9 Efficient Location-Based Marketing Strategies for Your Business

In this post, we will be taking a look at some location-based marketing strategies that can help take your business to the next level. So, read on to see all what location-based marketing is and how people have been using it to win over more clients for your business!

What Is Location-Based Marketing?

In simple terms, location-based marketing is targeting your audience based on their location. This is not limited to only online marketing strategies but also extends to offline strategies, too.

Location-based marketing entails that you critically analyze the buying behaviour of your potential customers, as well as knowing what their wants and needs are, and what could cause them to be interested in your business. Nevertheless, this type of marketing is solely focused on attracting people that are near you, who are also looking for what your business offers.

Top4 location-based marketing platform has helped many businesses manage successful advertising campaigns.  It’s a great platform where we use one dashboard to manage all of your social media strategies with focusing on local content, manage your online reputation and ads for your multi-location businesses and franchises. We’re the team that does it all, so you can focus on your multi-location businesses and franchises. Top4 Marketing Platform integrates and works hand-in-hand with Google, Google Maps, and Social Media Platforms to improve and strengthen your businesses online.

Location-Based Marketing Strategies for Your Business

#1: Take advantage of geo-targeting marketing

Geotargeting is a great location-based marketing strategy that allows you to show targeted ads only to users within a specific location. This can be people within a specific zip code, city, or geographical region. Geotargeting helps to increase customer experience through personalization. It makes it easier to target users based on their needs specific to their location.

A good example of this is done by Uber. When you are travelling and arrived at a new city, upon opening your Uber app, you will get a notification about available cars in that city.

#2: Use geofencing marketing

Geo-fencing marketing allows you to advertise to people within a specific geographical location. You choose a radius that you want to market within, and then you send out SMS alerts or notifications so that people can engage with your business immediately. The blasts go out automatically to all the people with smartphones within that radius.

A great example of a business using geofencing marketing is Starbucks. Starbucks pulled this off by sending out a notification every time someone would pass by their coffee shop in a particular town. The notification would be brief and would advertise whatever promotional offer or discount they would have on that day e.g. “50% off on iced coffee”.

Use sources online to help you figure out how to go about geo-fencing, and use it to grow your business locally. You don’t need much to start your geo-fencing marketing. All you need is an app and GPS coordinates. Then you can set blasts to go out at specific times to people within the radius. Your blast should be brief and have a clear call to action, and your radius shouldn’t be too large. The ideal size would be a five-minute travel radius.

#3: Optimize for local SEO

More than ever, Local SEO has been a great tool for promoting any business. Local SEO basically refers to the organic traffic generated from Google My Business listings for consumers searching for a business that offers certain goods or services.

Improving your local SEO by creating location-specific content on your website and optimizing your GMB listing can help give your business an edge over the competition. When creating content for your website or blog, ensure you use enough location-specific keywords to help bring your website to the face of people searching for your product or service in your area.

#4: Engage with the local community

Make sure to get some face time with potential customers to increase the chances of them doing business with you. People like to put a face to the name, and they also trust businesses that don’t seem like cold, faceless corporations. This is especially true for people looking particularly to buy from local businesses.

So go out there and let people know who you are. Set up a booth in the local mall and hand out free samples or prizes for answering trivia questions. Show up at local festivals. For instance, if the town arranges a carnival, be sure to be an active part of it. Enter local contests and familiarize yourself with your customers and your competitors.

The idea is to gain the trust of the public and the best way to do that is to show them exactly who you are and what you stand for.

#5: Location pages

These are websites created to share information and promote one location of a multi-location business or franchise. Location pages are important because they provide local customers with a way to find information about the specific location they want to visit.

Creating such a page will help you provide relevant information to your prospective customers while also directing them to your website. If well implemented, location pages can help transform your business and help you get a huge return on your marketing efforts.

#6: Put up flyers

If you want to familiarize people with your brand name, one of the most effective strategies is to put up flyers in your neighbourhood. Post these flyers in all public spaces – parks, bus stops, roadside benches, you name it.

You should also put your flyers up in other places where foot traffic is high, for instance, near office buildings, community centres, government buildings, restaurants, bars, etc. Just make sure to check local laws and regulations and get permission from building owners before putting up your flyers to avoid any inconvenience.

You don’t have to be a professional graphic designer to make the perfect flyer for your business. Sites like PosterMyWall have a ton of small business flyer templates that you can customize to create something truly eye-catching and unique. It takes very little time and is also incredibly cost-effective.

#7: Use PPC Geo-targeting

If you are yet to be taking advantage of Pay-Per-Click advertising, this is just the time to start. PPC campaign can help you filter your target audience based on some factors, such as their age group, location, and needs. With PPC geo-targeting, you will be able to save extra money on your campaigns. Instead of targeting people that are way too far from your business, who may not be able to visit your store, hence wasting resources, you will be targeting only people around you.

#8: Don’t forget social media

Plenty of social media sites allow you to market to your target audience based on location. Particularly, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram let you set location tags for your business.

Let’s say you’re running a sushi restaurant. If you have a location on Instagram, every time someone searches for sushi on the site, your place will pop up as an option. This is a great way to build brand recognition and get customers to your business.

Don’t forget to use location-based hashtags on your social media posts. For instance, if you’re a business operating from New York City, add “#NewYorkCity” or a similar hashtag to your posts. This way, anyone scrolling through your feed will know exactly where you’re located. And if you establish yourself as an integral part of the city’s culture, you’ll also be more likely to get business from tourists or outsiders.

#9: Introduce a loyalty program

Every customer loves to stay where they are valued. To keep your existing customers while also attracting new ones, consider setting up a loyalty program for customers that are faithful to you and your company. Since your target is people around your local area, it won’t be so much a problem creating a loyalty program that would benefit both your customers and your business.

If you own a clothing business, for example, consider giving our loyalty cards to your customers when they buy from you. You can make it in such a way that your customers could get a 20% discount on their purchase after buying 3 different times.

Just look for something that will be easy on your customers so they will be encouraged to take the advantage of the loyalty program.

Final Note

These are some of the most efficient online and offline location-based marketing strategies that every business should employ. Remember, the crux of each strategy is to get your customers to trust you as an option and to keep coming back to you for all their future needs.