Every website wants to attract local traffic. Sure, maybe that isn’t the case for some like Rotten Tomatoes (movie reviews) or TIME Magazine, but I’ll bet half my life’s savings that every blogger or small business website out there is eager to gain the attention of a local townsfolk or two.

Why is that? Because local traffic brings business and generates sales.

Making your website visible on local search engines becomes easier once you know what to do and where to begin. Without further ado, let’s start the process of exploding your website traffic by…

1. Adding your business to the Google Local Business Center
Google is the world’s most popular search engine. It is now a household name. Why wouldn’t anyone want to make their website “Google-friendly”?

When you create a local business listing on Google, you 1) put yourself within reach of every person who uses Google, 2) allow Google to show your exact location through Google Maps, 3) display your website as a search hit and 4) create printable coupons for your customers to avail when they hire your services.

2. Putting your city and state as title meta tags of your webpages
Most if not all search engines pay particular attention to the title meta tags of webpages they search for. It’s just how search engines are designed. Knowing this, if you want to improve your website’s local search visibility, you should include your city/province and state (ex. Calgary, Alberta) in the title meta tags of your homepage as well as other important webpages you wish to draw attention to.

3. Adding a local number and full mailing address on every webpage
An 800 number is fine, but thing is it doesn’t give any hints to your location. So an 800 number by itself is pretty much incomplete.

Adding your full mailing address and local number at the bottom of every webpage achieves two things – first it improves your local search visibility and second, it’s easier and more convenient for visitors to obtain your contact information.

4. Building quality inbound links to your website
The long-term goal of every internet marketer—that is, small business owners and service professionals marketing their services online—is to build a library of quality links that directs visitors from other websites to yours.

Take note this isn’t a case of quantity as it is a continuous effort over the years as long as your website is running. Search engines see inbound links as a sign of influence—a sort of “thumbs up” sign. The more links directed toward your website, the better you’ll rank on most search engines.

5. Attracting good (and bad) reviews
Review websites like Yelp help increase your local visibility.

Create a business listing on Yelp. Then write something like “I’d love to hear your comments/feedback” on your contact page followed by a link to your Yelp business listing.

The thing with a near-perfect review record is that some people tend to become suspicious. So welcome bad reviews as you do positive ones. No company is perfect. Even Apple has its haters.

The problem with small business owners and service professionals who want to attract local traffic is they tend to look for solutions in all the wrong places.

If you want for people to find you on the Internet, you got to start at the place where everybody goes when they want to find anything on the Internet – the search engine.

In this podcast, I revealed some cool tricks to get FREE traffic to your website.

If you got a budget, I also revealed the best way to pay for targeted traffic for your website.

Also, I answered a “business question” by one of my dear subscribers and members.

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No doubt one of the best ways to drive the spotlight to your business is through blogging. While Twitter is still king, blogging has a certain charm all its own. It’s a terrific way for your fans and followers to get to know you and you to get to know them. Thing is, what’s a blog without readers?

One of the biggest challenges of blogging is the challenge of directing traffic to the blog website. It’s easy to lose the motivation to blog when you know no one reads your blog other than yourself.

But if you’re blogging for business, it isn’t as easy as, “Okay I’m done with this. Maybe blogging isn’t really my thing.” You got a business to run. Instead of putting salt on the wound, why not use the time to consolidate if you’re doing it right? Here are 8 tips on how to drive local traffic to your blog.

1. Publish on a regular basis
The golden rule of blogging. In fact this works for attracting both foreign and local traffic to your blog. People like to see fresh updates, and very few folks like to read the same blog post twice. Writing on a regular basis gives readers a reason to come back to your blog and therefore increase traffic.

2. Choose a URL that works
Same as every other website – it all begins with a URL. Choose a URL that describes your blog or type of business, even the location where you operate. For instance,

Sample URL: http://www.professionalgrafixdesigns.com/calgary-design-services/

3. Search for local blogs
Next step is to find local blogs in your area and take a dip into their community. These days blogs are a dime a dozen. Contribute to their discussion by posting a comment on one of the more popular blog posts. Most of the time there should be a text box that asks for your website or email address. Provide them here, not within your comment itself.

Remember your purpose is to promote your own blog by sharing useful information or insights on their discussion. Blatant advertising is out of the question.

4. Participate in local forums or message boards
Forums and message boards are abundant these days. The quintessential social networking platform, many forums and message boards cater to, even specifically target, local traffic. So if there’s any place to promote your blog and increase local traffic, it’s here. Always remember to be helpful and respectful at all times, stick to the forum etiquette, and avoid self-serving comments. Also use your blog’s URL as your custom signature.

5. Link your blog to your email signature
This ensures every email you send out is also doing the job of promoting your blog website. So if you do a lot of email passing back and forth with local clients, you’ll be seeing a spike in your local traffic in no time.

6. Inform local clients via Twitter
If you’ve been keeping a business Twitter account for some time now, chances are most of your local clients already have you in their Following list. What’s left for you to do is update them whenever a new blog post is up. If possible, include the title of your blog post in the tweet message along with the link.

7. Inform local clients via Facebook and other social media
The same idea applies here. Assuming you’ve got a lot of personal friends on your Friends list, updating your Facebook status with a message similar to your tweet should direct even more local traffic to your blog website.

8. Post relevant topics
Perhaps one of the most effective ways to generate local attention is to blog about local stuff. Incorporate local news and events to your blog posts. With a little brainstorming, the success of a local restaurant shouldn’t be too hard to relate to its impressive marketing strategy and your company’s online marketing services. This is the stuff that most readers want to read and tell their friends about afterwards.

Directing local traffic to your blog is easy. At the same time, it should be free, as long as you’re aware which strings to pull and where the majority of your market niche hangs out. Or if you choose to follow other methods not listed here they should only come at a minimal cost.

How about you, what local traffic strategy do you use?

Two weeks ago, I was looking for good photographer here in Calgary. I need a head shot picture for my blog.

So I Google “calgary photographers” and I was surprised how many freelance photographers we have in the city.

I guess a photography service is a great side job.

And then I saw this guy’s work and I was impressed. So I gave him a call to talk about his services.

From our discussion, I can feel how much he loves taking pictures but I can also feel that he struggles in getting consistent income from this talent and passion.

Photography is no doubt a profitable pursuit nowadays.

I know quite a few people—I’m sure you do too—who’s decided to buy their own Canon DSLR cameras, but no amount of high-end gadgetry can match the artistic and careful eye of a talented photographer like yourself.

No one would trust their wedding day in the hands of an amateur with an expensive camera. They’ll hire a professional. You want to venture out into this world, hopefully make a small profit doing something you love and know you’re good at. And you’re aware the online industry is the place to start, but how? Where does a solo service professional begin to make a name for himself online?

The thing you need to know about marketing your photography service business on the internet is you need to stick to a realistic plan with a realistic goal in mind. Start small. Keep a modest budget in hand. As your client-base grows and business starts to pick up, then you can invest on a broader set of online tools to increase traffic flow into your website.

Here’s what you need to get started on your online marketing campaign:

• Your personal website which you designed for free

When a person needs something nowadays, the first thing he or she does is search for the product or service on the internet. That’s given.

A website advertising your skills and services is vital to your early success as a professional photographer. But a successful website doesn’t necessarily translate to an expensive website. There are several online tools that let you piece together a professional-looking website from scratch – for FREE. I recommend that you use Wordpress.

These tools require no design or coding experience whatsoever. I call them “plug and play” online publishing platforms.

• Consider touching stock photography as a side service

Stock photography is when clients purchase your photographs from a supply on a website instead of hiring an actual photographer. The smart thing about stock photography is it lets you showcase your work on your website at the same time, so it’s a win-win situation for you. You can choose to discontinue offering stock photography service once your client-base has grown to a comfortable level.

• Easy payment methods for your clients

I’ll make this short and sweet. If you offer stock photography services, make it easy—and safe—for your clients to send payment. Direct payment is still your best option. Otherwise, think Paypal.

• Market cost analysis

When you start small, you make more out of every dollar investment on your project. The average ROI for online marketing is $10-$13 per dollar spent.

• Tap into social networking

As a service provider just starting out, you want your name to resound in places where more people are likely to hear or read about it. Why look elsewhere other than social media? Namely Facebook, YouTube, MySpace, Multiply, photo-sharing platforms like Tumblr and Photobucket, and the social media platform king – Twitter.

Get active in these forums and start talking directly to enthusiasts and other professional photographers. You’ll expand your horizons as well as learn a few tips of the trade. For someone as dedicated to the craft like yourself, investing an hour or two of your day talking to fellow photographers should be a welcome task.

The internet is a powerful tool for anyone looking to start their own small business. But unless you learn the ropes on how to get started effectively, you’ll end up getting the attention of no one and only hurt yourself in the process.

As a professional photographer, take to heart these low-cost startup tips I mentioned above. Remember, the first step to success is getting the first step right.

Before I end this post…

Do you know that the most popular stock photography company, iStockphoto, is based in Calgary?

If you live in Calgary, why don’t you call them and see if they’re looking for any freelancers.

Have you ever wondered why you can’t convert your website visitors into a paying client?

Most web sites are designed by graphic artists. People who are educated and skilled in arts and design.

So what’s the problem with that?

They are not marketers. They design web sites wearing a “designer” hat instead of a “marketer” hat.

I’m an Internet marketing coach and my job is not to design you a “pretty” website. My job is to create you a “client getting system.” And that’s the difference between me and the rest of my competitors.

Listen in this audio program as I interviewed a Calgary based business broker where we talked about his business and how to get clients from the Internet.

You’ll learn…

• The deceivingly single web page that will pour leads to your business.
• How to turn these leads into paying clients.
• How we discovered the huge potential waiting for him.
• How to separate yourself with your competitors and dominate your market.
• How to drive traffic to your site without spending a dime in advertising.
• The “hypnotic technique” that every service and independent professionals should know to win their prospects.

Go ahead and CLICK the play button below.

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It was 11:36 in the morning and I’m in my home office studying when my phone rang.

I normally don’t answer phone calls if I’m studying but for some reason I had the urge to do it this time.

Sure enough as I suspect, it’s a cold call from a Carpet Cleaning Company based in Calgary, Alberta.

The tone of the telemarketer was friendly and he said “Hi, my name is Richard and I’m from XYZ Company. How are you today?”

And then he said that they have a promotion going on and offering me their services for $89.95.

I think the price is reasonable but as a typical consumer, I just don’t jump in and accept any offer especially from a cold call. I want to think about it first and see what their competitors have.

So I just asked him to leave his company name and telephone number.

Quickly I went to Google, and searched for their company name.

They don’t seem to have a website but I was surprised to what I’ve discovered.

They’re listed in Google Maps.

So I clicked on the link and saw 2 customer reviews. Here’s the screen shot.

So it’s a 1 star review and a 5 star review.

This tells me something, that this carpet cleaning company is not reliable. I’m not here to malign them. I’m just saying that 1 bad review weigh more than 1 positive review. It’s not 1 is to 1 ratio. Bad comments weigh more and can spread quickly than good comments.

Another thing is why they don’t have a web site? Are they hiding something? If they have a website, well it’s not available in a quick search in Google. A typical Internet user will not dig in search results. Very few people will go past the second page.

Here are some points I would like you to learn from this post.

1. People will search you or your business online.
   I just demonstrated to you a typical behaviour of a consumer in this new generation. And this is in every market. They will search you and see what other people have to say. Websites like www.epinions.com and www.yelp.com are some of the sites that are driven by community (Web 2.0 in action.) You should always be checking the Internet about you or your business.
2. Bad comment outweighs good comment by 3:1.
   The basic step to defend yourself is to publish success stories or positive comments on your web site. You may also contact the person who posted bad comment and see if you can fix the issue.
3. Consumer has more power.
   There’s a BIGGER platform now for consumer to voice out their experiences about you or your business. You can’t just say you’re the best. People will validate that through review sites, blogs, facebook, etc.

Internet is the cheapest and fastest way to get clients. But unless you use it to your advantage, your competitor will. If you can’t seem to get new clients or customers, check online if there’s something sabotaging your business.

Help your prospects to decide that you’re the right person to hire. Give them ALL reasons why and publish it online.

One morning, I got a call from a lady who’s trying to launch a Virtual Assistant (VA) services outside Calgary. She’s primarily targeting small businesses in downtown Calgary.

She was asking for a “secret recipe” on how to rank in Google search engine as she saw my business listed at the top of Google search result.

I wish I could help her, but like most people she’s looking for a “tactics” and not strategy.

READ THIS: Strategy will bring you consistent flow of new paying clients and not tactics.

It’s the same in offline and online world.

But anyways, if you’re really dying for some easy and quick tactics to implement in your business, watch the video below as I show you how I rank in Google first page without search engine optimization and all this technical jargon.

Yes, you can implement this in 5-10 minutes.

Don’t forget to post your questions and comments below.