Qualities of an Effective Online Marketing Agency: Guide for Business Owners

To give your business a solid online presence, you need the help of an online marketing agency. Research shows that in 91% of small businesses, the CEO also serves as the primary marketer. Playing double roles doesn’t come as a surprise as 96% of these businesses have a staff of five or fewer.
Unfortunately, business owners and managers like you simply do not have enough time to dabble and experiment online. The core business – be it a bakery, carwash, dental clinic, or restaurant – needs you. You need to be running operations. Trying to learn the technical aspects of online marketing and sacrificing time for the business is not worth it.
So why burden yourself when you can leave the technical stuff to an agency, right? Correct! But now, here’s the challenge: how do you choose the right provider for your business? Here’s some helpful advice.

But First, Be Wary of Unrealistic Promises

Internet marketing consultants or companies typically make the same promise to business owners: more traffic, leads, and sales online. What business owner wouldn’t want those results, right? But the question is, can they really deliver? Are they telling the truth, or merely making promises to peddle their services? Just remember, if the promises are too good to be true, they probably are.
It’s easy to plunge into this pitfall as many businesses are in dire need of services, and are assigning these needs to providers. For instance, one research found that 63% of marketers will spend more on content creation this year. That’s how bad they need new content. Meanwhile, 50% will spend more on search engine optimization (SEO) and search engine marketing efforts delegated to agencies.
But while you may badly need these services, remember that falling for “we’ll give you the moon and the stars” type of promises is the biggest pitfall small business owners make when hiring an Internet marketing agency. Be careful when choosing your online marketing provider. After all, that company will represent your business online. If they create a faulty and spammy website, publish irresponsible Facebook status posts, or write articles with terrible grammar, it’s your business that will bear the brunt.
So how do you choose the right online marketing service provider for your business? Here are two qualities you need to look for.

Expertise: Testing and Experience Combined

Unlike major corporations, small and medium-sized businesses have small and medium-sized marketing coffers, too. As an owner, you want to ensure that you will get your money’s worth when entrusting online marketing activities to an agency. And to ensure you get a return on investment, one of the things you should search for in an agency is expertise.
“Expert” level Internet marketing agencies typically possess these characteristics:

• Carry out research and development
• Conduct testing
• Continuously improve services
• Frontliner in the industry
• Have sufficient experience

Agencies that are experts in what they do are always on the lookout for new techniques and strategies to help promote your business online. They do not merely rely on previous experiences. They keep on improving services by combining experience and results of new tests they conduct. They stay sharp through research.
That is why they understand what Google Panda and Penguin updates are, what the Hummingbird algorithm is, and what all of these terms mean to your SEO strategy. They understand how to maximize online maps, local directory listings, check-in sites, and review sites to boost your local online presence. They know that sharing content via social media is better than building cheap links and spamming. If a provider is a front liner in the industry, and has sufficient experience, there’s a good chance it can also handle and steer your business to online marketing success.

Passion: How Bad They Want You to Succeed 

Passion, they say, is a subjective quality that you cannot measure. But if you ask any entrepreneur, they’ll say that passion is a crucial factor in the success of any venture. And for an online marketing agency to be able to help your business succeed online, they must be passionate in helping you achieve your marketing goals. How can you tell if they have this passion? Ask yourself these three questions:

• Does this agency listen to my needs?
• Do they provide In-depth consultation based on these needs?
• Do they align their services toward my marketing goals?

If you answered yes to all these questions, and you’ve determined their expertise based on the characteristics we mentioned earlier, then you might just be looking at the online marketing agency you’re looking for. The important thing to remember here is that passionate agencies do not simply offer specific packages without first listening to you and analyzing your business. No one knows your business better than you do!
That’s why it’s important that the agency takes the time to listen to you and give you an in-depth consultation based on your needs. Knowing your marketing goals and business needs is always the first step to achieving online success. It’s also a very good indicator of the agency’s expertise and passion in helping your business make the most out of SEO, Local Marketing, Google, Social Media, Facebook, Responsive Web Design and online marketing in general.

We’re not shy to say we’re experts at what we do and we’re passionate in helping businesses succeed online. Send us a message now at info@advantagelocalagency.com or call us at 404-806-7284 to find out how we can help you meet your business goals through online marketing today.

DIY SEO Audit in 10 Steps

Whether you manage your own website or you have a webmaster team dedicated to search engine optimization and online marketing, a website audit can be useful. It will uncover SEO mistakes and help ensure that proper SEO techniques are being used, throughout your website.

The main reasons for using SEO is to make your website easier for search engines to navigate, to increase your search engine rankings, and help boost the amount of traffic your website receives. If you are worried about the SEO on your website, then use these 10 steps to perform your own DIY SEO audit.

#1 Search Your Business

The first step in this DIY SEO audit is to search your own company, using Google Search. If you search specifically for your business, your website should be the first result. Look at what other references come up in the search, including customer reviews and any articles or websites that mention your company.

#2 Setup a Webmaster Tools Account

If you have not already done so, set up a Google Webmaster Tools account. This will allow you access to a variety of statistics related to your search engine optimization, including security issues.

When you performed your business search, if you noticed any results that include the message “this website may be hacked”, then you may have a security problem. Take a look at the security issues section in your Webmaster Tools account, for more details.

After you have resolved your security concerns, submit a request for Google to re-evaluate the security of your website, so that the warning messages can be removed from search results for your web pages.

#3 Remove Dead Links

Using good link structure on your website helps ensure better navigation for users and for search engine crawlers. Dead links, which are links that are not active anymore, can lower your SEO and your search engine result rankings. A dead link can also cause a visitor to leave your website and go to your competition.

Use a free tool, or online resource, to check your website for dead links. These programs will scan your website, visiting every link on your website, and determining if there are any dead links. Remove any external links that go to a web page that is no longer active.

#4 Add Redirects

If you have an internal link that results in a 404 error, then consider adding a redirect. This will help ensure your visitors are still able to reach the pages on your website, when the old URL is linked on another website or comes up in a search engine result.Using a 301 redirect, you are informing search engines that the web page has been permanently moved and not deleted.

#5 Check Your Title Tags

Title tags are the default titles that appear in search engine results and at the top of the browser window when a web page is opened. Check your title tags, either using your website editor software, your databases, or whichever option you have for editing your web pages. Try to use your main keyword at the beginning of your tag. Keep your title tag to a limit of 70 characters or less, but do not make them too short.

#6 Check Meta Descriptions

After checking your title tags, check your Meta descriptions. These descriptions are also used by search engines when gathering results. Follow the same principles for writing a good title tag, but with a 155 character limit. Do not use special characters and try your best to describe your web page in a unique way.

#7 Include Image Tags

Search engines cannot “see” your images, when crawling your website. Every image on your website should include an ALT text tag. This tag will contain a short description of what the content of the image is. Limit yourself to 100 characters and use unique keywords that are relevant to the image and your web page.

This tag was originally intended to help people with browsers that cannot load images and blind people that use voice to text for reading web page content. It has now become a major SEO factor, when determining search engine rankings.

#8 Check for Mobility Issues

The use of mobile devices has increased dramatically in the past decade. More people are relying on their smart phones and tablets to browse the web. If your website is not mobile-friendly, then you could end up losing a lot of the traffic to your website. Also, Google and other search engines have begun using mobility as a factor in creating SEO scores.

Google has their own tool that you can use to check for mobility issues. After checking a web page on your site, this tool will provide you with tips and suggestions for editing your code for better mobility. You can find this tool by going to your Google Webmaster Tools account.

#9 Avoid Duplicate Content

While everyone knows that it is a bad idea to copy content from other sources, there may be occasions where you end up duplicating your own content. Whether this is due to the updating of a blog article, the creation of a second page offering similar information, or any other cause, you should let Google know which page is the preferred page.

Add Meta data containing a canonical link to the preferred page. When a search engine comes across this Meta data, they will understand that this is not a duplicate page. You will need to add this information yourself, using whichever method you normally use for editing Meta data on your website.

#10 Update Your Sitemap

Every website should have a sitemap. This is an xml file that contains links to the pages on your website. You can have separate xml files for different categories of pages on your site or a single sitemap file containing all links. If you do not already have a method of creating a sitemap, there are several free resources available online for building a free sitemap. Whenever you update a page or add a new blog article, your sitemap should be updated and submitted to search engines using Webmaster Tools.

After performing all 10 of these tasks, you should have a much better idea of your current search engine optimization. Your own DIY SEO audit is something that you should perform at least once per month, to monitor changes to your SEO and make sure that you are continuing to do everything that you can to boost traffic and increase your search engine rankings.

For more information visit Search Engine Optimization Atlanta

Grow Your Chiropractic Practice Online

Advantage Local Agency - Atlanta, GA

Is Your Chiropractic Office Searchable and Visible Online?

People should know better than to think of chiropractors as glorified massage therapists. You don’t just work patients to the bone; you also treat and alleviate muscle and tendon disorders. You are the providers of sweet relief.

People Use Search Engines to Find Chiropractors

When people were asked to think about the last time they searched for health and medical information, as well as doctors or other health professionals… a huge majority (77%) said that they began at a search engine such as Google, Bing, or Yahoo.

Will they find you online and gain information about the possible causes of their pain? Also, is there clear contact information so that they can get in touch with you for their chiropractic needs?

If your clinic is found online, do you provide helpful information about their health to gain their trust?

Can they find you on search engines at all?

Get a Mobile-friendly Website

Here’s a fact that people won’t have a bone to pick with:

A survey finds that of the seventy-four percent (74%) of adults who use the Internet:

·         Eighty percent (80%) have looked online for information about health topics, such as specific diseases, treatments, or procedures.

·         Thirty four percent (34%) have read someone else’s commentary or experience about health or medical issues, such as chiropractic procedures, on an online news group, website, or blog.

·         And twenty five percent (25%) have watched an online video about health or medical issues, such as cosmetic surgery procedures.

Are there positive reviews about your practice online?

If your answer to any of these questions is “no,” you don’t need to get bent out of shape. There’s a lot you can do to improve your chiropractic clinic’s online presence, and make it highly searchable.  You can stand out in local listings.

You can engage and reach out to more people in social media. You can build and expand your own brand. We can help you with that.

Build and Expand your Chiropractic Practice with our Help 

Advantage Local Agency provides:

·         Responsive Web Design

·         SEO

·         Local Buzz

·         Social Media Optimization

·         Online Reputation Management

·         Website Audit

·         PPC and Remarketing

·         Brand Establisher

·         Brand Booster

Fill out the form today or call Advantage Local Agency at 404-806-7284 and take a crack at setting an appointment with us. Understand how we can help you adjust your online marketing strategy.  Our services are ready to be your online marketing backbone.

Grow Your Accounting Business Online

Advantage Local Agency - Atlanta,GA

Is Your Accounting Firm Searchable and Visible Online?

Can your accounting firm be found by potential clients today?

Thirty percent (30%) of your potential clients are looking for expert accounting services online, while only nineteen percent (19%) are relying on recommendations. They use several techniques in searching for firms, from search engines, to social media, to online reviews.

Studies have found that clients go through five stages when selecting an accounting firm:

They recognize a need, begin the search, pick the contenders, narrow the field, and select the firm.

How do you get your potential clients choose you?

Get a professional accounting firm website from Advantage Local Agency!

Your website must have appealing design and copy that precisely target your visitors to consider you as their accounting firm.

You have to display client testimonials on your website, even case studies or industry reports that your potential clients may learn from.  Doing this will also demonstrate your expertise.  According to studies, eighty percent (80%) of clients check out websites to shortlist their selection.

Your website must be responsive to all devices.  Sixty seven (67%) of users say that a mobile-friendly website will make them more likely to buy a service.

Boost your visibility on search engines.

Your website must have the content your potential clients are looking for with the right and relevant keywords as the majority of them use search engines to find accounting services.

Do you come up in search results when people type terms to find accounting firms and specific accounting services they are looking for?

Be present in local online directories.

You need to make sure that you are present in local online directories, whether you are in a single or multiple locations.  Do you have correct and consistent contact information in your listings? Do you have positive online reviews? These are factors that will help them choose you.

Share content through your blog.

You must share useful information with your potential clients through a blog. Publish tips, tax calendars and how-to guides to drive more traffic to your site, and earn their interest and trust.

Engage with potential clients in social media.

You must establish your presence, practice responsiveness, and build your credibility online through social media channels such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.

Your expertise is a very powerful asset – let it shine online. We can help you leverage your resources to dominate your competition.

Grow your bottom line through our online marketing expertise. Fill out the form and call Advantage Local Agency now at 404-806-7284 for a free consultation!

Grow Your Dental Practice Online

Advantage Local Agency - Atlanta, GA

Get into online marketing so that potential patients who look for dentists online will find you.

  

Beyond Traditional: Online Marketing Tips for Your Dental Business

In the traditional marketing age, flyers, brochures, billboard and coupons used to be the most popular means of promoting a product or a business. However, since the birth of the Internet and other technologies, these methods were eclipsed by digital marketing. With the rapid growth of people using the internet and the change in their behavior when looking for services, many businesses have decided to explore online marketing.

Both methods have the same objectives: establish a brand image and get customers. Which of these two can help your dental business the most?

Traditional Marketing vs. Online Marketing

When it comes to marketing your services – is going digital an imperative in this day and age?

Many local businesses today, including dental offices, still rely on conventional marketing methods to attract customers. They give out flyers and place ads around their area, hoping that people who read these materials will remember them when they need their services.

Is this enough?

According to a study, Seventy-two (72%) of internet users say they looked online for health information within the past year. Seventy-seven percent (77%) of these people say they began at a search engine such as Google, Bing, or Yahoo to look for information.  Eighty percent (80%) have looked online for information on health topics, such as specific diseases or treatments. Thirty-four percent (34%) have read about someone else’s experiences with their health or medical issues in an online newsgroup, website, or blog. And twenty-five percent (25%) have watched an online video about health or medical issues
.

These numbers are growing steadily year after year.

Nowadays, when potential patients realize they have a dental issue, they will look for a solution online. They will have to find you as their friendly and accessible local solution.

In contrast, when you distribute traditional marketing materials like flyers and brochures, you “hope” that someone will remember and call you or visit you when they have finally acquired a dental issue. 

Traditional marketing still helps, but with changes in consumer behavior, now is the best time to integrate online marketing into your dental practice.

Why?  Simply put, online marketing can help your dental office be searchable and more visible to people who are actively searching for and considering a dentist right when they need one.

Put some Teeth into your Online Marketing with these Tips

The reality of the situation is that search engines and local directories have taken the place of the Yellow Pages. As a dental practitioner, it is your responsibility to ensure you invest the majority of your energy into new marketing strategies that can benefit your business.

Here are six major ways you can maximize your online marketing efforts:

1.       Have a Great Dental Website. Your website is where your online marketing efforts should start. Usually, potential clients will have a quick look at your website before considering your services and if they find your site boring and outdated, chances are, they’ll quickly navigate away from it. When websites are designed well, clients can acquire the information they are looking for without much trouble. That’s a plus for you and your office!

To guarantee your website’s efficiency and accessibility, be sure to include the following:

·         Access to your contact information as well as directions to your clinic

·         Details and pricings of your services

·         Links to your blog and social media pages (Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc.)

·         A corner where customers can place and read reviews about your services

·         Your website must be mobile-friendly, employing a responsive web design architecture

2.        Learn the Basics of Search Engine Optimization (SEO). You’ve probably heard a lot about search engine optimization practices such as optimizing keywords, or publishing relevant, useful and fresh content. But are you aware that there’s more behind your website that can help too? Things like headers, alt texts and meta descriptions can help search engine crawlers rank your websites higher in search results.

Here are some other tips that can help your website achieve better rankings:

·         Provide useful and fresh content like articles, videos, infographics, reviews, etc.

·         Integrate promos into your content

·         Optimize your URLs, titles, descriptions, alt texts

·         Improve your website’s loading time

·         Register your website with Google and Bing webmaster tools

3.       Invest in Local Visibility. Did you know that search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo! offer local listings for businesses? By listing your dental office with these search engines, you increase the possibility of being visible to people looking online for dentists within their area and coming across yours. There are other local directories and internet yellow pages such as Yelp, City Search, SuperPages, and many more.

Here are some ways your local visibility can be boosted:

·         Publish your promos on local listings and directories

·         Bolt on your SEO and Social Media to your Local Buzz strategy.

4.       Utilize the Power of Social Media. A strong presence on Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms is essential nowadays, since most of your current and potential clients are probably active social media users.

What should you do to keep up with this growing trend? How can you use social media to market your services? Here are some quick pointers:

·         Include testimonials and reviews from past customers

·         Have a regular discussion about good dental practices

·         Include a quick link back to your website and blog

·         Share engaging photos (like pictures of happy clients, quotes, etc.)

·         Post announcements of special offers

5.       Online Reputation Management. In the digital era, no one and nothing is protecting you from criticism anymore. Such is the case for dentists, whose practice can be hit by negative online reviews once in a while. Do you know how powerful online reviews can be? According to research, fifty-two percent (52%) of those who searched online for referred businesses looked for reviews or ratings. A separate study also showed that eighty percent (80%) of consumers can change their purchase decision after reading a negative review.

What can you do to spare your dental office from the effects of bad reviews about you if ever there are? How can you maintain the good reputation of your office? Here are a few tips:

·         Look for in-depth reports detailing where you stand against your competition and what actions you need to take for your ORM campaign

·         Publish genuine consumer reviews only in relevant websites

·         Optimize your social media accounts

·         If you don’t have a blog yet, set up one and start posting content that can push down negative reviews about your services

6.       Make use of PPC (Pay per Click) Advertising. When you need traffic, PPC advertising is a great way to get it. In a nutshell, PPC is pretty simple: Search engines have features that allow businesses to buy ad placements in their search results. These listings appear above, below and alongside organic, non-paid results. If someone clicks on your listing, they will be redirected to your website and you, in turn, will be charged the amount you bid.  These ads can be a bit expensive, but if you’re looking for immediate results, PPC advertising can offer a guaranteed solution.

Aside from appearing directly on a search engine’s results pages, you can also run ads through Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn.

7.       Tracking, Analytics and Reporting. Making sure your website looks good is one thing; knowing if you’re actually getting traffic is another. You need to have a traffic and analytics system that does the following:

·         Allows you to see the total traffic your website is getting, including the breakdown of data from organic, referral, direct, paid and social sources

·         Allows you to analyze which of your campaigns are working or not

·         Allows you to know if visitors are engaged in your content or if they leave right away

·         Alerts you if there are crawl issues on your website

·         Allows you to know how often your web page appears in a search query and how many times it has been visited, as well as its average ranking

·         Automatically detects every new search query or keyword that a user types in search engines that your web page shows up for

At Advantage Local Agency, we know you need to focus on doing what you do best, and that is to maintain the overall oral health of your patients. Studying and exploring online marketing strategies on your own can be very time consuming, and that’s why we are here. We can help you in all of areas of online marketing – it’s what we do best!

We provide Responsive Web Design, SEO and Website Audit, Local Buzz, Social Media Optimization, PPC, Online Reputation Management and Online Presence Tracking and Analytics to grow your business.

Send us an email info@advantagelocalagency.com  or call us at 404-806-7284 so we can schedule a free consultation with you today.

Grow Your Law Firm Online

Can your law firm be found by your potential clients today?

Advantage Local Agency - Atlanta, GA

Seventy-six percent of adults are seeking lawyers online.

A study identified a four-stage search process for people looking for a lawyer.  They gather information about their legal issue; find a lawyer; validate a lawyer; and select a lawyer.  They use various online resources in all of these stages.

How will they find you in all of these stages?

They use search engines.

Your website must be very visible on search engines for technical keywords, as well as keywords that are in the everyday language of potential clients that pertain to various legal issues you handle.

Can they easily find your website online? Do you provide legal information to demonstrate your competency? And therefore, addressing the first two stages of their search process.

They go to online legal advice forums.

You must be present in these forums as they gather preliminary information.  Are you there to provide initial advice?

They look in local online directories.

You must be present in local online directories with your clear contact information and areas of specialization. You must have positive reviews to validate your expertise.

They use social media.

You must have a good presence on LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter as they will look at your posts, your network, and other people’s comments or testimonials about you.

They read legal blogs.

Your website must have a blog for updates and stories about how you’ve helped people with their legal cases.

They visit law firm websites.

Your website must stand out with the information they need, and it must have clear calls to action to guide them to the next step. They will try to validate you here, and if satisfied, will select you.

We can help you increase your online presence and exhibit your competence and trustworthiness as a lawyer to more of your potential clients.

Digital marketing is in our jurisdiction, and we know all the twists and turns, all the possible angles of attack to make your firm successful online.

Your online presence will be judged, so fill out the form or call us now at 404-806-7284 for a consultation!