Small Business Web Marketing - Keep It Simple

I find a lot of small business owners are still overwhelmed when it comes to what to do on the Internet. Whether it is a website, blog, Pinterest, Houzz, Facebook, Twitter, etc. it is easy to lose sight of what it is all about. All these are just touch points where we have the opportunity to connect with potential customers. Keeping it simple will help make your online initiatives more productive. So how do we start?

In its simplest form the web is made up of content - text, images, and videos. That is what we upload to our websites, blogs, use in online ads, on social media channels and share with others in emails. And that is also what we need to focus on - quality, relevant content. Which means - written text, digital photos and videos that tell a story or fulfill customer's needs.

We also need a simple understanding of what is the purpose and goals of our online initiatives and define who is our targeted audience you want to appeal too. Only then can we then start to make a solid web marketing plan. Two great goals for small businesses start with:

• Build online awareness for our business
• Drive consumers to our brick-and-mortar storefronts

Now we have to sit down and start planning how to make the connection between content that will appeal to our targeted audience and get them engaged with our store. Again, keeping it simple to start with so we get comfortable doing this.

Probably the best place to start is by answering some questions:

• What are the common questions customers ask you when in your store?
• What are the most popular items people seek in your store?
• What services do you provide that your customers use your products for?

Now start to write a list of bullet points answering these questions. Once the list is completed you can prioritize the list and add a date by each one and where you want each one to be placed - website, blog, etc..   Review the list with your staff and have them help you gather the text content and images you may want to use with each one. Once completed either get this to your web designer or whomever in your store does the uploading along with a posting schedule. Lastly, keep adding new questions as you or your staff think of them. Try to make this a team effort.

This will start to become easier over time. At least now you are beginning to build a sound strategy that will evolve over time as you see what works and what doesn't. Either way you will be adding fresh content all the time that will help engage more potential buyers and definitely help with your search engine ranking placements too.

Slideshow on Online Local Business Listings

Below are some of my slides from the Surfaces 2012 tradeshow highlighting online local business listing examples and why they are important for local flooring stores.

Presentation Slides - Local Business Listings

View more presentations from WebstreamDynamics.

Building a Path For Success in 2012

To be really successful in business today you need to establish business goals for your entire organization. This may sound easy, but it is often misunderstood, or totally forgotten. The goals must be specific and customer focused so you can monitor and measure the results. Without being able to measure the results you have no clue if you are meeting your goals.

Too often I hear flooring businesses say they have a website because they have too.  I also see a lot of stores that just follow the group and have the cookie-cutter website offered by their major supplier or buying group, even though they are all in different marketplaces. Worse, these websites are never updated by the stores themselves to reflect their goals and specific customer informational needs, which means you have no effective way of measuring the website against your goals.

I also have seen this with some flooring blogs. They have a 3rd party creating and posting all the blog content for them. Unfortunately, the 3rd party often times has no idea what your goals are, what exactly is your product mix, nor do they understand the true informational needs of your targeted buyers. This means you are doing it because someone said you should, but you have no involvement or idea if it’s really helping meet your goals or having a positive effect on your bottom line. So why are you still doing it?

If you have not established any goals for this business year you should really take the time to list your key business goals. Then make sure everyone in the organization is aware of them and is striving to achieve them.

For example:

Let's pretend your business is split 40-60 between residential replacement business and commercial work. One of your goals could be for 2012 you are going to increase your overall residential replacement sales by 15%. That goal is measurable and can also be used to help decide on your marketing strategies. Now look at what are the informational needs of the residential replacement buyers in your trading area. What are the most effective ways (media channels) to reach them? What are the costs associated? Knowing the goal and your targeted customers' informational needs you can now start to formulate the editorial content you will need for print, Facebook, Twitter, Google+, blog, website, pay-per-click advertising, etc. Along with this you can create Call to Actions, such as: “Download our Before You Buy Checklist”, “Download this coupon” and tracking new replacement order transactions. These will help you measure if the customers are getting engaged and if you are you staying on track to meet your goal.

In the current economic environment businesses need to set goals, understand their customer’s informational needs and use their websites, social media, blogs and offline media channels towards achieving those goals. It is not too late to set your goals for 2012 and establish how you will measure them. Then examine your current online and offline content marketing to see if it is inline with your goals and with your customers’ informational needs. Also, look for new, cost-effective ways to reach and fulfill the informational needs of your targeted customers and help meet your goals, such as writing a column for a local paper, blog, or Facebook page.

If you don’t have the time then you should look to outsource the content publishing. Preferably, look for a company that already knows your industry and knows your customer informational needs. Be sure they fully understand your goals and there is a written agreement which describes exactly what they are doing for you along with an editorial publishing calendar. Also, establish how you and they will measure the results against your goals. Last, someone within your organization should read before hand everything they are going to publish for you.

If you are want to learn more about how to grow your business in this new marketing age I recommend you read: Get Content, Get Customers – turn Prospects into Buyers with Content Marketing, by Joe Pulizzi and Newt Barrett.It might be the best $12.90 you spend all year.

Google Newest Algorithm Change Affected By What's Above The Fold

On Google's Official Search Blog Google announced yesterday another Google alogrithm change that is based on the the page layout and what page content is actually above the fold. Websites that appear to stuff lots of PPC and banner ads above the fold pushing down useful content make find their search rankings penalized.

"Rather than scrolling down the page past a slew of ads, users want to see content right away. So sites that don’t have much content “above-the-fold” can be affected by this change. If you click on a website and the part of the website you see first either doesn’t have a lot of visible content above-the-fold or dedicates a large fraction of the site’s initial screen real estate to ads, that’s not a very good user experience. Such sites may not rank as highly going forward."

They seem to say here that there are two ways to be penalized..

1. not a lot of visible content above the fold
2. large portion above the fold is all PPC ads

What is somewhat confusing, how is Google defining: "visible content"?

The other question is what screen size are they using to determine "above the fold"? Monitors are becoming larger but most sites are still developed with 1024 x 760 pixel screens.

What I find somewhat ironic about this new Google algo change is Google Search doesn't seem to follow it's own rules. The screen shot below I grabbed is from a 1024 X 764 display size. Noticed the red -X-out areas are all PPC advertisements above the fold. At least 50% of the screen space is PPC ads. :-) If you pull out all the white space in the header it is even worse.

BTW, I think it is great that Google will use this to help reduce high rankings for web pages stuffed full of PPC ads (including Google AdSense). But, will inbound links continue to trump lack of visible content above the fold?

Accelerate Your Flooring Business Online

Just having a website is not enough any more. Even having a Facebook page with a few posts per month is not going to win in 2012. Search engines are constantly changing the rules, consumer browsing habits are changing, and even the devices we use to access the web are changing. Everything around you is accelerating and changing quickly, except your store’s online presence. Don’t be left behind!

Webstream Dynamics’ Accelerate is a solution designed to keep you on the top even if you have a buying group’s or manufacturer’s template website. A website is only one of many online consumer touch points. Search Engines, Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Google+, Google Places, Bing Local, Yahoo Local, YellowPages, Yelp, Localeze, Axiom, SuperPages, FourSquare, YellowBook, online business directories, Flickr, Tout, email marketing, mobile web, and more can all impact your business. Add to this keyword analysis and placement, search engine rankings, geo-targeting, link building, call-to-actions, customer reviews, analytics, measuring results, customer engagement, website updates, and more.

Too Busy Managing Your Business?
If you are too busy running your flooring store and you want a web partner for 2012 who can Accelerate your business online and help drive sales come see Webstream Dynamics and the WFCA at Surfaces 2012.

Surfaces Booth S6171
Just look for WFCA’s booth.. you can’t miss us both.

Improving Customer Feedback Through Digital Text Communication

Google's TalkBin allows your customers to send you digital text messages through their mobile phones while in your store. This tool is meant to help engage people in your store and allow them to send you anonymous feedback, suggestions, and questions to you in real time and lets you respond immediately via your cell phone or via email.

When you sign up for TalkBin you receive a TalkBin phone number and TalkBin signage from Google. Customers in your store can then send anonymous text messages to your TalkBin number which is then forwarded to you. No personal information about the customer accompanies the message, encouraging honest communication from your customers.

Here are some TalkBin videos that will help you better understand TalkBin...





To learn more and sign up go to TalkBin.com

By the way, you can supposedly get the TalkBin service for a $1/month through the end of December. See http://blumenthals.com/blog/2011/12/13/googles-talkbin-special-1mo-per-location/ for details.

Creating Google+ Page for your Business

Google+ pages for Businesses has just gone live for everyone. What that means is businesses and organizations can now create their own business page, sort of like a business page on Facebook. To create your FREE Google+ business page you must first create a Google Account and then sign into Google+ with your Google account username and password.

Once signed into Google+ for business you have several different options for creating a business page. You can create a local business page using your business phone number or create a brand/product page, a business page, etc. Each has slightly different requirements for creating the initial page.

 Once you have successfully created you page you can add interesting posts about your products and services as well as add an about section, business photos, a business logo and links to your YouTube videos. You Google+ Business page can also include a link to your website and your business phone number.

You can then select to share your content with just those who are following you (called your Circle) or make it public for all to see. With each post you can elect to allow others to leave comments or not allow any comments. Below is my Google+ business page I recently created for my company, Webstream Dynamics. Feel free to follow me to updates about search engine marketing, effective website design strategies, mobile website design, Google+ and Google Places.

Click here for Webstream Dynamics' Google+ Business Page

Lastly, you can help spread the word by adding a Google+ icon to your website with a link to your Google+ Business page.

How all this will effect website's SEO and driving traffic remains to be seen, but it certainly can't hurt and it is free.

Lowes introducing new interactive consumer Internet tools

There was an interesting article on Forbes yesterday about How Lowe's Plans To Revolutionize Its Customer Experience. The article talks about how Lowe's is trying to use technology to help engage their customers and improve customer service.

Lowes is introducing a new online tool, called “myLowes”, that will enable consumers to access information and advice via the Internet about their home improvement preferences. It sounds like a personalized digital workbook with various home decorating tools and helpful articles. Along with this Lowe's has supposedly given 42,000 employes iPhones for in-store use to search products and make sales.

"It allows customers to build room-by-room profiles of their homes and to experiment with different styles virtually."

This sounds like it could be a win-win for web-savvy, home improvement shoppers and Lowe's. There is no doubt Lowe's is definitely pushing ahead of the curve trying to find new, innovative ways to engage customers through technology. In my August blog post Lowes Launches A Slick iPhone Shopping App I talked about Lowe's iPhone shopping application. Now they are taking another step further by connecting Lowe's sales people directly with homeowners and giving homeowners additional online tools.

For retailers, Lowes is definitely a company to watch.

Note: flooring retailers Lowes free install for STAINMASTER® Carpet.Offer ends 11/18/2011

2011 WFCA Consumer Buying Flooring Study

The WFCA and Clear Seas did a flooring consumer study in August 2011. Most of the research focused on flooring buyers use of various online websites and social media channels.

There were 494 email responses from consumers who had previously purchased flooring in the past 6 months and had remodeled or updated one or more rooms. 75% said they were either post graduate or a college graduate and 69% said their annual income was $65,000 or more. 59% said they were full-time employed, 21% said they were retired, only 3% were unemployed or a student, and the remainder were either employed part-time or were home makers.

From the 494 consumers who responded Tile was the most popular flooring type installed for their most recent project, followed by Laminate flooring, Hardwood flooring and Carpet. Most of the laminate floors were do-it-yourself remodel projects, not professionally installed. No real surprise there. (It should be noted that the 494 responses were about a 50-50 split between DIY and professionally installed.)

Here are a few highlights of the results that I found most interesting...

• Three-out-of-four consumers surveyed used online resources when shopping for their most recent flooring product purchase. Big box retailer websites (such as Lowe’s and Home Depot) are the most used online resources, followed by flooring manufacturer websites and search engines. Just over one-in-three consumers used a specialty flooring website.
• Among those who used an online resource only about one-in-three actually researched and selected a specific brand online to purchase before visiting a store who did use.
• Seven-out-of-ten also rate special offers/coupons, benefits of products carried, brands carried and customer reviews of retailers as important or very important. Consumers reported the least important content to include on the website is, by far, links to social media.
• Most also stated they used previous experience or personal recommendations when selecting a store, followed by search engines, retailer's website and then manufacturer's websites.
• While 80% of consumers report participating on social media (mainly Facebook), they are unlikely to use it to find a specialty flooring retailer and do not find it important that specialty flooring retailers are involved in social media. Social media involvement does appear to positively influence consumers’ perceptions of specialty flooring retailers.

Social media has become a large part of society today, but despite the high involvement, consumers buying flooring are less inclined to use it when purchasing new flooring. From my personal conversations with various retailers I find most feel they have to be on Facebook but don't find it a big traffic generator. Of course consumers who post great things about the flooring they recently purchased on their own personal Facebook page would be a great word-of-mouth testimonial for that store.

This brings me back to what I posted last week about Creating an Effective Local Web Marketing Business Strategy. I am seeing more traffic being generated to the store's websites from Google Places and in some cases other Internet Yellow Page type directories than from any social media channel. Google Places and their other business directories also contain all the essential things needed for a consumer to find a local store, including directions, map, store hours, address, phone number and in some cases are really a mini-web page with customer reviews as well. That doesn't mean this holds true for all types businesses, some other types of businesses are doing very well with Facebook and other social media channels. If you have any questions feel free to email me at: john@webstreamdynamics.com.

Creating An Effective Local Web Marketing Business Strategy

There is a lot of store owners confused today when it comes to creating a smart, effective online marketing strategy. So often I see the shotgun approach - do a little of everything and see what sticks. A large part of that is due to lack of understanding and hearing all the hype about what is the latest online rage. So many local businesses try to do to much and in the process do nothing extremely well.

Deal of the day websites like Groupon are a prime example of hype we have all heard for a while. Now there is a saturation of too many of these type websites and they are starting to loose their effectiveness with many local consumers. A lot small businesses jumped on offering deals without thinking through to the end result - will this really be profitable for my business (ROI).

Many stores are beginning to post on Facebook and some are Twittering, or have some company twitter for them. But few have a real content strategy and even fewer are measuring their results to see if it is worth their precious time. Also, few analyze if their tweets and Facebook posts are really engaging their targeted local  consumers. For example: go to your Twitter and Facebook page and pull out all your friends, relatives, competitors and employees and count how many are left.

So here is what I recommend store owners to start with for their online local business strategy:

1.  Establish your online marketing goals
1. For example:  drive online, local targeted buyers to your storefront
2. Keep the goal(s) in focus with everything you do online
2. Get your website in order first
1. Local SEO optimized
2. Compelling content for driving targeted buyers to your storefronts
3. Highly visible "Call-To-Actions"
4. Google Analytics & WebMaster Tools to measure website results
3. Claim, or add, to all major Yellow-Page type business directories
1. Google Places a must!
2. There are about 15 others to add all locations too
3. include description, website address, categories, upload photos and video if possible
4. Get other local listings where possible to improve your visibility
1. Local Chamber of Commerce website
2. Local newspaper business listings, if available online
3. Supplier's website store listings
4. Association member listings (for example: www.WFCA.org)
5. BBB online (if you can tolerate all their BS)
6. exchange links with other local businesses
5. Create a Facebook store page that is public
1. Keep content interesting to targeted buyers
2. Try posting promotions and drive to website, create special landing page
3. Make sure website is update to date with sales, etc.
4. Measure the results
6. Set up a pay-per-click advertising campaign
1. Establish a monthly dollar budget
2. Bid on local geo-keywords +  major product groups you don't do well with in natural search
3. Create compelling text ads and tweak as need
4. Create special geo-targeted, relevant landing pages with "Call-To-Action"
5. Measure the results weekly
7. Re-examine all the above after 3-6 months to see what is working and what is not

If you need more explanation or help understanding any of the above feel free to email me at john@webstreamdynamics.com

Monitor What Others Say About Your Business Online With Google Alerts

Google Alerts is a free search tool that can help manage what others online are saying about your business, or about your competitors. This is not a full-blown reputation management tool, but as a freebie, it ain't bad to start with.

It only takes a free Google Account to save your alerts and have new alerts emailed to you every time Google Alerts finds something online that matches the keywords you selected. For example:

1. I logged into my Google Account and then went to: http://www.google.com/alerts

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2. Type in the Google alerts text box the desired keywords, such as your business name. For this example I used my business name "webstream dynamics" (highlighted in yellow above).
3.For Type: I selected on wanted "Everything" that Google crawls.
4. For How Often: I selected "As it happens" (So I only get an email alert as it is found by Google.
5. For Volume: I selected "All results". I want it totally unfiltered.
6. For Deliver to: I left it go to my Google Account email address.
7. You should notice a sampling of results on the right side of your screen based on the keywords you typed in the Google alerts text box. You can also click the blue-colored Preview results button located to the right of the alert text box.
8. Last, if satisfied, click the red-colored Save Alert button.

Now when ever Google finds something new said online that contains the keyword phrase you will be notified. Later on if you want to remove any Google Alerts you just log in and delete the ones you don't want to receive emails for any more.

TIP: If you want to create an alert and fiilter out some results you can append "negative keywords" after your keyword phrase.
For example: carpet -red -cleaning -cleaners

Lowes Launches A Slick iPhone Shopping App

If you have an Apple iPhone or iPad and you are looking to buy products for your home, are on the go a lot, and live close to a Lowes store this powerful little, FREE iPhone shopping app is for you. I recently saw this promoted on Twitter and had to go take it for a test run, At first glance it seems extremely well done and includes a ton of great features, such as: idea gallery, how to videos, find a store and of course the product catalog. Nice app Lowes - 2 thumbs up!

Lowes iPhone Shopping App

Lowes entire online product catalog is only a touch screen away. I checked out some Bruce hardwood flooring and all the info I needed to make a buying decision was there, including: reviews, product specs, pricing per carton, product availability, in-store and truck delivery and even social media sharing.

Shopping Bruce Flooring on my iPhone

Lowes states you can also activate the videos and product ratings by scanning barcodes and Microsoft Tags found on the products while in their stores. Who needs a saleperson to answer questions anymore? :-)

You can checkout the Lowes' iPhone shopping app here, or go right to Lowes' iTunes app page.

Note: If you are looking to use your iPhone to help buy or shop flooring be sure to download my free, Flooring Calculator Lite from the App Store too.

A Glimpse Inside Your Free Google Places Business Listing

This assumes you have already claimed your Google Places business listing. If not, go read this post.

One of the advantages you get from claiming your FREE Google Places business listing is you can get a glimpse on how well your Google Place listing is doing or a given time period and what actions people took. All you need to do is login to Google Places to see the visitor activity details in your dashboard. There you will see the number of times your Places listing appeared (called: Impressions) in the search results over a given time period and the various Actions taken by some of the search users.
The Actions will show you:

• how many people went to Google Maps to learn more about your store location
• looked up directions to your store
• how much traffic was sent to your website

Along with the actions you also get a listing of the top search queries. This can help tell you if your Google Place listing is really getting your targeted shoppers.

If you feel you actions are low and the top queries are not the best keywords used by your targeteed audience then maybe it's time to revamp your business description and 5 business categories to better match your targeted buyers. You can also add a 30 day sales announcement or update to your Places page that can help entice viewers into action and drive more store traffic.

It's important to also realize not everyone has to go to your website to get your store address, phone number and directions. With Google Places listing all the necessary information is right there. This is also true with the other Internet yellow-page business directories. Look at these as mini-display advertising pages to help improve market reach and drive store traffic.

Is Your Business Taking Advantage Of The Free Online Listings?

The major search engines and local business directories include free business listings. A quick way to check if you are taking advantage of these is by going to getlisted.org and typing in your "real" business name and zipcode. After a few seconds you will see your "listing score" on 6 different search engine websites, including Google, Yahoo and Bing.

If you click on "To Do" in the left menu next to your results you will see how the score is determined and things you can do to take better advantage of the free listings at these 6 search engines. There is also a lot more you should do as well, such as add a business description, update and/or add categories for your products and services, add your website address if it doesn't exist, etc..

This is by no means a complete list of all the  local search directories, such as YP, SuperPages, InsiderPages, YellowBook, CitySearch and more. All of these allow businesses to claim and update their "free" listings. Plus, by actually checking your business listings you may find incorrect information and by claiming your listing you can correct the errors. One thing to note, if you have multiple locations you have to do this separately for each location.

Last, you can listen to my recent radio interview with Dave Foster about this and other local seo advice on TalkFloor ... http://www.talkfloor.com/interviews.aspx?interviewParentID=467

Impress Your Online Customers With Great Photography

We have all heard pictures tell a thousand words. On the Internet that is also true even if they are 72 dpi digital photos instead of print resolution. Yet, I often see retailer’s websites with poor digital photos of the interior of their store and products.

First impressions do count when shoppers land on a website and having the right photos can make a huge difference. Unlike the big chain stores most shoppers are unfamiliar with most specialty small businesses. For example: most consumers can easily visualize in their minds a picture of the products sold and type of service offered by Home Depot, Lowes, Walmart or Best Buy store because they frequently shop there more often than specialty stores.

Although the specialty store, such as flooring stores or camera shops, may have better quality products, competitive prices and outstanding service most shoppers don’t know that, so today most shoppers are using the web to research their local store options. Interior photos of the store and personnel on a website can make consumers feel much more confident in choosing that particular store, or the photo images can totally turn potential customers off. So why do so many storeowners skimp on store photos? Quality digital SLR cameras are not that expensive any more. Add a good low-light, wide angle lens with some lighting accessories can make a huge difference. As an alternative, there are a lot of wedding photographers in most communities that for a small investment can help storeowners capture great photos of their store, products, jobs and staff.

Take this simple test… which store shot impresses you more? (Click image for large view)

Store Shot A

Store Shot B

Not just storeowners, but also manufacturers need to pay attention when creating roomscene product photos. Which of these two hardwood flooring roomscenes seems more appealing? (Click image for large view)

 Roomscene Shot1

Roomscene Shot 2

Avoid Duplicated Content to Improve Search Visibility

In the first part of this video by Matt Cutts from Google talks about the use of duplicated content pages within the same TLDs (ie: ".com", ".net", ".org", etc.) will likely be filtered out by Google's algorithms. This is one reason I keep preaching to retailers not to use a  templated website that re-uses the same content over and over from website to website. Besides, you really need to differentiate yourself from your competitors and give your targeted shoppers compelling reasons to buy from you. Personalize the web experience with ins-store photos & videos, testimonials, your staff's experience, selection, service, etc.. Successful websites are not a printed advertisement, they are a whole lot more today.

Show What You Like On The Web With Google +1

Google officially launched on June 1st a new way for people to show others what they like or recommend on the web by clicking on the Google +1 button. The button will appear on web pages, in search results, sponsored ads, blogs, websites and more.

Google +1 is meant to be an approval or popularity rating counter that increments by one every time someone new decides to click on the +1 button. This is similar to Facebook's Like button, but can appear in many more places around the web depending where webmasters want to place them.

All people have to do is when they really like something is click on the Google +1 button, such as the bottom of this blog post. The key is you have to have a Google Account and enable your Google public profile in order to click on the +1 buttons. Also, if you are not logged into your Google Account you will not see the Google +1 buttons, which I think is crazy. Google has also stated the +1 ratings will have some effect on your search rankings.

Google Offers (beta) Launches in Portland, OR

Google launches Google Offers (Beta) and joins all the other local-deals-of-the-day websites that email daily a local business's special offer to local email subscribers. Google has launched their beta offers inititive in Portland, OR. first. Obviously they plan on going head-to-head with Groupon, Living Social and the others who offer a local special discounted deal sent daily to your email inbox.

Time will tell if these deals of the day will survive and continue to grow or will eventually fade away. I am not sure how many small businesses can afford to offer legitimate, deep discounts (50% or more) and pay the email-deal-sending website around 30% for a one-time mass buy-in. Lost leaders are not made up with more volume. Anyway, it will be interesting to sit on the sidelines and watch all the players vie for the deal-of-the-day crown champion.

Is My Online Advertising Campaign Really Working?

A lot of stores are considering if they should do some advertising on the various online yellowpage type directories, such as YP.com, Yelp, Yellowbook, etc. I often hear storeowners tell me that have a campaign already setup with a major local business directory they have no clue if they are getting their monies worth for the bucks they are spending.

Before you start any online, store advertising campaign you need to be able to view how people are getting to your website. The easy way to determine where your website visitors are coming from is by using Google Analytics (it's free) on your website. This will help you track where your website audience is actually coming including any advertising campaign you decide to try. See a simple example below...

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Notice the yellowpages.com source. What this is showing you is over a selected time period how many website visitors came from Yellowpages.com. I also added the region so you can also see where the website visitors came from. If you were a store in Massachusetts you would see that 5 visitors came from Massachusetts to your website from Yellowpages.com. Depending on the time period and advertising costs you can now better decide if it is worth it.

One thing to note: The bottom line is getting web visitors to your store (converting visitors to buyers). So if those 5 Yellowpage.com web visitors all became new customers you might find this advertising program is a great deal. It's about the quality of the leads, not just quantity.

Using Google Trends To Look At The Flooring Industry

Now that we have completed one third of 2011 I thought I would look at the trends in certain flooring industry categories again to see how things look compared to previous years. Although some things seem pretty obvious I wanted to confirm my suspicions based on conversations I had with many different flooring customers.

I like to use Google Trends because it gives us a pretty accurate picture based on searches done on Google. I will start with a couple of trend tests to demonstrate Google Trends is fairly accurate and believable. First one is based on a recent fad which is women putting feathers in their hair. This really took off late 2010 and is going crazy in salons right now across the USA. (I know this because I have a client who sells a boat load of feathers each month.) So let's see how it looks using Google Trends..

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The second test is the "Super Bowl", which should peek for a very short time span and does...

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We can see the Google Trends are fairly accurate. So lets see how Walmart and Amazon are doing over time. Notice the high peeks every year during the holiday shopping season.

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So now lets look at some search trends for specific flooring categories from 2004 to present and only for the USA.

1. Carpet..

2. Hardwood flooring...

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3. Laminate flooring...

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4. Flooring...

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I heard from many store owners that 2010 started out fairly strong and then died the second half of 2010. The Google search trends for 2010 seems to pain the same picture.

5. Shaw Carpet, Mohawk Carpet and STAINMASTER

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6. Compare "Carpet One", Flooring America" "Mohawk Flooring" and "Shaw Flooring"..

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7. SmartStrand (Notice the huge spike in searches during zoo animal promotions

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Google Trends seems to say the amount of interest and noise being made online about flooring is steadily declining. If we looked at from State to State I am sure we would see some area trends doing much better than others.