Growth in the reach and frequency of Yellow Pages usage between the first and second half of 2009 signals broader economic recovery as a greater number of consumers search for local businesses, according to a new study released today.

The findings are part of two studies, conducted by comScore and Burke and released by the Yellow Pages Association (YPA), that study consumer usage of Yellow Pages and other sources to find local businesses.

“Historically, we know that Yellow Pages usage is a strong indicator of overall economic confidence,” said Yellow Pages Association President Neg Norton. “We are greatly encouraged by growth in Yellow Pages usage between the first and second half of 2009, and think this indicates that local businesses can expect increased sales on a path to recovery in 2010.”

As Search Engine Results Pages (SERP’s) become more and more localized and personalized with organic, paid, local search and video content… they also become more convoluted with blogs and social media results like blogs, twitter and facebook. In a recent blog post from 21st Century Investor Relations based on an interview from Webmarketing123, they analyze how SEO is evolving, and what your business needs to do NOW to keep internet leads coming in.

Your business needs to be on the first page of Google if you want to be successful in todays world - So what if your site isn’t on the first page of Google? The quickest way to immediately see an influx of new internet leads in through Paid Search.

While the Marketing123 interview for SEO is great advice for getting higher organic rankings, it’s also a strong argument for why your business needs Online Advertising.

As I have stated before, Google makes at least one change per day to their search algorithm.  If you haven’t updated your site in over 5 years, thats nearly 2000 times when your online presence may have been affected by major restructuring in how search engines rank your website.  That also means if you competition is updating their website on a regular basis, they are solidifying their presence with Google, Yahoo & Bing.

SEO takes a lot of time and energy to see real results.  If your website ranks organically on the 3rd, 5th, or even 10th page, you need a new website – there’s no question.  But it will take a while for you to start ranking on the 1st page organically.  A great tactic for you to immediately get new leads almost instantly is SEM.

Given that page ranking normally correlates to traffic, you will get new leads simply being on the first page of major search engines.  As I demonstrate in the graph, a balanced online marketing campaign includes both SEO & SEM because while your site is gradually becoming more relevant in search engines (ranking higher for relevant search terms, garnering more traffic) it also is smart to have an aggressive online advertising package to actively promote your products and services.

It is also important to have a balanced portfolio of SEO and SEM because consumers use internet mediums differently.

Local Search (map section) is generally used by mobile users and those looking to compare local products or services, geographically to their own proximity.

Organic Search is also used when buyers are comparing products and services, but at a more in-depth level – more research than a buying mode.

Paid Search Listings are used when buyers are used when buyers have already done their homework and/or they need a product/service now – at their moment of relevance.

To be successful locally, your business needs a balanced marketing mix in the following medium: Print and Internet Yellow Pages, a strong website with video content and a search marketing campaign to actively get new customers.  If you aren’t covering the most basic elements of local marketing, someone else will undoubtedly get that new lead ahead of you because they have seen that value of investing in marketing.

Even though the Donald’s over-inflated ego, TV show and ridiculous quaff of hair always get in the way of his message, I think he was spot on in his recent blog post, The Power of Video Marketing.

Online video marketing isn’t about pitching consumers with shotgun-style Television commercials which they habitually block out – it’s about engaging potential customers with information relevant to THEIR search!  If nearly 85% of online users watched video in March, as a savvy business professional, why would you want to miss out on such a large target market looking for your products and services?

Video can be used in many ways:
- Online Video is a must for Search Engine Marketing landing pages – independent Berry studies have shown a 50% boost in conversion rates when video is placed on SEM landing pages compared to those campaigns without one
- Web Video should be properly tagged with keywords relevant to your business so people can find it and distributed to all the major video sharing websites
- If you have several products or services, you need a ’say-it-all’ internet video as a 24/7 pitch for your business, and several shorter (15-sec) videos for each line of business

The old adage of “a picture is worth a thousand words” could never be more true than in today’s consumer driven online world.  People are constantly being bombarded with media they didn’t ask for.  If online video is available to you at a low-cost with this kind of ROI – internet video that  delivers the right video content to a potential client searching for your business at the exact time they want it  – then what have you got to lose…

Our thirst for online video consumption is at an all-time high  Trends consistently show large-scale growth in this internet medium.  If there was ever a time for you to have a professional video produced for your local business, it’s now!

People aren’t just watching video for fun – the viral kind.  People are using video to learn about brands, products and services.  They are using it as one of 8 medium the consult before making a purchase decision.  Utilize online video to accelerate your leads by engaging potential customers with a 60 second online pitch.

Data from the comScore March 2010 Video Metrix report shows more than 180 million U.S. internet users watched online video in March, up 3.5% from February alone!  Total video views soared to over 31 billion, with 42% of those views happening on Google properties, more specifically, YouTube.

comScore-march-2010-video-metrix

Other notable findings from March 2010 as quoted by comScore.com include:

• The top video ad networks in terms of their actual reach delivered were: Joost Video Network (by Adconion Media Group) with 38.0 percent penetration of online video viewers, SpotXchange Video Ad Network with 19.9 percent, and BBE with 19.1 percent.
• 84.8 percent of the total U.S. Internet audience viewed online video.
• 135.3 million viewers watched 12.9 billion videos on YouTube.com (95.6 videos per viewer).
• The average Hulu viewer watched 26.7 videos, totaling 2.6 hours of video per viewer.
• The duration of the average online video was 4.3 minutes.

In a recent video from Matt Cutts in response to a user-submitted question, he addresses two issue: Algorithm changes and content.

To my surprise, Cutts says Google makes nearly 350-400 changes in a year – nearly once a day! In a recent article from Search Engine Land covering an article by Wired on Google’s Algorithm, they have stated Google makes 550 changes a year… in any case, this means it’s even more important to keep your metadata fresh and up to date with search standards.

As for content being king… it still is, however, Cutts eludes to people actually viewing your website and content hierarchy standards.  This is getting back to the basics – how many inbound links and how many visitors you have will contribute to your organic ranking.  Best practices also says to have landing pages for each product/service/topic, making it easy not only for users to navigate your site and digest content, but equally as important for spiders to efficiently index your entire site frequently.

The bottom line: Use proper site architecture through taxonomy and site map strategy, update your content regularly, keep your meta fresh and utilize and inbound linking strategy with directories, reciprocals and by writing articles for other blogs to use.

LinkedIn is a valuable professional social media tool that small business should be leveraging in a number of ways.  Guy Kawasaki does a good job of listing ways small business uses LinkedIn.

Some great take-aways from the article that I’ve been preaching:

- Building your industry network
- Customer acquisition through recommendations
- Raise funding and VC
- Competitive intelligence and research

A great info graphic recently released, “How SMB’s Spend Their Social Media Dollars” details how businesses are spending their social media advertising dollars.

The most startling thing about the research right off the bat is for all the success that many business owners are finding online, so few are dedicating any sizable chunk there. Some key take aways:

• Many Business owners luckily see the gap in online advertising and plan to dedicate more spend to it
• The internet currently has a lack of some key advertising components such as online video for advertisers, creating a great opportunity for early adopters
• Advertising spend on TV and Radio are becoming cut more and more for the small to medium sized business
• Social media marketing is poised to become the biggest marketing channel

With the help of Berry, we were able to develop a Website that is a great complement to our print advertising. It extends our business’s reach and our traffic continues to grow.

In a survey assessing the factors that make up local search rankings, participants were asked to rate the importance of 49 criteria with respect to their influence on rankings in the Google and Yahoo Local “Universal” search algorithms (those that drive the 10-pack, 3-pack, and authoritative onebox search results; NOT the standard organic algorithms)

Some key take-aways include:

- Local search algorithms are not perfect and it’s anyone’s educated guess as to what ranks in most importance (similar to SEO theories)
- Important factors include: Verified listing, proper categories, KEYWORDS in title and listing and citations from major data providers
- While search engines somewhat forcefully make sure your business is shown only in the city where your address is, NOT YOUR SERVICE AREA, it is possible to slightly ‘game’ the results into using a PO BOX close to the centroid

It will be interesting to keep an eye on local search results for small business, especially as mobile becomes an even larger factor in how consumers research and purchase locally.

Today I was reading a quick article that says “MySpace generation happier to talk online than in real life“. That’s great news for businesses that already integrate many online solutions for their customers but bad news for slow adopters. We already know that the longer we take to get online, the more opportunities we miss out, and beyond that the harder it will be to break out online.

The younger generation is eager to talk, learn, and buy online so help the customer purchase through you by giving them what they want. When you create a website it is very important to keep that in mind, don’t make your customers call a number, give them the option to fill out a contact us form, give them an email address, they are quick and easy for the end user and allow them to become a buyer on terms they are comfortable with. Phone numbers will always get you calls too, but not using your email is effectively blocking off an entire generation of eager buyers.