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How to use location data to grow your website on Google search maps - by Brad Smith - AutomationLinks

Brad Smith • Sep 17, 2020

This blog post has been researched, edited, and approved by expert Hannah Peake. Join our newsletter below to get our free marketing guides.

Some of the biggest companies in the world text message their customers, you can use Social Media to communicate and start getting text message optins to your website.

Marketing can be tricky and it can fail miserably if it is not done right. However, it can bring great rewards. There are different ways to market and one is location-based. Location-based kind of marketing can be beneficial and there are different ways in which it can be used to get new customers and get your competitor's market share. For it to be effective, it has to be done the right way.

How to win market share and outsmart competitors using location data

The location-based kind of marketing is practiced widely. However, understanding it and using it effectively poses a great challenge, especially for small to middle-sized brands and agencies. There are so many tools, technology, and jargon that digital marketers have at their disposal. This is what makes the whole process more complex than it should be. There are some tips that marketers can make use of to ensure that location data can be used to their advantage. Many technologies, tactics, and strategies are available to marketers today. Thinking about the opportunities available can be very overwhelming. While marketers have a lot at their disposal, it is still very hard for them to make up their minds and get things going. The tricky part is picking the best methods that will eventually drive sales and boost revenue. When done correctly, location-based marketing can help achieve so much more. Mobile marketers who make use of data campaigns that are location-based to get things done. According to research on emarketing, more and more people are investing in this kind of advertising every year. It is a great tactic for retail and consumer segments. Location data is one of the most important things that marketers need to embrace.

Some of the key terms

Some terms can help you understand the context of location-based advertising. They include:

Geofencing: this is one of the keywords people are looking for when they are doing location-based kind of marketing. This is all about virtual barrier creation around a location. It can be a radius or a polygon depending on the area you want to be covered. It can also refer to the kind of advertising done once a person crosses or enters the virtual barrier. The user can get an ad, an alert, or other types of push notification. This is very important in location-based advertising.
Geotargeting has to do with delivering ads, especially if they have been to a given location, this may have to do with good delivery and so on.
Geoconquesting: this involves advertising to those who have been in the competitor’s location previously. It is done to win them from competitors. This method is very viable, but it is still not utilized fully.

Segments of location-based marketing

Normally, there are three main segments here if we were to consider businesses that fit the location-based marketing.

Those with many retail locations: Include food and dining, auto dealers, and franchisees, and retailers.
Those running special or seasonal events: these could include major sports, hospitality and travel, concerts and events and so on.
People who have their audience in a very specific or particular retail location like CPG brands and eCommerce where you target people visiting retail competitors.

How it works

A lot of the location-based data marketing is usually GPS powered especially when you opt-in. When you decide to show your current location within an app, the Longitude and latitude data gathered makes targeting possible. GPS data are accurate and offers a considerably meaningful scale. Basically, data on GPS is ingested, then aggregated, and finally anonymized to ensure that individuals cannot be identified. It is also done to ensure that the data used is clean. This meets privacy standards that have to be complied with. The data can then be matched to places such as dealerships event reviews, businesses, and so on. You need information that is updated regarding the business. You have to categorize everything in the right order at all times. Data enrichment is an important step though it can be treated as optional. This can involve appending behavioral or demographic insights into the data available regarding the location. It can be done with a data platform about the consumer or any other valuable stack. The main elements of this kind of marketing are attribution, audiences, and analytics. Analytics is the tool that helps you understand the audience you are targeting based on how often they shop, where they shop, and the distance they have to cover to get there. This is something that allows you to be even smarter in ad spend. When you understand this, it becomes easier to find a method that you can market to the location-based audiences. It also makes sense to know the way ads are performing. This is where attribution comes in. You can easily tell who, among your audience, is visiting the different locations that you are advertising.

Location-based marketing and privacy

When dealing with location-based marketing, privacy is also very important. The kind of location data you use needs to be compliant as far as privacy is concerned. When you are looking for a vendor in this area, you need to think about a couple of hallmarks. These include CCPA compliance, aggregated and de-identified data sets meaning that you can single out people individually from your audience, and honoring OS opt-outs. You should take time to find out if the vendor is involved in working and privacy advocacy groups.

Conclusion

To get ahead of your competition, you have to work hard and think smart. Make use of all the advertising platforms available. Google and Facebook are great places to advertise. However, using them, managing campaigns, and getting support can be tricky. You may not get highly targeted audiences as you please.
To get around this, you can choose to geotarget a state or a city. You should make use of audience market places to reach your targeted audience usually based on characteristics that they have. Also, consider using marketing software that is location-based as well. This takes you to the store level.

Less promotion, more presence

A lot of companies use social media platforms to sell products and services actively. This is not received very well among people because, after a point, all those ads become cumbersome. Even if you are a brand looking to grow and push your products, don’t make it an ‘in your face’ ordeal because that is just a bad look. People will get put off and they might never return to your page. Instead, use your creativity to come up with subtle ways to put out your products and services. But most importantly, use social media as a means to engage and communicate with people. Understand people’s needs and try to meet those needs.
You cannot build an empire for yourself on social media in a day. It takes some time and you will need to be patient. Your presence has to be consistent and something people can rely on. Establish a routine, if you say you will post videos every Saturday, make sure you do. Make sure your every post is well-aligned with what your brand stands for. Be in congruence with your brand’s image. Let the social media responsibilities be limited to a few who understand your company’s essence and let them carry it forward.

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