Local Marketing Moving Away from Traditional Ways

Local marketing is taking on a completely different look. Once upon a time, it consisted of an ad in the local newspaper, direct mail marketing, and a telephone book listing or ad. There may have been some signs outside of storefronts, flyers around town, and a number of other old school methods, but now marketing has a brand new face and it is because of the digital age.

Just as large companies use the Internet to market their brands, local companies do the same. They are using such tools as Google Places, Facebook, Google+, Twitter, and a number of others to reach their local audience. Social media, Google Places, and various others have made it much easier to contact a local market and get an automatic response.

Back in the day of the newspaper and Yellow Page ad, the business had no idea who was seeing their ad. They did not get an instant response. They didn’t know the impact of the ad until the day of a sale or until someone told them that they saw the ad and that is not always information that someone conveys.

Now this is not saying that newspapers, direct mail marketing, and telephone book ads are completely dead. There are still certain audiences that patronize businesses placing ads and sending them marketing pieces. However, this works with certain industries, such as the car dealership showcasing its cars for the week (even they need a website to show off their cars, deals, and what sets them apart from the competition). Many businesses that have products and services that can be used by an older population can benefit, but even individuals in their 70s, 80s, and 90s are learning how to use the Internet and they are responding to the advertising that is put in front of them.

Because more demographics are using the Internet to find what they are looking for, the face of local marketing is completely changing and this means that trends are moving away from the traditional ways. This makes local search engine marketing more important than ever. You also know that you are reaching people in the local population so that you can tweak your local marketing campaigns when they need tweaking. That is something that the traditional ways never allowed to happen so quickly. Sometimes it would take months to know if an ad was working. Now, there are reporting tools and pay-per-click ad metrics that instantly measure how well advertising is working.