Local
businesses know better than any other model what it means to fully participate
in community life. You are the good neighbors who are there to serve, inspire,
and sustain the people and traditions that make your town a unique and
enjoyable place to call home.
As we
explore this topic of what local businesses can do during the COVID-19
pandemic, I want to honor all that you have always done to take care of your
community as a local business owner or marketer. Thank you.
In this
article, you will find local SEO tips that could make a difference for your
business in the coming weeks, innovative resources for support, advice from my
own tight-knit community of some of the world’s best local SEOs, and some
serious thinking about building a better local future.
Adhere to all regulations
First and
foremost, start each day with a review of both local and national news to be
sure you are complying with the evolving regulations for your city, county, and
country. Policies designed to mitigate the harm of COVID-19 vary widely from
region to region, and your business must keep informed of which forms of service
you are allowed to offer in this dynamic scenario.
And,
while social media can be a great connector within your community at any time,
beware of misinformation and, sadly, scams in the days ahead. Get your news
from sources you trust, and if you are not certain about interpreting a
guideline, directly contact local authorities. This article does not take the
place of laws and regulations specific to your community.
Communicate abundantly
The most
helpful thing any local business can do right now, whether it’s deemed an
essential or non-essential service, is to provide accurate information to its
community. There are three key places to do this:
Google My Business
“More
than ever, your Google Business Profile is a critical communication nexus with
your customers”. — Mike Blumenthal, GatherUp
Local
businesses know just how big a role Google plays as intermediary between brands
and the public. This remains true during this difficult time however, Google’s
local product is not running at full strength. Joy Hawkins’ article for Local
University on March 23 details the limited support for or complete
discontinuation of Google Q&As, posts, descriptions, reviews, and owner
responses. It’s an evolving scenario, with local SEOs reporting different
outcomes each day. For example, some practitioners have been able to get some,
but not all, Google posts to publish.
As of
writing this, there are four fields you can utilize to communicate current
information to customers via GMB, but please be aware that some edits may take
several days to go into effect:
Name
Google is
allowing businesses to edit their business name field to reflect that they are
offering curbside service, takeout, and delivery. For example, if your current
name is “John’s Grill”, you are allowed to temporarily change your name to
“John’s Grill — Delivery Available”.
Phone number
If
regulations are keeping you at home but you still want customers to be able to
reach you on your home or cell phone for information, update your work
answering machine to reflect the changes and edit your phone number to the
appropriate new number.
Hours of operation
The
discussion on how best to show that your business either has no hours or
limited new hours is ongoing. I believe the best route for the present is to
use Google’s method of setting special hours. This option should be especially
useful for multi-location enterprises who can set special hours via the API.
Be
advised, however, that there are some instances of agencies setting special
hours for clients and then clients receiving emails from Google asking if the
business has closed. This can alarm those clients. However, to date, it appears
that when Google receives responses to this prompt that yes, the business is
closed, they simply put a message about this on the listing rather than remove
the listing entirely.
On March
25, Google implemented a “temporarily closed” button inside the “Info” tab of
the GMB dashboard, as reported by Joy Hawkins. Utilizing this button may
temporarily decrease your rankings, but you will be able to remove the label in
the future and I strongly hope (but cannot guarantee) that this will remove any
effects of suppression. I recommend using this button if it applies to your
business because we must put safety first over any other consideration.
Update
3/30: Google’s Danny Sullivan has clarified in a tweet to Damian Rollison that
the “temporarily closed” function should not impact rank.
COVID-19 update posts
Google
has newly created a Google posts type that you’ll see as an option in your GMB
dashboard. While other post types have been published sporadically, I am seeing
examples of the COVID-19 Update posts going live. Try to fit as much
information as you can about the changed status of your business into one of
these posts.
In
addition to the edits you make to your GMB listing, update your most visible
local business listings on other platforms to the best of your ability,
including on:
- Bing: A “Temporarily closed” business status is available in the Bing Places dashboard. This is currently not available in the API.
Update
3/30: Bing has added a “temporarily closed” flag in the Bing Places dashboard
and the API so that businesses can mark themselves closed due to COVID-19.
- Yelp: Yelp has introduced a new field called
“temporarily closed”.
This is
meant to be used by businesses which are or will be closed (but not on a
permanent basis) due to the COVID-19 outbreak. Businesses need to indicate the
“end date” for when this business status will end. Given the uncertainty
surrounding timelines, Yelp is allowing users to provide an “estimate” for the
end date which they can always update later. Special opening hours can be added
on Yelp itself, too. Neither field is available in the API.
Website
Google My
Business may be experiencing support issues right now, but thank goodness you
still have full control of your website as a home base for conveying important
information to the public. Here’s a quick checklist of suggested items to
update on your site as soon as you can:
- Put a site wide banner on
all pages of the website with key information such as “temporarily
closed”, “drive-up service available 9–5 Monday — Friday” or “storefront
closed but we can still ship to you.”
- Provide the most complete information about how your business has been affected by COVID-19, and detail any services that remain available to customers.
- Edit location landing pages in bulk or individually to reflect closures, new hours, and new temporary offers.
- Be sure hours of operation are accurate everywhere they are mentioned on the website, including the homepage, contact page, about page, and landing pages.
- If your main contact phone number has changed due to the situation, update that number everywhere it exists on the website. Don’t overlook headers, footers, or sidebars as places your contact info may be.
- If you have a blog, use it to keep the public updated about the availability of products and services.
- Be sure your website contains highly visible links to any social media platforms you are using to provide updated information.
- It would be a worthy public service right now to create new content about local resources in your community for all kinds of basic needs.
Social media and email
“Make it
clear what you’re doing, such as things like home delivery or curbside pickup.
And mention it EVERYWHERE. The companies that are being successful with this
are telling people non-stop how they can still support them. Additionally,
don’t be afraid to reach out to people who have supported you via social media
in the past and ask them to mention what you’re doing.” — Dana DiTomaso, Kick Point
Whether
your customers’ social community is Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, or
another platform, there has never been a more vital time to make use of the
instant communication these sites provide. It was Fred Rogers who famously said
that in times of crisis, we should “look for the helpers.” People will be
looking to your brand for help and, also, seeking ways that they can help, too.
If you
can make the time to utilize social media to highlight not just your own
services, but the services you discover are being provided by other businesses
in your city, you will be strengthening your community. Ask your followers and
customers to amplify information that can make life safer or better right now.
And, of
course, email is one of the best tools presently at your disposal to message
your entire base about changed conditions and special offers. My best practice
advice for the present is to be sure you’re only communicating what is truly
necessary. I’ve seen some examples of brands (which shall remain nameless)
exploiting COVID-19 for senseless self-promotion instead of putting customers’
concerns and needs first. Don’t go that route. Be a helper!
Beyond
your local business listing, websites, social media platforms, and email, don’t
overlook offline media for making further, helpful informational contributions.
Call into local radio shows and get in touch with local newspapers if you have
facts or offers that can help the public.
Operate as fully as you can
“Find out
what support is being made available for you at [the] government level, tap
into this as soon as you can — it’s likely there will be a lot of paperwork and
many hoops through which you’ll need to jump.” — Claire Carlile, Claire Carlile
Marketing
While the
social safety net differs widely from country to country, research any offers
of support being made to your business and make use of them to remain as
operational as possible for the duration of this pandemic. Here are six
adjustments your business should carefully consider to determine whether implementation
is possible:
1. Fulfill essentials
If your
business meets local, state, or federal regulations that enable it to continue
operating because it’s deemed “essential”, here are the ways different business
models are adapting to current conditions:
- Some healthcare appointments
can be handled via phone or virtual meetings, and some medical facilities
are offering drive-up testing.
- Drivethrough, delivery, and
curbside pickup are enabling some brands to offer takeout meals,
groceries, prescriptions, and other necessary goods to customers.
- Supermarkets and grocery
stores without built-in delivery fleets are contracting with third parties
for this service.
- Farms and ranches can offer
honor system roadside stands to allow customers to access fresh produce,
dairy products, and meats with proper social distancing.
- Companies that care for
vulnerable populations, banking, laundry, and fuel can implement and
communicate the extra steps they are taking to adhere to sanitation
guidelines for the safety of customers and staff.
- Brands and organizations
that donate goods and services to fulfill essential needs are taking an
active role in community support, too.
2. Evaluate e-commerce
If your
local business already has an e-commerce component on its website, you’re many
steps ahead in being well set up to keep selling via delivery. If you’ve not
yet implemented any form of online selling, investigate the following options:
- If you have a credit card
processing machine, the most basic solution is to take orders over the
phone and then ship them, allow curbside pickup, or deliver them.
- If you lack a credit card
processing service, PayPal invoicing can work in a pinch.
- If your site is built on
WordPress and you’re quite comfortable with that platform. It allows easy
setup of flat rate or free shipping and local pickup options.
- Pointy is a simple device
that lets you scan product barcodes and have them catalogued online. Read
my 2019 interview with the company’s CEO and determine whether Pointy plus
shipping could be a solution to keep you in business in the coming months.
- If you’ve determined that
robust investing in e-commerce is a wise move for the present and future,
I found this 2020 overview of options from Shopify to Volusion to Magento
very useful. Don’t overlook the Moz blog’s e-commerce category for free,
expert advice.
3. Connect virtually
In my
very large family, one relative has transitioned her yoga studio to online
classes, another is offering secure online psychotherapy appointments, and
another is instructing his orchestra on the web. While nothing can replace
in-person relationships, virtual meetings are the next-best-thing and could
keep many business models operating at a significant level, despite the
pandemic. Check out these resources:
- UC Today provides an
excellent guide to free video conferencing and collaboration.
- Business Insider has this
tutorial on how to share rivate YouTube videos with anyone .
- I especially want to
highlight the exceptional job Zoom is doing in building out an entire
section of resources for how to conduct business virtually, whether you
are a healthcare professional, an educator, or are managing employees who
have transitioned to working from home.
4. Use downtime for education
If
COVID-19 has somewhat or completely paused your business, it’s my strong hope
that there will be better days ahead for you. If, like so many people, you find
yourself with much more time on your hands than usual, consider using it to
come out of this period of crisis with new business knowledge.
Begin working towards a stronger local future
“I would
say generally it’s critical for business owners to connect with one another. To
the extent they can join or form groups for support or to share ideas, they
should. This is a terrible and scary time but there are also potential
opportunities that may emerge with creative thinking. The ‘silver lining’, if
there is one here, is the opportunity to reexamine business processes, try new
things and think — out of necessity — very creatively about how to move
forward. Employees are also a great source of ideas and inspiration.” — Greg Sterling, Search Engine
Land
I’d like
to close with some positive thinking. Local SEO isn’t just a career for
me — it’s a personal belief system that well-resourced communities are the
strongest. Every community, town, and city shares roughly the same needs, which
we might depict like this:
In this
simple chart, we see the framework of a functional, prepared, and healthy
society. We see a plan for covering the basic needs of human existence, the
cooperation required to run a stable community, contributive roles everyone can
play to support life and culture, and relief from inevitable disasters. We see
regenerative land and water stewardship, an abundance of skilled educators,
medical professionals, artisans, and a peaceful platform for full human
expression.
COVID-19
marks the third major disaster my community has lived through in three years.
The pandemic and California’s wildfires have taught me to think about the areas
in which my county is self-sustaining, and areas in which we are unprepared to
take care of one another in both good times and bad. While state and national
governments bear a serious responsibility for the well-being of citizens, my
genuine belief as a local SEO is that local communities should be doing all
they can to self-fulfill as many data points on the chart above as possible.
While
it’s said that necessity is the mother of invention, and it certainly makes
sense that the present moment would be driving us to invent new solutions to
keep our communities safe and well, I find models for sane growth in the work
others have already contributed. For me, these are sources of serious
inspiration:
- Learn from indigenous
cultures around the world about stewardship and community. Here is just
one example of how knowledge is being applied by tribes in the Pacific
Northwest during the pandemic. In my own state of California, a number of
tribes are leading the way in mitigating wildfires via cultural burning,
addressing what has become an annual disaster where I live.
- Look at the policies of
other countries with a higher index of human happiness than my own. For
example, I am a great admirer of Norway’s law of allemannsrett which
permits all residents to responsibly roam and camp in most of the country,
and more importantly, to harvest natural foods like mushrooms and berries.
In my community, most land is behind fences, and even though I know which
plants are edible, I can’t access most of them. Given current grocery
store shortages, this concept deserves local re-thinking.
- Study the Economic Bill of
Rights US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt introduced but didn’t live
to see passed. Had this been implemented, my local community would not now
be suffering from a shortage of medical providers and denial of medical
care, a shortage of nearby farms for complete nutrition, homelessness and
unaffordable housing, and a widespread lack of education and essential
skills. From a purely commercial standpoint, FDR’s bill could also have
prevented the collapse of “Main St.”, which local search marketers have
been fighting every day to reverse.
- Join organizations like the
American Independent Local Business Alliance which exist to build more
resilient local communities via methods like the Buy Local movement and
community education. I strongly encourage you to check in with AMIBA for
guidance in these times.
Other
models and examples may personally inspire you, but I share my friend Greg
Sterling’s opinion: now is the time to bring creativity to bear, to connect
with fellow local business owners and community members, and to begin planning
a more realistic and livable future.
For now,
you will have to make those connections virtually, but the goal is to come out
of this time of crisis with a determination to make local living more
sustainable for everyone. You can start with asking very basic questions like:
Where is the nearest farm, and how many people can it feed? What do we need to
do to attract more doctors and nurses to this town? Which facilities could be
converted here to produce soap, or bathroom tissue, or medical supplies?
I don’t want
to downplay the challenge of forward-thinking in a time of disruption, but this
I know from being a gardener: new seeds sprout best where the earth is
disturbed. You have only to visit the margins of new roads being laid to see
how digging is quickly followed by verdant crops of fresh seedlings. Humanity
needs to dig deep right now for its best solutions to serious challenges, and
this can begin right where you are, locally.
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