Leverage Your Offline Presence to Market Locally Online

February 19th, 2008

So your local small business has finally taken the step to go online and explore the growing marketing opportunities available on the internet. Good for you.

The age of local has arrived on the world wide web and many small business are finding success there. But to maximize the effectiveness of your business website you should not rely solely on search engine traffic or advertising links from other websites. You must let your website reach out into the offline world.

How do you do that? It’s rather easy really.

Piggy Back off Your Current Offline Marketing

In a nutshell that’s it. You already have a number of marketing mediums you’re using out in the real world. Attach your domain to it. To all of it.

Add your domain name to;
• business cards
• signs
• vehicle decals
• newspaper ads
• yellow pages listings
• radio ads
• television ads
• magazine ads
• invoices
• receipts
• EVERYWHERE

People Will Take Notice of Your Domain Name

We’ve all embraced the internet fully. Most of us using it daily. We see domain names being plugged all the time and we take notice of the ones that interest us. Maybe we don’t remember it after the first time we see it but after seeing it a few times we do.

Watch your website stats and see how many more direct requests you get to the site. These are the people who are typing your domain name directly into the address bar of their web browser. Go ahead check your stats now. I bet you already have a few people doing that now. Perhaps they found your site before through a search engine and are coming back again.

You may be surprised how much more direct type in traffic your site could attract if you were promoting the web address. And these are obviously local people. They saw your web address somewhere locally.

It Costs Next to Nothing

You’re already using various sources of traditional marketing so take advantage of it to plug your other marketing vehicle, the website. There is little to no added cost associated with adding your URL to your existing marketing media. The next time you renew any of your advertising be sure to update the ad to include your web address.

On the next printing run of your business cards, letterhead, or even invoices and such, make sure your web site URL is on them.

Vinyl decal on vehicles are cheap and often very effective. Add your URL there too.

Is your local newspaper featuring your business in a story? Ask that they include your web address at the bottom of the article. Heck, offer to pay them to add it if need be. Getting interviewed on the radio or television? Be sure to drop a plug for your site. It only takes a couple seconds to say “…and visit our website at www.ourwebsite.com”.

Obama is Doing it, So Should You

Take notice of all of Barack Obama’s signs. His domain name is on all of them. Whenever he is speaking the sign at the podium, the one that gets all the TV coverage, is prominently displaying his website address. The signs his supporters are waving all include his URL. He has it everywhere and his campaign website is very well designed, very usable, and has become an excellent campaign tool.

Regardless of your personal politics or opinions of Obama, that has nothing to do with this post, take note of his offline leveraging of his online presence. Copy it because it works.

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