LOCALiQ | Columbus Marketing Blog

    Six Ways to Improve Your Website Using Analytics

    A good business website is one that answers important questions, offers value, and generates leads and customers for your business. You may know that the content, design, and structure of your website directly impacts your lead generating efforts. However, you may not know exactly how to measure that impact or how to improve it.  The key to improving your website is in analyzing the data. Website analytics are intimidating because they can be difficult to make sense of, but we’ve got you covered. In this post, we’ll go over six aspects of your website analytics that you can understand and use to improve your website.

    Why The Midwest Is About To Become America's Next Silicon Valley

    My boss sent me this article recently and thought it was worth sharing with you. It's about how the Midwest, specifically Ohio is rapidly becoming a hub for startups & venture capitalists alike, especially in the tech industry. The article, originally posted by Peter Lane Taylor of Forbes shares some eye-opening stats and figures about the growth and opportunities in Ohio & Central Ohio. I've included the image below and a PDF for you to download if you'd like a copy. Please read the full article HERE.

    Dowload the image below as PDF

    Image Courtesy of VentureOhio

    Tips for Optimizing Your Small Business Marketing Budget

    Most small business entrepreneurs think they don’t have enough funds to create and implement complex marketing strategies, so they stick to handing business cards to customers and boosting one or a few posts per month on Facebook.

    Since insufficient budget is usually the biggest issue for small business marketers, we’ve decided to help them with the marketing budget guide that focuses on channel optimization. This is not one of these articles about cost-cutting that will tell you to shift your marketing to the digital sphere since the secret of marketing budgeting lies in choosing the most appropriate marketing channels. So, which channels are those? They are the ones that can be optimized & customized to best reach your target consumer.

    The best way to determine this is to use the Pareto principle. Find 20% of the channels that bring the 80% of the leads and sales. Businesses that use small marketing budgets can make this even narrower and choose 10% of all the channels they use. For most small companies, these would be the channels that allow them to target their best consumer in the local community.

    US SMBs Plan To Increase Social Media Budgets in 2017

    More than half of US small-business owners anticipate increasing their social media budgets in 2017, according to a recent study. Social media led the way with over 56% of SMB's planning to increase their budget. Digital Advertising, SEO, Email Marketing and Print Ads / Direct Mail and Content Marketing also show increases for 2017.

    Choosing the Best Advertising Channels for Your Small Business

    By Emma Miller (guest DMG Blogger)

    Choosing the best advertising channels for a product or a service is one of the most important tasks for every marketing professional. In recent years, marketing agencies have managed to incorporate the digital channels into their marketing mix, and now they are efficiently targeting their audience with both online and offline techniques.

    Small business owners, on the other hand, are left stranded and confused. In most cases, they don’t have the means to finance complex marketing campaigns, so they use only the channels that offer free or affordable promotion. This kind of thinking affects their marketing ROI and slows down the development of their business. In this article, we are going to explain the process of choosing the best advertising channels for small business entrepreneurs.

    Small Business Wishes that just Might Come True in 2017

    By: John Rossheim

    What tops the 2017 wish list of small business owners and their HR managers? Items on the list include affordable health insurance coverage and improved talent-acquisition processes, among other things. 

    Here’s what the companies we checked in with are wishing for in the New Year to improve their hiring strategies and employee retention.

    6 Tips on Being Found Easier


    Greetings from Columbus, Ohio. As I was typing that it still didn’t feel right. I'm new to the Columbus area, originally from Cleveland, OH. In the nine-plus weeks I've lived in Columbus, I've noticed a few frustrating things as I've been searching for a new "everything" (doctor, dentist, car wash, gas station, grocery store, laundromat, gym, eye doctor, pizza place, pet groomer, veterinarian and doggy day care.) It's been hard to find these places online with proper listings, correct information, accurate hours of operation and correct phone numbers. It doesn’t make sense to me why a business would be ok with having inaccurate information floating around the internet. Some may not know any better, some may know and not know how to fix it, and some may know and maybe don’t care, I hope not.

    Holiday Prep for the Small Business Owner

    Too early to already be thinking about the holidays? Think again! The National Retail Federation found that about 40% of consumers begin their holiday shopping before Halloween – a trend that has been pretty consistent since 2004. With the holiday season being one of the most profitable times for businesses, it is critical to start marketing to consumers early and strategically. Here are some key marketing insights for small business owners to have a successful holiday sales season:

    •  Be in the right place, at the right time, with the right message

    The best marketing plans include multiple points of contact whether it’s through print, digital, or social means. Think about your customers and how they might make a purchase from your business. Print advertising is often sought out and seen as a local, trusted source for holiday shopping and digital components are now a necessity:

    “This year, 56% of all in-store retail sales, $2.1 trillion, will be influenced by what consumers see on digital media. About 70% of shoppers in all age categories use digital media before a shopping trip.” 

    The Affordable Care Act and your Small Business: A Primer

    By: Reva Nelson

    Does your small and growing business have a handle on the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) requirements? The Employer Shared Responsibility, aka “pay or play” rules, kicked in on Jan. 1, 2015 for employers with 100 or more full-time employees; 2016 ACA requirementslaunched January 1st, 2016 for employers with 50-99 employees.

    Three Essentials to Gaining Customer Trust

         Three Essentials to Gaining Customer Trust
    Make sure you have a professional email address. If you are still using a personal email account (e.g. gmail or yahoo!), customers will wonder if you are a real business. Getting email to match your website domain is easy, and is a very affordable option.

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