You can look at internet searches as a sort of monopolizing issue. Many times, those who pay more play more; i.e. those who pay a lot of be featured are. Not every merchant can afford this, and thankfully now there are many things that merchants can do to avoid paying – and still get featured higher up on a Google search.
First, use Google Metrics or another metric-based tool to analyze what triggers a good search result for your business. You may need to do some tweaking of your website and content formatting to get higher on the list, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
Secondly, add a video. Websites with longer visit times are higher on the search list, and even a quick video can keep someone around long enough to increase your visitor time rate. It doesn’t have to be your own video, but always cite the source of the video. This can be tricky if you are in an industry that doesn’t have a ton of Youtube videos floating around, but if you have a smartphone you can make your own in just a few minutes.
Third, guest blog for an out-of-town company or blogger. Just make sure that your blog posting is linked to your website. If you are a blog reader, you notice that a lot of blogs have guest writers, since it is tedious to operate a blog full-time. If you want to try this, reach out to a like blogger in another area of the country to see if you can do a few guest postings for them.
Forth, and one of the most essential pieces of business advice for anyone, is to list your locale multiple times on the site. Do you have to do it with every sentence? No – but it helps if you have a map and your tag line involves your area. Also, make sure that your business is listed on the major review sites, such as Google and Yelp to get better online ratings. This can help your business tremendously.