local business

As I mentioned yesterday in my “1,000 Thank You’s” post, the SoLoMo web (that’s social, local, mobile web), matters. A lot. Consumers increasingly use the web in ways that are different from what we’ve gotten used to over the last 15 years. And these changes in consumer behavior require marketers and e-commerce folks to re-examine their activities. Every. Single. Day. Here are some good places to start looking:

• Our old friend Linda Bustos at GetElastic returns to the Link Digest with this look at 4 social behaviors invading e-commerce. Good stuff.
• Search Engine Land shows how Google’s overhauled Place Pages incorporate user reviews into the results, giving your customers more information up-front before linking out to your site. That’s a fairly major change. And one we’re going to be learning a lot more about over the coming years. I’ve said for some time that your business needs a Google Place Page, but I would strongly recommend against making a Google Place Page your brand’s only web presence.
• Despite rumors to the contrary (more on that later), social doesn’t kill search. At least not yet. Still social signals significantly influence search. How much? Well, SEOmoz asks the same question and offers some intriguing answers.
• Whether you get people to your site from search, social, local or mobile, you’ve still got to turn them into customers. Fortunately, the fine folks at DIY Themes provides a good look at how to find your top pages (and what to do with them). [Full disclosure: I am a DIYthemes affiliate and use their Thesis theme for the blog—however, this is not an affiliate link].
• Finally, Mitch Joel points to this fascinating video featuring Roger McNamee on the top 10 trends in technology:
  
  
  
  Like Mitch, I don’t spend a lot of time talking about the tech underlying marketing. But McNamee’s arguments in this video are so compelling and clear, that it’s well worth your time to give him a listen. I use William Gibson’s “The future is already here, it’s just not evenly distributed” quote all the time. After watching McNamee’s presentation, you’ll have a whole different view on just how true that quote is.

Enjoy your weekend Big Thinkers. We’ll catch you back here next week.

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