Small businesses are usually sole proprietorships, partnerships or privately owned corporations. They employ a small number of employees and often do not have financial turnovers as large as those of large multinational companies. Small businesses are present in every industry. Ranging from interior designing to jewelry sales and even pet services, it is hard to avoid any of these businesses in our daily lives.
However, with so many small businesses selling products and services in society, we often forget that they can potentially be a very lucrative pool of customers as well. Any company that provides products or services to small businesses can benefit greatly from having a small business list.
Fortunately, the advancement of technology has enabled almost anyone to get access to a small business list with ease. There are online portals available for organizations and individuals to communicate with these small businesses, allowing them to get up-to-date information about company details and any other updates. One can also do a quick search online to look for such publicly available small company details. However, this is a potentially long and tedious process.
A good alternative is to look for small business mailing lists offered by list brokers and compliers on the web. The small business lists provided by brokers enable immediate access to a large pool of up-to-date information about other small businesses. The best part is that these lists are continuously being updated, so you won't have to worry too much about getting outdated information. A quick rental of such a list would save one the time of having to personally search and update records.
Next, after having a small business list, individuals and other businesses can use it to their advantage. Entrepreneurs, start-up firms and home-based workers can use the list to conduct market analysis and research for example. This way, they easily identify market needs and are able to offer their products and services to these potential clients.
Another way a small business list can be used is to send out promotional material to highly targeted business prospects. For example, if you own an air-conditioning repair service, you could send out promotional brochures advertising your services to small businesses that could very well be your clients in the future. After all, which business office doesn't own an air-conditioner or two?
The benefits of having access to a small business list is worth it's weight in gold. But should one compile the list themselves, or rent one instead? If one wishes to manually compile the small business list himself, he will have to ensure that they are constantly being kept up-to-date.
This is because companies often make changes in their management, causing contact persons to change, or even a change in company address. The time and monetary costs required to maintain an accurate list of small business contact information is not small.
To avoid this, it would be best to rent a small business list and spend their time on making actual sales.
Having immediate access to a complied updated business list helps individuals and organizations to save time and money. When they require small businesses for their marketing needs or require help in their businesses, they can tap on this large resource base easily and efficiently.
This may be the year when the convergence of hardware, software and consumer behaviour makes a business? ability to be found through local search an online marketing necessity. The importance of having a business web page that ranks for local search terms on Google, Yahoo!, MSN and the plethora of other search engines that drive Internet commerce is particularly pronounced for small, local businesses that compete for the foot traffic that pass their storefronts in competitive marketplaces.
The hardware that is driving this convergence and fuelling the emergence of local search as a business-critical issue for small business is the new-generation of handheld mobile phones and PDAs ? particularly Apple's iPhone, the next-and-latest version of which is being rolled out in 22 countries July 11th. The software is search engine giant, Google's Google Maps and the similar mapping applications on the other search engines.
More and more consumers, particularly in the youngest and most coveted marketing demographics, are using smart phone technology as a preferred method for searching the Internet. Typically, the products and services these young and mobile consumers are searching for online are local products and services ? be it a coffee shop, a live entertainment venue, a clothing shop or any of the other myriad goods and services that are advertised both online and off.
Google is set as the default web browser on Apple's iPhone, and the iPhone is the leader in smart phones ? a position that is only likely to be enhanced when the next generation of iPhone comes onto the market in July. Google has long been the hands-down leader in Internet search. The synergy of having the world's leading search engine as the default setting on the world's most popular smart phone gives a huge impetus to the emergence of mobile search as the rising tide in small business marketing. Already, Google ? thanks to its collaboration with Apple ? is riding the rising tide of mobile search. In the first quarter of 2008, Google captured 61% of the mobile search market, while Yahoo! raked in an 18% share and third-place MSN accounted for only 5% of mobile searches, according to survey numbers from Nielsen Mobile. This, of course, leaves a paltry 16% market share for all other search engines combined.
As more and more smart phones come to market with advanced Internet search capabilities and GPS functions hoping to cash in on the market already dominated by the iPhone (and RIM's BlackBerry line for business-types), Google's dominance of local search and mobile search is likely to be cast in stone. Accordingly, for small businesses who wish to turn web traffic that is already searching for products and services online into foot traffic that will drive customers to and into their storefronts, having an online presence that will rank on Google becomes ever more important.
Survey results from Nielson/NetSurvey, in conjunction with marketing firm WebVisible, indicate that 86% of all Internet users in 2008 search for local products and services online. This number is up from the 70% of Internet users who were conducting online local searches in 2007. Significantly for small, local businesses whose focus is their company's storefront, rather than an online business, the Nielson results show that 90% of the transactions that are initiated through online local searches are completed offline.
Thus, the importance of local search, mobile search and an effective online business profile for small businesses that are seeking to stay competitive in an increasingly crowded and digital marketplace. And, hence, the importance of Google Maps, perhaps the chief software application that is refining and defining the race for local business web pages that rank well in search engine ? read Google ? results. Google Maps gives the potential customer who is searching for a local product or service on the fly from his or her mobile handset the maps and directions that specify where the products and services can be purchased in the geographic locale where the customer is.
There are a multitude of 200+ factors that are constantly being tweaked by Google to determine a specific page's ranking, and over 45 factors that are used to determine a site's specific local ranking. Optimizing the on-site and off-site factors that determine a web page's ranking and local search ranking is no easy feat. Yet, at a minimum, small businesses will want to have a web page that sets out there products and services, and to register that site with Google's local business listings so that they can tap into the web traffic that is increasingly turning into foot traffic thanks to the emergence of mobile search and its convergence with smart phone technology.
Both Chris Burns & Bruce Orr are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.