “Arizona Custom Pools”, you simply do a search for “Custom Pools”. Which of the search engines are going to help you find results that are relevant to your local area the best?

And the winner is: Google. (no surprises here huh?)

Google Local Results

I did a search on Google for “custom pools” and got these results back (see screen-shot) that give me mostly local Arizona results, even though I searched without the “Arizona” in the phrase. The local results are some of the ones that come up, which is actually the whole point of this post. So, make sure you add your business to the local areas that the search engines allow you to. It is also noteworthy the way that Google includes some local image results which can be picked up from many different places – this occurs by using the right “geo-targeted” keywords in your alt tags and including the right information when you upload your pictures of places like Flickr.

Next up: Yahoo

The next screen shot is of Yahoo, and the reason I am not pleased with any of these results is because not one of them is a local result. They also show nothing in the form of local results as Google does.

Yahoo Local

Of course, I think it’s still important to get a local listing with Yahoo. But, I think that Yahoo can do much better. I modified the search to include “Arizona” in the search phrase, and guess what? Still none of the results are from the Yahoo Local results program. Lots of local results, but nothing that makes it easy to find a local pool builder near me! Yes, It does make a difference too because if it (the SE) finds a builder that is closer to you – that’s a better result. The #1 result for this search was for a company that builds far away from where I live. How is that going to help me? I want results to come up that are useful and that will help me in my area and this is where the local results program could really come into play.

MSN:

The funny thing here was most of the results that came back on MSN, were for the East coast. How is that going to do me any good in Arizona? However, MSN did do a better job at getting me decent usable local results (compared to Yahoo) when I modified the search phrase to include “Arizona”, but still did not bring back any of the MSN Local program results – which again, I think would be the “best” result.

MSN Local

Finally, ASK:

Ask did not bring back any local program results, which I thought they would have, but to my surprise they did list citysearch as the #1 result which I think is far more useful then any of the results that Yahoo and MSN brought back. Even when I modified the search to include “Arizona”, ASK did not offer up any local results = FAIL.

ASK Local

Although, I feel many of these search engines failed, I do still think it’s very important to obtain the local listing through the local program for each SE. Why? Because, there are many times they work really well… for example any time you include a specific town/city.

I just wanted to run this little test to see how every SE compared. Google rocked it of course and what is interesting is that no one else is copying the Google. And usually they do!

It was also cool to see how local businesses, if listed with Google Local, can earn a top 10 ranking out of (in this case) 200 plus million sites for a non geo-targeted seach phrase such as “custom pools”. That alone should be reason enough for any local business to take the time to get listed with Google Local. So besides obtaining the local program listings on all of the major search engines, I have noticed that obtaining listings in other local directories like the following (see below) have helped increase the search engines awareness of your local presence – and I think are a MUST!

1. CitySearch
2. YellowPages
3. USCity
4. AOL Local Search
5. Local Search Guide
6. Yelp
7. Local.com

In conclusion:

The bottom line here is to make sure you go to Google, Yahoo, MSN and Ask (TODAY) and sign up for the local programs. It is fast, easy, and free. If you need help figuring out whether you are listed with them or not, you might want to try Get Listed, which a great resource that will help walk you through what you need to be doing. Got anything to add to this? Let me know. I love comments! Thanks!

I got to thinking about this yesterday when I was going off on how much I loved the Chandler West Auto Care company for taking care of me. I was also reminded of it when Chris Hooley left a comment about sending them some link love in the post. Here’s the deal, I would love to have sent their business some link love, but guess what? They didn’t have a website for their business! As much as I love their customer service, and know they will continue to get an amazing amount of referrals, they absolutely need a website for all those people looking for information/reviews/maps etc. about them online!

The online world is not going to go away, and potential customers are only going to be using it more and more down the road; think about the generations growing up with the power of technology in the palm of their hands. People use their phones to look for reviews, maps, recommendations, etc., you name it! You need to have that business online, so there is a place that all the traffic/reviews/recommendations can be directed to.

With domain name and hosting packages as cheap as they are, and free CMS and blogging platforms like WordPress, there is no longer an excuse to not have something up. I am not saying that it’s all you need, but it is better then nothing and is a start!

I know there are all kinds of review sites, like Yelp, and all the search engine local listing ones you can get your business listed on etc., but when you do that people are linking to them and not you. That is helping their website and not the one that you should have up. Plus, you can do a better job at getting people ALL the information they might be looking for through your site. I think you will see a dramatic increase in your customer base, especially if you implement a little local seo with your new website.

Again, its just a suggestion from what I see going on everyday around me. I don’t know one business owner that would not want more customers, or would want to get the right information in front of potential customers all while making more money. AM I SMOKING CRACK? Thoughts?