Local Search and Hyperlocal Blogging

This session was dedicated to how a company like Swipht could take advantage of local and hyperlocal searching that users are doing more of each day. I had very little mindshare on local searching, as for me it consisted mainly of using Google Maps. But local search entails much more than that, and, as the 3 presenters explained, local search can transform a business.

Greg Hartnett from Best of the Web, gave some great tips on where to start. I always took the search directories for granted. I personally don't use them, and always felt they were hokey, in the sense they didn't necessarily help users get to a destination. But thinking of the search engine relationship power they present has me reevaluating my former opinions.

Mary Bowling of seOverflow.com gave a cadre of techniques, over 20 in total, on how to build your local listing presence. A few include:

• standardize your business info across the web
• make sure your business has a tagline
• reviews weigh more and more each day

The last, reviews, is interesting. Good reviews of course, help the most, but even the review microformat like that used on corkd.com provides a good way for search engines to get what they really want. Maybe sites like Digg are actually worth something?

Finally, Matt McGee of hyperlocalblogger.com spoke on hyperlocal blogging. He and his wife run a few local blogs for the Tri-cities area of Eastern Washington. Blogging about local events that aren't really related to his business as a SEO marketer or his wife's profession as a real estate agent still helps to drive traffic to their respective sites. Can't argue with results, no matter how small they might be. As long as users convert...

So far the conference has started out strong. I'm looking forward to the next session, On-site Insight.