When we started helping The Nail Shop Maui, Judy Stockwell and her daughter, Jamie, had just taken over the nail and skin care spa in Kihei, Maui.  The shop had suffered from the recession and owner fatigue, with sales falling almost 50% from their peak in 2007.  As with any destination travel location, sales were effected by the loss of tourist trade and because the local clients were impacted by the poor economic conditions.

in addition to the locals and the tourists, an important part of this nail spa’s income came from snow birds that only come for a few months in the Winter.  The Nail Shop Maui is upscale and the prices reflect that.  So the wealthier clients that can afford to spend a few months in the island are the core client.

Starting with improvements to the website and blog, then moving to Facebook, the shop now has great visibility in the area.  We made sure they had at least five reviews on Google Places.  This combined with seven reviews on Yelp has added to their phone ringing more frequently.  YouTube videos of the grand opening has been a huge hit.  Other YouTube videos zero in on specific products that clients are likely to run out of while on vacation. Oh, did we mention that The Nail Shop is ranked #1 on Google Places for ‘nail shops maui’.

Nail shops are particularly positioned to take advantage of both search engine marketing and traditional marketing.  The Nail Shop Maui has created an incredible look in both the shop and their advertising materials.  They have also created a great email list, and through our efforts generate almost 50% opens on each months mailing.

So if you have a nail shop in Des Moines or New York City, we can help you bring customers to your door through our extensive Internet Marketing expertise.

Call Today or Contact Us Today For A Free Consultation

800-708-1748

Bike shops are one of the last true mom and pop businesses in the US.  But even the smallest bicycle dealer can’t afford to rely on the marketing strategies of the mom and pop era, and hope to survive.

With several bike shops as clients and the two owners of Page1Listings having long and storied resume’s in the bicycle industry, we are able to provide fast results using both online and off line marketing approaches.  Like most retailers the starting point in 2011 has to be Google Places.  Showing up on page two for Google Places as a bike shop is the kiss of death. 

The search engine marketing effort for a bike shop requires major content on the bicycles themselves.  We typically use a combination of huge websites, very active blogs, multiple YouTube videos, and application of our Magic Tool to create lots of content on the other social media elements.  Frequent Email blasts to the customer list is a must.

Offline efforts include store design, sales training, signage, meetup.com for rides and clinics, plus event management.  Investing time and energy into helping the casual rider and the enthusiast engaged in the use of their bicycle is a major contributor to increased sales and profits.

Our long experience in marketing for bicycle retailers allows us to dramatically effect performance for our bike dealer clients.

Ask any wedding photographer that has been in business for more than a year or two.  The business has changed dramatically.  And online marketing for wedding photographers has changed with it.  Our client, Bill Stockwell Photography also known as Photos On Maui is a second generation wedding photographer, and he has seen the changes up close and personal.

Only a few years ago he was located in Napa, Ca. with a minimum fee of $2900, and every client needed lots of prints and an album.  Now he is located in Maui, Hawaii, with an average wedding lasting two hours and selling for $1000.  The newlyweds get a CD of the photos in the package, and might occasionally buy an album.

What we knew for sure was that most of the business was coming from the hotels and that he was just one choice on a list.  The wedding coordinators would provide the websites and let the brides decide.  So the first effort had to go into making sure there was a constant flow of wedding shots on the blog and that the blog was one step from the website where other galleries were in place with best ever shots.

Google Places was important to gain the rogue brides who were not using a coordinator.  A huge amount of effort went into insuring that the Google Places listing was highly ranked on page 1.

1.  Traditional WOM (Word Of Mouth) is and continues to be a huge driver of new business to all small local companies.  But Internet WOM is already or will be the number one source of new clients in 2011.  The single most important component will be Reviews, Testimonials, and Reputation Management.  Whether on Yelp, SuperPages, TripAdvisor, InsiderPages, Google Places or your own website or blog, folks will use the words of your existing customers to determine whether to buy from you or not.

Our Solution:  ShoutDog continues to help clients gain more positive and will soon be joined with a new business review tool called Review This Biz.  It will combine a simple method for generating reviews with other feedback methods to help improve your positive customer service.  We expect Review This Biz  to be a VBD (Very Big Deal) for our clients in 2011.  Expect a beta launch in mid-Januaray 2011.

2.  Email Marketing will continue to be the number one ROI (Return On Investment) for all marketing tools available to small businesses.  Sending relevant and fun emails to your clients past, present, and future is producing fantastic returns for everyone we know.

Our Solution:  ShoutDog Email and List Services will help in generating new emails for your database. Our email department is getting stronger at creating emails that will get opened and produce actions.  If you are not currently sending out emails to your own list, make it a priority in 2011.

3.  Google Places will continue to baffle and befuddle with their changes and their buggy applications, but they will also continue to produce noticeable results for those who are highly ranked under important keywords.  Our expectation is that Places will become even more dominant in 2011.

Our Solution:  We are nationally recognized as an expert in Google Places (Look up ‘Google Places Expert’….we are ranked #1).  We believe that reviews will be the big determinant of rank in 2011.  ReviewThisBiz will be helping to drive reviews to your Places Listing.  We will continue to DAILY monitor the entire web for what the other experts are saying about optimizing Google Places.

4.  YouTube now sees 35 hours of video uploaded every minute.  Nationally YouTube is the 2nd largest search engine and drives business to every kind of company.  Every single pundit sees even more emphasis on this category of marketing as smart phones become the number one way to view videos.

Our Solution:  We were way ahead of this curve and have now produced well over 400 YouTube Videos for our clients.  We have added new technology in December that allows for a very inexpensive way to create great videos.  We highly recommend that every business have a minimum of 20 YouTube videos.

5.  Social Media is not going away.  Facebook is the current king but others are working to take market share. During 2010, we jumped into the social media pool with a tool called Go Social.  This allowed for the much more efficient use of time and energy for Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, and Linked In.

Our Solution:  In 2011 we will work to further streamline the creation and distribution of content for all social media sites.  We believe that we already have the most effective system in existence.  Through our process a 500 word article can become an online article, two press releases, two to three blog posts, and those blog posts create activity on FaceBook, Twitter, and Linked In.  Even one such effort per month will result in 100′s of potential views of your ideas on the net each month, and 1000′s within a year.  We will have a tutorial on Go Social available by Jan 10th, 2011.

6.  Websites are, says Google, critical to your ranking on Google Places.  Moreover, with Google’s new Preview tool on search, the front page of your website needs to be an attention getter in two seconds or less of viewing time.

Our Solution:  Every website needs to be evaluated for content and local SEO (search engine optimization).  The front page needs to be reviewed to see if it has the WOW factor in Preview. And most importantly, the website has to designed to have a very high conversion rate or all of the SEO in the world will not generate new customers for your business.

7.  Local Networking:  WOM from your customer to their friends and neighbors is fantastic.  WOM online through social networking, videos, and reviews is really great.  But many small businesses fail to appreciate the importance of WOM from peers, suppliers, and community resources.  In 2011, we expect this type of marketing to continue to be increasingly useful and popular.

Our Solution:  We will have a tutorial on how to get WOM through local networking available by January 10th. We will have a check list of things you need to do to get the most out of Local Networking.

These are the biggies for 2011.  There are many other important marketing developments that will effect us all in the new year, but if every local business got these seven right, we suspect business will be quite good in 2011.

Feel free to contact us for comments or questions about anything you’re read.

800-708-1748

Sincerely,

Your Page1Lsitings.com Team!

ps – Have a great 2011!

If you need to move product from retail shelves, create trust with your clients, or explain important details about consumer goods or business-to-business services, YouTube may provide your company amazing returns on your investment.  YouTube videos are reportedly 27 times more likely to show up on page one of your critical key words.  Knowing why and how could result in substantial revenue and profit increases for businesses like yours.

The oldest bicycle retailer in America under one families’ ownership is located in Ontario, California. Bumstead’s Bicycles is now owned by the forth and fifth generation of Bumsteads. But in their 99th year things were pretty rocky. After a failed attempt to move into larger, more expensive, quarters, they questioned whether they would be celebrating number 100. One thing they tried was YouTube Videos. Lloyd Bumstead points to creation of a series of YouTube videos as one of the best decisions they made in 2008. “In one weekend alone we had three new customers buy bicycles who were drawn by our videos.” Lloyd and son Garrison are now in year 101.

Why is YouTube working for small businesses? Visual media is trusted. Many consumers prefer to get their information by video instead of text. The emotion and energy of a powerful visual presentation convert visitors to buyers better than print. Use of music and special effects accomplish things that no other media can duplicate. But in this internet age, the big deal about YouTube is how easily you can get visibility on Google search. It is not uncommon for a thoughtfully keyworded YouTube Video to show up higher than your $5000 website.

In fact, Google is now making a concerted effort to “mix media” on page 1 search results. That’s why you now see news, images, videos, and local search engine results right on the top page mixed in with traditional websites. It is now estimated that a YouTube video is 27 times more likely to show up on page 1 of a google search for your important keywords than a website. Results happen quickly, too. Commonly your YouTube video will be seen on Google search within hours.

What does it take to create a video that might get such startling results? You can either do it yourself or hire a professional video production company to do it for you. The cost for a professional will range from a few hundred dollars complete to $1000 per minute. For YouTube purposes a good $300 video is probably all you need. Inexpensive videos might include a staff member explaining the benefits of a product, service, or the company itself, but many videos are simple compilations of still pictures, text slides, super text, and music.

Going it on your own is simpler than you might expect, and yet the potential return on your time investment may depend on a serious commitment to getting past the basics that follow. Excellent results may require digging into tutorials available on the web. Learning how to “tell your story” in a way that captures and holds the viewer’s attention long enough to create action is more art than science. That said, here are the basics you will need to do it yourself.

• Camera – Almost any camera that takes digital video will work. I like the Casio Exilim cameras. You can even get the job done with the Flip.
• Movie Editing Program – Apple’s IMovie is fantastic, but there are many free programs available.
• The Script – Plan out what you want to say and how you want to tell the story.
• Directing – Whether you are only directing yourself or others, admonish the story teller to just relax. They can do it over as often as necessary. Also, YouTube is a relaxed environment. Many viewers don’t want the material to be too commercial.
• Upload your contents into your editing program. Add still shots as inserts or breaks in the action. Create an intro and credits. Edit the video down to the point where you story is fully told. Add music if you dare. Music is a big plus at least for the intro. Here is an example of a YouTube video created for a bike shop that captures these ideas and has successfully sold a lot of product.
• Upload to YouTube. Your Title should be keyword rich, but still attract viewers. Your description can be really long. Start with your website URL, then add content. Some suggest the description should be a transcript of what’s on the video. Tell the visitor what action to take. Add keyword tags.
• Promote your video. Get friends to go to the video and give it a 5 star rating and make nice comments. Add the video to Facebook, blogs, and your website. Tell your followers to go see it.
• Finally, do Google searches under the keywords that you targeted. See where you are showing up.

There you have it. Easy and actually fun. Go back to your YouTube account, look under insite, and track the results. You may even want to tweak the title or keywords to try and get better traffic. What is a success? Hard to know. The best gauge? Does anyone buy anything from you because they saw the YouTube video. Five views a day and one order a week is better than 50 views a day and no orders.