Four Developments in Local to Watch for in 2012

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Four Developments in Local to Watch for in 2012

Last Friday night, I spent a few hours devising a plan to win the Powerball.  Using the winning numbers from the past two years, I created a database and concocted a formula to predict the next winning numbers.  I naturally included various factors—outlier numbers, recent trends, total history—that would influence the drawing.  Upon completion of this plan, I was wholly confident that my analysis would deliver a positive outcome – to my bank account.  As you’d expect, when the numbers were drawn Saturday night, I was ready to collect my winnings. Fast forward …

Since I’m now writing this post, I bet you can guess the outcome.  Out of the six numbers drawn, I got one.  Yep, you read that right.  One.

As I crumpled the ticket in angst, I thought about the many brands that have set their 2012 local online agendas in the same way. They’ve looked at what has happened in the past and have made the assumption that future success will come from employing those same local online strategies and tactics.  However, if the past few years have taught us anything, it is that consumer behavior is anything but predictable, and that being the leader in a new space is much more valuable than captaining a ship with a dwindling passenger count.

Fortunately, brands are not alone in their efforts to navigate the local online landscape of 2012. Following is my list of the top four local online considerations that warrant paying close attention to as we look ahead to Q2.

1. The Rise of Google+ As Social for Businesses

In 2012, Google+ will become the dominant social destination for businesses.  Google+ has topped the 100 million member mark, but it is nowhere near the size of Facebook and there remains debate over the size of its active member pool.  The launch of Search plus Your World renders those stats unimportant.  Google is now incorporating social results directly into the organic listings and seems to be heavily favoring Google+ results over other social signals, which will turn a brand’s involvement on Google+ from a luxury to a necessity.

What does this mean for brands?  Google+ Pages is the portal for brands to create, define and build their social presence on Google.  These brand pages have a similar look and feel to Facebook, but Google+ has one vital component Facebook can’t match.  On Facebook, social commentary dies after a few days.  With Google+ Search plus Your World, commentary can live on and influence organic search results.  Most importantly, this influence can and does extend beyond searches by those in a brand’s circle; there are already examples of social influence on organic results, whether or not the searcher is logged in to Google+.

What should brands do?  Brands should create a main Google+ Page for the brand and for each brick-and-mortar location, and take steps to gain friends and create circles for each page.  The larger the pool of friends, the greater the chance of the searches by those friends being influenced by the location pages at their points of consideration.

2. Social Content Will Continue to Flummox Marketers

Social network success will no longer be defined by number of follows, friends, fans or likes.  Brands will discover that these metrics define social success no more than Nielsen ratings define success for a television spot.  A brand may have 10 million fans on Facebook, but how many of those fans really care?    A recent study by the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute shows the answer to that question is not what many brands want to hear; engagement by “fans” with a brand is actually only around 1.3 percent.

What does this mean for brands? No one brand has truly harnessed the power of social media.  Many have garnered fans and likes, but turning those likes into dependable revenue remains elusive.  Those brands that can construct a winning social formula will pull ahead of the pack.

What should brands do? Digital social media is the 21^st century version of the picket fence or water cooler, and brands need to approach it as such.  Turn the current approach of a digital billboard to one of an engagement platform.  Stop thinking of friends as consumers and instead treat them as, well, friends.

3. IYP Sites Will Continue To Stumble

IYP sites will no longer be a prime destination for local information.  Although local online search generally started with websites that were the digital counterparts of local yellow pages, today this is no longer the case.  The local ecosystem has expanded and evolved, print directories have become antiquated and local search traffic has migrated to search engines or specific sites, leaving the IYPs grasping.

What does this mean for brands? Most IYP sites engage in paid models where basic location information (name, address, phone number, etc.) is free to list on the site, but further details require “upgrading” to a paid service.  With Google and Bing both offering robust listings for free—and covering approximately 55 to 60 percent of local search traffic—paying for a listing that delivers only a fraction of available traffic has been seen as a poor investment by many brands.

What should brands do? If a brand is currently paying for IYP listings, it should closely examine the benefits of that spend and determine if better results can be achieved through that investment, but in another place of the local space.

4. Mobile Has Truly Arrived As A Search Device

According to Google, this past Valentine’s Day, 62 percent of all US-based national chain restaurant queries came from mobile devices.   JiWire reports that 21 percent of consumers search for a coupon on their mobile device while in a store.  Morgan Stanley estimates that by 2015 there will be more mobile web users than PC web users.  90 percent of local mobile searches result in an action, typically within 24 hours.  Mobile has truly arrived…and in a big way.

What does this mean for brands? Having information that is accessible via mobile devices is critical for local businesses.  As more and more consumers engage with their mobile devices, having a mobile-optimized site (not only one or two mobile pages) will be essential to capture those consumers who prefer to shop via their devices.

What should brands do?  The first step should be to optimize all local business listings to ensure they have top positioning on mobile searches, as results past the first page are typically ignored.  Serious consideration should also be given to incorporating elements of HTML5 into brand site designs, as this can help the site render correctly on mobile devices.

This year will be one of advances and growth in local and will foster the continued bonding of local, social and mobile.  Those three elements of the digital world are now irrevocably intertwined and can no longer be viewed as separate enterprises and projects.  Implementation of the tactics discussed here will enable brands to ride the wave of so/lo/mo, while ill-prepared competitors get left behind.

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