Nuclear meltdowns, an earthbound asteroid, perhaps the rise of Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton as president (depending on your political views) — all might lead to the end of the world. Though the demise of local search might not necessarily rank among those aforementioned disaster scenarios, it certainly does take brainpower to remember life before local and imagine how the world would operate today if it vanished.
Just the other day, I was gearing up to take a road trip, and my very cautious mother presented me with eight maps covering different areas of Colorado, Utah, Nevada and California — with a very meticulous route planned out.
“Now, when you see the sign for Las Vegas, make sure to follow that down until exit number… And when you need food, this map shows the exits past… “
In one ear and out the other (not my best daughter move), but it all got lost in translation from her generation to mine. I will just do a “near me” search to find any hospital, rest stop or fast food along the way, if necessary.
Google reported that mobile searches have outpaced desktop searches since May 2015. Near me searches have doubled from 2014 to 2015, with 80 percent of those searches coming from mobile devices. Regardless of whether the searcher is in a car, bus, Uber — whatever — those searchers are showing intent to go to the specific location.
If the location for the search is not optimized, the customer gets lost and is unable to finish his or her search-to-purchasing cycle. Or even worse, the customer completes the cycle with your competitor. If you, as a business, are not optimizing your local listings to appear in the local pack, you are handing over revenue to your competitors.
Without companies that truly live, optimize and thrive in the local search space, we as consumers might find that our world is ending. After all, so many of us put “near me” searches at the center of our universe to fulfill our immediate need for a specific product or service.
Let’s review how our world might crumble without businesses optimizing for local, while also providing some strategy so you can be part of the solution to keeping mobile near me search results thriving.
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