The Argument for Google+ As Your Website

Google wants you to use their products, they reward you for using their products:

• Google+ is the first social network shown to people searching for your business. 
• Google Reviews are shown prominently when your offer is Googled (i.e. pizza in Brooklyn, NY) 
• Your listing is ranked (partly) on the availability of information you've made available to Google and the number of reviews on your business. 

So, if it's true that 97% of people have Googled a small business, why not host your businesses' online presence on Google+? Promote Google Reviews, delete your Facebook, and let your business be a beautiful piece of the 97%'s Googling experience. 

I love how Google+ shows how many visits have been made to your page. How many of you actually keep tabs on web traffic? With the view count on every Google+ page you'll at least have a sense of reach. And the numbers are big! I pulled these views numbers from local businesses with 10 reviews or less: 

• Sciarrino's Pizza - 7 reviews - 66k views
• Season's Pizza Newport - 4 reviews - 136k views
• Pizza Pro - 8 reviews - 55k views

Point is, if you don't want to worry about a Facebook a Twitter a Pinterest a Website - don't. The only thing that will happen is Google will make it easier for your business to be found. Create Events, share photos & new offers, and respond to reviews. 

Start on Google+

Space, Local Business and the Sharing Economy

The Sharing Economy (sometimes also referred to as the peer-to-peer economy, mesh, collaborative economy, collaborative consumption) is a socio-economic system built around the sharing of human and physical assets. (wikipedia) 

Individuals share their homes. We share transportation, tools and advice. The Sharing Economy is a willingness driven market. I've purchased something you want to use and I'm willing to lend it to you, sometimes for a fee. It's interesting to see how much we have to share. Listing spare bedrooms, any asset really, so someone you don't know can make use of your property or knowledge.  It's interesting to see small businesses on the sidelines.

For big business a new trend has emerged. A business model known as Open Innovation. Big companies share knowledge and unused patents to bring new products and services to the market. But we're not talking about big companies with pools of patents. We're talking about local businesses. I wonder how your business could share unused merchandise, inventory, knowledge and space to create unbelievable value for an organization that needs it. It could be a charity, a school, another small business, elderly blonde women - anything.

Could your business double as a drop spot for a local shoe drive? Could you reward customers with discounts based on charitable donations, not repeat business?

Don't think 'what can we do for the community?' in dollar donation terms. How could you share your space, your inventory, your knowledge to donate value to the community? More value than you could donate in dollars.

Happy sharing.

Local Business Collaboration: Water Ice Meets Bread

Black Lab (left) featured with Fusco's (right) 

Fusco's Italian Ice is a family owned water ice shop in the heart of my city. Worth all 5 stars. 

Black Lab Breads is a family owned bakery just up the street from my house. Bread is tough on my stomach. Worth all the stomach aches.

The families know each other well. They're both staples of the community. They respect each other, not for their business acumen, but for their quality. People work at Fusco's. People work at Black Lab Breads. These people have taste buds. Their taste buds tell them the water ice is fresh and the bread is delicious. No outside reviews needed for this issue. 

So how have the used this tasty knowledge to their advantage? They show each other love. They show the community love. And the community can't help but show love for 2 icons rubbing shoulders. There may be some shoppers of Fusco's who have never had Black Lab Breads. How do you think they'll receive it when they see 10 people commenting on the quality - on a different businesses' page! 

In return Black Lab could have included Fusco's in an e-mail blast, they may not have responded at all. The point is Fusco's showed respect for a community staple, and the community supported the message. 

Take this example here and amplify it with an organized campaign on Social Local. Share customers locally. Rub shoulders with community staples. 

Social Local: The Local Business Platform Your Community Deserves

Yes, this is a pitch. But it's not salesly, it's actionabl-y(?). I'd just like to define what we believe here, who we make products for and why we do it. I demo a lot of new software as part of my job. How can it help us? Is this the one with this one metric I've been asking for on my Christmas list? I find that a lot of platforms have no ideals, no real vision. The vision is success. They want to win their market's hearts and praise, blossoming into the only option a decision maker could possibly rationalize. And the products work, they work even better than the previous ones. But they work for yesterday's problems. We work for tomorrows. 

Local business has always been a little behind. Not all local businesses, of course, but logic supports it. We don't have people dedicated to finding the newest technology, we don't have the budgets to afford them, we don't have the kind of team that could easily implement them into the operations. If it's not simple, if it's not measurable, and if it's not relatively affordable, it's not for us. 

Some local business programs of a different nature have been offering free trial versions of big, all you can eat giant marketing companies. I've used these companies. They work great for big business, where the gadgets are needed, the new features are actually news to someone. But for local business? Who's going to learn to use this? And why do we need all of that? A platform like that could have forums full of customer q&a, the only recourse you could ever need. Heck, they might not even need a guy like me. But they'd have one, because they're the biggest and the biggest have all the features (most of the time). 

We don't have forums full of q&a. In fact, if we do, we've failed. You shouldn't need to learn to use our platform, it should all be intuitive. Not only that, but before signing up you should be able to see the value in our features. How they can drive your business objectives, how they can help you sleep at night. 

This is how we design Social Local - with a twist of course. See, we believe local businesses are part of local communities. We believe that cross promoting with other local businesses is a way to share awareness, to share customers. We believe that the daily deal model is silly on the backend. Of course, as a buyer, we love them. We love huge discounts. But the sales process is wacky, there is some level of pressure involved, and there is an incentive for a salesman to push more deals than are healthy for the businesses' balance sheet. 

With Social Local you have the power to manage beautiful promotions and the simplicity of a movie check-in counter. We stick to what's important - new customers. We're careful how we go about doing it - incentivizing you all to share other, local deals in our system. 

They call it gamification. It's just a points system. Earn points for signing up local businesses, spend them when your promotion is shared with new customers. It's a way for us to attract new members, no doubt about it, but more importantly for the overall system, the system we believe in, it's a way for you to build your community. More members mean more deals mean more shared awareness. 

When you're not sharing, you're creating. Beautiful deals, the kind of deals that you thought could only come from a daily deal site. Nope. All fully customizable, and easily shareable through Social Boost (1 page with  buttons to edit and share across any network.) 

This is what how we've arrived at our current platform, and it's where we'll be headed in the future. We're here for local businesses. For the ones who don't need all the extra features, and the ones who are understand how important they are to their communities. 

Here's to local business. 

- The Social Local Team 

Surprise! Why Customers Talk and How to Influence Their Words

"1 star terrible service won't ever return you shouldn't either. In fact try x place it's better. Here's the link." Ouch. 

"2 stars service was great could tell staff cared about paychecks but food was stale and foreign, didn't recognize the ingredients and didn't care much for the brand of Apple Juice they carry." Can't even get the apple juice right. 

"Would give 0 stars but 1 star for the purpose of hurting them. Spent $20 on their service should have dropped it out the window when I woke out and saved my gas and time." Nice. 

Hearing negative criticism is never ever fun. The great college basketball coach John Wooden said "You can't let praise or criticism get to you. It's a weakness to get caught up in one." I think for small businesses, most of the time, a positive review doesn't drown anyone in approval. There are people to pay, customers to serve, things to do. A positive review online is a nice thing, but money speaks louder. 

A negative review, on the other hand, hurts us. We stop and acknowledge it, often brush it off as unfair. How can it be fair? I mean, your service isn't bad. You know that. And look! All of the positive reviewers know that. This guy's crazy, a loony. You don't need him, in fact, you don't want him! 

But the fact is it is fair. People are entitled to their opinion, and platforms are validated by the sharing of both positive and negative reviews. If Yelp had 1 million bad reviews, and 0 good reviews, no small business would pay for advertising. If Yelp had 1 million good reviews, and 0 bad reviews, few customers would trust it. They're fair, they're part of the game, and they demand your attention and respect. 

My brother is a doctor now. He often talks about how important preventative maintenance is. "If you just did this every day, it wouldn't cost you that in the future!" type deal. He's the smart one in the family, so I trust his words on issues like this. I wonder, what does preventative maintenance mean for a local business when it comes to reviews? "If you'd just have done this each day, you wouldn't have thousands of customers finding so many poor reviews about you!" 

Let me ask this: What is the nature of most customer reviews on local business pages? Most of the time it doesn't cover the price. The price is available online in most businesses. If it isn't, the price won't be mentioned unless it's surprisingly affordable or unreasonable expensive. The nature of most customer reviews on local business pages is in regard to 3 things: 

Service

Overall Experience 

Surprises

Broad enough for you? But seriously, people get on to complain about poor service. They get on to praise the overall experience. Above all, the reason most people review, is to document a pleasant or unpleasant surprise. We come in with expectations, based on the reviews of others and the perception we form ourselves based on how your business presents itself. We form it on reputation, previous experience and personal preference. And when something happens from time we engage with your business to the moment we forget about you and engage with the start of another experience, we remember. We feel dissonance. Something is off, and off demands out attention. 

You have to understand this and decide what that dissonance will be. Understand that there will be negative dissonance. Your business will get busy, employees will call out sick, and it will cause customers to wait, to give more time than they had planned. Dishes will be prepared poorly. Meat will not be cooked as requested. People will be upset. These moments are to be handled with extreme care, like handling your ailing mother. In these moments, it's my opinion, the customer is right. He or she is right at least in her own mind, and to hold a policy that defends your business against all customer perspectives will work only for the most popular establishments. Unreasonable complaints are one thing, quickly disregarding them as nonsense is another. 

In these negative moments, when you know your customers aren't getting what they paid for, you have to give them your attention. Because if in the moments of negative dissonance you don't give your customers attention, they will give you the attention you don't want online. In the battle for 'who is right' between business and customers, the customers have a new weapon. It's free, it's easy to use, and it's powerful enough to make a dent. 

On the other end, positive dissonance can be created. Letters can be written, policies put in place, things can be done to go above and beyond what is expected of the business. If you're a bar, or a candy shop, or an auto shop - you come packaged in the customers' minds. You are expected to perform base services and do them well. If you have a niche, well, then, you're special. BMWs only, Mercedes only, whatever it may be. But as an auto shop, just the bottom line, you are expected to be able to answer simple questions and fix common issues. Anything beyond what is advertised is a surprise. It makes a lasting impression on the customer and, if that customer happens to review often, it will have a lasting impression on your business. 

The moments of dissonance are very important characters in your businesses' journey to be pleasantly perceived online. Don't forget when handling or creating these moments that your customers are stronger than ever. They are out there making and breaking future decisions for customers we have never met and may now never know. Be simply extraordinary in ordinary moments and those you've respected will shine the spotlight on you proudly. 

It's Not Loyalty If You Paid For It - Believe In Your Offer!

There is an interesting local business 'loyalty program' making its way across the U.S. By joining an exclusive club of merchants, your business can offer customers 2% cash back on every purchase. The business also gets .5% cash on any purchase made at a participating member location by a customer they brought into the program. That was a horrible sentence, so let me explain. If I'm a Crab Shack and I sign up Tom and Mel, and Tom and Mel spend $100 each at another member's venue, I get .5% of 2 $100 purchases. The program is far more complex than any other local business program. It gets into points, referrals, and so much more that after spending multiple hours on their site I still couldn't understand it. The complexity isn't the point. The point is, it's not a local business loyalty program if you're paying for loyalty. And trust me, when most businesses work out the numbers on that .5% cash back into the business, nearly all of them are paying.

What's the biggest issue with deal sites? Can't target? Can't track? Hard to explain to employees? Nope. Nope. Nope. The biggest issue is the type of customer they bring in - deal hunters. We give up too much to get too little. Not only that, the sales process is uncomfortable, and an uncomfortable sales process usually leads to uncomfortable results.

You don't need to give out great big deals to get new customers, and you don't need to offer cash back to keep current ones. In fact, an interesting question is being posed in Psychology these days. Regarding the psychology of rewards,

is money the best motivator in any given situation?

I've borrowed this from an interview with Alfie Kohn, author of Punished By Rewards. Our Psych insight for the day: 

Interviewer: And you're saying rewards are just as undesirable as punishment.

AK: By virtue of being controlling, they're likely to be experienced as aversive in the long run. The reason is that while students would certainly like to have the goody itself—the pizza or money or gold star—none of us enjoys having the very things we desire used as levers to control our behavior. So it's the contingency of the goody—"Do this and you'll get that"—that accounts for its punitive status over the long haul.

The answer is (usually) no, and the logic is sound. If you say 'try our product for $10 off' or 'come in Tuesday for a $20 cut' you are discounting your product and valuing your customers time. You're saying '$20 should be enough to get you in the door' or 'We can take money off. Sure, if that what it takes to get you to try us.' Have a backbone, will ya?

People don't always want cheap, and they don't like having their time valued. In advertising they say it's not what you say, it's how you make them feel. Shh, keep quiet on the discounts, and make them feel special with a more surprising offer. 'Try our product and get a few of my homemade brownies' or 'Come in Tuesday for a burger made by me!'. Now we're bringing in brownie lovers and friends, not penny counters and nickel framers.

It's true that discounts work. Who doesn't love free money? But we want to attract and retain the type of customer that comes for more than that number in the checkout line. We want the people who are their for the experience. Plus, everyone gives discounts. In a world with the internet, how is that going to help you stand out to the great customers, really?

Sharing is Caring - Local Business is a Team Effort

Cindy Lou Who is a local mother of 4. She needs groceries, haircuts, clothes, snacks, entertainment and a lot of help from Mr. Lou Who. Cindy's greatest getaway is Lou's Salon, the one just past Famous Tim's Bar and just before Stangood Pizza. Cindy loves Lou's. Not even so much for their service. Honestly, it's par for the area. It's the atmosphere, the escape. Cindy loves Lou's for the moment abroad. She loves Lou's so much that one day she finds herself signing up for their e-mail list. Any excuse to visit Lou's is a good one, so she signs up for excuse alerts.
Lou goes home that night, pours a glass of wine and checks his e-mail. 1 new e-mail - Cindy Lou Who. Cindy has joined 126 other loyal escapees on the e-mail list. It's an exciting development in her life. The new e-mail gets Lou thinking, though. He wants to give more to his loyal patrons. He understands them so well. He personally recognizes each person on the list. Cindy, Jenna, Chrissy, Billy, more. All 127. He knows Jenna has kids, and Chrissy does too. In fact, nearly every one of them has kids.

I wonder if Stan, over at Stangood Pizza, would want to give them something on here. 

So Lou gives Stan a call at home. Stan's an old friend, and he's in his pajamas at 7 o'clock, watching Doctor Who reruns sipping Hot Cocoa with his wife and son. He would love to send Lou's customers a little something in the e-mail blast. Heck, he doesn't even have an e-mail list of his own, but he would love to be part of one. 

Stan, I think a lot of our customers are the same. You know Cindy Lou Who? And Billy Bean? and Jenna Jones? and etc. etc.? That's who's on this list, and I'm trying to give them a little more than they're expecting. Something for the kids. 

Stan slurps his Hot Cocoa to max volume, sending chills up his son's spine, and tells Lou to throw on a deal - 20% off pizza if you show your receipt from Lou's. That's right, getaway at Lou's and then avoid cooking that night. Come home with a box a pizza to a crowd of smiles, for 20% off. 

Back to Cindy. It's been a few weeks, and she's doing what Moms do. Mr. Lou Who is standing on his head, doing cartwheels, picking the kids up between work. They're making it happen. Amidst the chaos, when the kids are off to bed, Cindy sees a light in the distance. It's her computer. She's received an e-mail. 

The outside world...I, it's been so long.

Exhausted and disoriented from a 400 hour day, she opens Lou's e-mail and sinks in her seat. Tomorrow, the spa, and I'm not making dinner. Lou has gone from escape to savior, and Stan has a customer tomorrow for the pleasure. 

Local businesses are privileged to know their customers unlike any other enterprise. Often times your customers have similar issues, issues they shop locally to solve. Collaboration is the way to maximize your awareness and deliver unparalleled value for a friend, neighbor or shopper. When you ask 'how's the family' or 'how's work', you care about the answer. When you collaborate in your e-mails, or Facebook posts, or Tweets, they become something more. Customers start to care about the message. 

Did we mention you can collaborate using the Social Local Platform?

Happy sharing. 

Let Your Customers Squeal

Small talk has always involved high praise. "Have you tried this place?" "You have to go here." "We did this." "We did that!" "He learned to make heat, a fire he calls it, I'm sure he could do it for you!" We don't need a well funded study, a new marketing book or an ad guru to prove to us that people talk about great service. There's something special about being able to answer a friend's question. To be their Google in real time, it's something we don't pass on. So when somebody mentions in passing that they're looking to renovate the kitchen (you just renovated your kitchen!) or they need a good place for their anniversary dinner (your other friend just had a great birthday dinner at that Italian place!), we squeal.

"This guy did an incredible job in my kitchen! I'll send you his number at least give him a call!" 

"I heard that Italian place was unbelievable, Italianos. Give it a search online." 

Small talk is still the same in nature, we still love to squeal, but it's not so small anymore. Now comments go online, public displays of loyalty are found on your profiles, the great products and services are being rewarded for being great. 

Not all of us squeal online. Some wait for a friend to mention a need in passing. But many of us do squeal online. Many of us are Yelp Elite members, others check-in on Facebook for their Friends to see. It could be to help the business raise awareness, or to help friends find something cool, whatever it is - it ends in a squeal. 

How can you make it easier for your customers to squeal online? 

Often someone will search your business for hours (are they open?) or a menu (do they have steak?), prices too, and much more. Each time they search for that one answer, they find many more. They see the whole show, not just the scene. They'll notice when you have many Google Reviews or just a few. They'll notice when a Facebook page pops up and (if you're not active) they won't. The customers that squeal, the ones that just enjoy reviewing, for any reason, you want to give them the chance to do so. 

Get started on Google Reviews and Facebook Reviews by asking some of your most loyal patrons to give you a shoutout. Don't say 'follow us' and leave it at that, they want to help! Say 'show us some love' and they will! 

Social Media Is Important: A Local Business Approach

Spending on marketing can be tough to justify. Many times we spend on marketing because "it's worked in the past." New options, like Facebook, Twitter, Google Search, even texting, are half-respected, half-questioned. That's understandable. In a small business there are so so many things to worry about. We were never compleeetely sure those newspaper and radio ads brought in more than they cost, but at least we knew them.

My own Dad operates a small business. He's always been a little ahead of his competition in the technology realm, so I wasn't surprised to hear he was spending on SEO and some other web programs for the business a few years ago. Still, in conversations, I could tell he was skeptical about the value of a Facebook Ad, a follower, a like or a comment.

"How is it helping me? What do I do to improve? I just don't understand it."

Again, this is completely understandable. There's been so much to think about the past few years. It's hard, and taking on more outside opinions is always a challenge. But times really are changing. I'd like to take a quote from the recent 007 movie Skyrim, the scene with Judi Dench on trial making an argument for 00 agents:

Today I've repeatedly heard how irrelevant my department has become. Why do we have agents, the 00 section, isn't it all rather quaint?Well I suppose I see a different world than you do. And the truth is that what I see frightens me. I'm frightened because our enemies are no longer known to us, they do not exist on a map, they're not nations, they're individuals, and look around you, who do you fear? Can you see a face, a uniform, a flag? No. Our world is not more transparent now, it's more opaque. It's in the shadows. That's where we must do battle. So before you declare us irrelevant ask yourselves: How safe do you feel?

Thank you, M. Our customers aren't enemies like Javier Bardem, but they are in the shadows, making decisions away from our influence.  Before our friendly service has a chance to influence them they're knee deep in customer reviews on Google, Yelp, FourSquare, UrbanSpoon, Facebook, and more. Google calls this moment of search the Zero Moment of Truth. All of that copy we wrote, all those clever phrases, that's all on one search result in a local Google search that brings up our business. The rest of the results? 2-200? Those words were written by experienced customers, just like the one searching at home. They're knowledgable, they're trusted, and they're still talking. 

Someone searching for something we can offer can't be expected to give us the benefit of the doubt if we have no reviews, or even worse, a few very poor reviews and nothing positive. When competitors look better on paper, they're perceived better in the search.

The good knows is there is something you can do. You can control what people find when they search. Sure, you will have unhappy customers, and they may leave unfavorable reviews, but by claiming your business on the networks and making social a real part of your operations you'll get new reviews, better receptions, and more customers.

Claim your business on the networks. Fill out the information. Add photos of your products, your services, whatever it is your customers enjoy. The beautiful thing about a local business is how well they understand the area. Somehow, your business fits into that area. It could be in a big way or a small way, but it has its place. Use social to stake claim to your service to the area, let your customers and friends market for you, and have fun with it! 

Introducing the Ask Us Anything! Tab

We're constantly talking with our members about new programs, features, websites or gimmicks in the online world. New questions pop up every day. On the Ask Us Anything! tab you'll see answers to an assortment of questions we've been asked in private conversations with our members. Please, ask that question you're kind of sort of unsure of but not enough to search out an answer.
E-mail bill@gorithmic.com with the question. We'll respond privately, and post the general question with the answer in the tab under the Social Local logo above.

Here to serve.

-The Social Local Team.