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Hyperlocal marketing is the key to getting more customers in your area. In just 15 minutes a day, you can get hyperlocal marketing done and make it work for you.
When thinking about your hyperlocal marketing strategy, it’s important to target the channels where your customers are spending their time.
I’m going to share my favorite online spots for hyperlocal marketing, and the easy process how you can use these platforms to your advantage in just 15 minutes a day, a few days a week.
Hyperlocal marketing is a type of marketing that is focused on a specific, small geographic area. This could be a geographic area, such as a town or city, or it could be a demographic area, such as people who are interested in a particular hobby. Sometimes it’s overlapping the two. We will primarily be focusing on the geographic audience.
One of the advantages of hyperlocal marketing is that it allows you to target your advertising very specifically. You can reach people who are interested in what you’re selling and who live close to your business. This is especially useful if you have a brick-and-mortar store that you want people to visit.
Hyperlocal marketing can be done online or offline, but we will focus on the online methods in this article.
Hyperlocal marketing can have a lot of benefits for your business. Some of the most important benefits are:
If you’re interested in hyperlocal marketing, the first step is to determine the demographic or geographic area that you want to target. This could be a town or city, or it could be a demographic area, such as people who are interested in a particular hobby. Sometimes it’s overlapping the two.
Once you’ve determined your target audience or geographic area, the next step is to start creating content that will appeal to them. This could be blog posts, Q&As, videos – all of which I always recommend that you post on your own website so that you can always be pointing traffic to a link on your site. But it also works to create a post specifically for whichever platform you’re posting on – a Q&A works great for this, where you take one question and provide the answer. The important thing is to make sure that your content is relevant to your target audience and that it’s engaging.
Once you have some content created, the next step is to start promoting it. There are a number of ways to do this, including social media, online directories, and even traditional methods like print or radio advertising. The important thing is to get your content in front of as many people as possible – which is why I’m going to share the super simple process (below) that only takes 15 minutes a day.
Traditional media outlets – radio, newspaper, television – can be a great boost for expanding your reach locally. I have an entire course dedicated how to make connections and obtain media coverage for this type of publicity, and it’s much more involved than we can go into in this blog.
Instead, we will be covering a few online platforms that are perfect for expanding your local reach. Here are a few of our favorites:
If you’re looking for a hyperlocal marketing tool that is specifically designed for small businesses, look no further than Alignable. Alignable is a platform where business owners can connect with each other and collaborate on projects. It’s a great way to get feedback from your customers and to connect with local influencers.
To get started with Alignable, create a profile for your business and start connecting with other local businesses. You can also join groups and participate in discussions, in addition to posting your own news and deals.
While Alignable is primarily B2B, the audience is still people who are interested in things outside of their own business, and in ways to collaborate.
Best use: post your deals, answer questions about your industry.
Nextdoor is a hyperlocal platform that is perfect for businesses looking to connect with their local community. With Nextdoor, you can create a profile for your business and share news and deals with your neighbors. You can also connect with other local businesses and participate in discussions.
Nextdoor is a great way to get feedback from your customers and to connect with local influencers. It’s also a great way to connect with people who are interested in your business but may not be familiar with it yet.
To get started with Nextdoor, create a profile for your business and start connecting with other local businesses. You can also join groups and participate in discussions, in addition to posting your own news and deals.
Best use: share tips and updates plus specials
When it comes to hyperlocal marketing, Yelp is a platform that you can’t ignore. With Yelp, you can create a profile for your business and share news and deals with your neighbors. You can also connect with other local businesses and participate in discussions.
To get started with Yelp, create a profile for your business and start connecting with other local businesses and posting your own news and deals.
Keep in mind Yelp will call you regularly to ask you to advertise … I don’t recommend doing this as part of your initial strategy.
Best use: share deals, respond to comments and reviews
Quora is a Q&A platform that is perfect for businesses looking to connect with their community. With Quora, you can create a profile for your business and share news and deals with your neighbors. You can also connect with other local businesses and participate in discussions.
Quora is a great way to get feedback from your customers and to connect with local influencers. It’s also a great way to connect with people who are interested in your business but may not be familiar with it yet. It’s also one of the better spots to help establish your expertise in a subject, since you can regularly respond to questions the audience has about your industry.
To get started with Quora, create a profile for your business and start connecting with other local businesses. You can also join groups and participate in discussions, in addition to posting your own news and deals.
Best use: answer audience questions about your industry
Reddit is a social media platform that is perfect for businesses looking to connect with their local community. With Reddit, you can create a profile for your business and share news and deals with your neighbors. You can also connect with other local businesses and participate in discussions.
There are two reasons people visit Reddit: to get information, and to be entertained.
To get started with Reddit, create a profile for your business and start connecting with other local businesses. You can also join groups and participate in discussions, in addition to posting your own news and deals.
Best use: share helpful information or something entertaining, answer audience questions
Buzzfeed Community is part of Buzzfeed. Anyone can write for Buzzfeed Community … but you will do best to provide quizzes and lists and information similar to the popular posts that you see trending on the site.
It is not for self-promotion, so the type of posting that you would do on Buzzfeed will need to fall in line with the other type of popular posts trending on the platform. It is an entertainment platform first and foremost.
Best use: entertaining lists and quizzes
Mediumis an open platform where readers find dynamic thinking, and experts and undiscovered voices can share their writing on any topic.
Medium is a perfect spot for you to reuse existing blog content, because with just a couple of clicks you can post it as a rel=canonical link … which means that search engines will view the version on your website as the original, and point all SEO juice there. For the most part. That’s as simple as using their Import a Story option and pasting an existing blog URL. Be sure you always use this method so that the links are always have the proper canonical link.
Best for: repurposing your existing blog content
Maps
Google Business is a platform that is perfect for businesses looking to connect with their local community. With Google Business, you can create a profile for your business, along with a listing on Google Maps, and share news and deals
To get started with Google Business, create a profile for your business and be sure to complete the verification process.
That will get your business to show up on Google Maps. But don’t stop there – one of the best things you can do is regularly posts updates about your business, along with specials and deals. Did you know that a deal posted on Google Business will show up in the Maps listing? But don’t limit it to deals – post regular updates, including repurposing existing content by including an excerpt with a link back to your website.
Best for: maps and directions plus posting deals
Similar to Google Maps (although Google is still #1 for traffic), with Bing Places, you can create a profile for your business and share news and deals with your neighbors.
To get started with Bing Places, create a profile for your business and start connecting with other local businesses. You can also join groups and participate in discussions, in addition to posting your own news and deals.
Best for: maps and company information
Apple Maps is a great way to market your business. With Apple Maps, you can create a profile for your business. This is critical if a lot of your customers use iPhones, since it’s the map that feeds Siri.
Best for: maps and company information
Paid Platforms
While I know you are primarily interested in free platforms, there are two paid platforms that are worth mentioning that will send you warm leads from people currently interested in your service.
Pricing varies – for example, on Thumbtack you only pay (using credits) for those leads that you choose to respond to and pitch your services. This can keep it affordable, and can be a great way to generate a few new clients during otherwise slower times.
Angie’s List (now called Angi) is a great way to market your business. With Angi, you can create a profile for your business. Angi is primarily directed towards businesses that serve homeowners, such as plumbing, roofing, cleaning companies.
Angi is free for the people searching for a service, and a paid option for the professionals on the platform.
Best use: if you are a home services company, you can list your business for free, although you will need to choose paid options to see the most benefit
If you’re looking for a more targeted way to market your business, Thumbtack may be the perfect platform for you.
Thumbtack is much like Angi in the fact that the consumers searching can do so for free, and fees to connect are paid by the businesses.
However, unlike Angi which is limited to home-service businesses, it is open to any type of local business – lessons, personal trainers, weddings, events, photography and so much more.
Best use: complete your profile fully, and then check regularly for requests that you choose to respond to
I know that everything we just shared can seem a bit overwhelming, but there is a very easy methods for doing this type of hyperlocal marketing … and in only 15-minute chunks.
You will be amazed at what kind of impact just a few minutes at a time, over time, will make.
First, choose how many days a week you want to devote a 15-minute block of your time. Three or five are the most popular with our growing entrepreneurs, but even one will get you further than you are now.
Most important – schedule a recurring appointment with yourself on your calendar now for these 15-minute appointments.
Get it on your calendar and commit.
However many days a week you chose, is how many platforms from the list above you’re going to choose.
For example, if I select three days a week I’m probably doing Monday, Wednesday, Friday.
So I will also select three platforms – one for each day. Maybe I choose Google Maps (always my #1 recommendation), Nextdoor, and Medium.
It isn’t quite as important which three you choose … as long as you choose something and commit to the 15-minutes.
At my first session, on Monday, choose a topic. I always recommend an existing piece of content from your website when you have one (and longer content can be broken into multiple sessions – for example, with this post you are reading, I could easily break it into four). You could also choose a FAQ that you often hear from prospects or existing clients and share that question and your answer. Or something interesting related to your industry that you read very recently.
This one topic is what you will use for all three platforms this week.
On Monday I post this on my Google Business profile – with a link back to the article or information on my website. (Always link back to your website when possible).
On Wednesday, I post very similar on Nextdoor. I may change the wording a bit since it’s a different platform. Or I may not.
On Friday, same topic or information, this time on Medium. Since I’m using Medium, I’ll use the “import story” feature so that it points back to my website properly.
Posting that information may take half of my allotted 15 minutes (even less as you get more used to doing it).
For the other half, I’m going to do a SEARCH on the platform and see if anyone has asked a question related to my industry that I can answer. Always sharing value and expertise. I’ll make sure that my answer either has a link back to my profile on the platform (pretty common) or I will add a very brief sentence like “you can find more advice at mywebsite.com”.
For the next week, I choose another existing piece of content, or answer a new question, or whatever topic makes sense.
Or perhaps this week I want to announce a new special deal I’m launching, so I could use that instead. I recommend following the 80/20 rule of posting and keeping your posts at least 80% informational and 20% sales (or somewhere in there) when possible.
And I repeat the process.
No problem! Repost something that you’ve already done. Yes, it’s really okay – and it’s actually extremely helpful.
You can reword it a bit if you want. Or not. It takes a human brain 7-11 times to see something before they remember it, so reposting is helpful to your business.
Or you can change how you present the information a bit. Last time maybe it was a tip. This time maybe you make the same topic a list.
Just remember, whenever possible, including a link back to information on your own website (not necessarily a hard sell link, just an informational link).
The first thing to do is choose how many days a week, and then choose the platforms.
Then for THIS week, go get signed up on those platforms so that you can begin posting later. The signup process on most will take you less than 15 minutes (other than one like Google Business which is going to require mail verification).
We have a mix of entrepreneurs looking for ideas on ways they can market their business, which is why we provide an overview of how you can get something done. Sometimes when you’re starting, or pivoting, you have a bit more time than money, so you look for DIY options.
Then we have the entrepreneurs who are focused on business growth and are at the stage where they realize they need to be outsourcing this type of activity so that they can focus on their zone of genius.
That’s why we offer this type of hyperlocal marketing as part of our search engine optimization services. Take it off your plate so that you can focus on the areas of your business that only you can do.
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