4 Local Lead Generation Strategies for Business Owners

Local lead generation is an important strategy for business owners who want to attract more customers in their local market area. By leveraging local lead-generation tactics, businesses like you can increase their visibility and build relationships with local customers.

Ultimately, this localization strategy can help you generate more leads you can convert into sales.

In this guide, you’ll learn the key strategies for local lead generation and how you can implement them.

Let’s get started.

What is Local Lead Generation?

Local lead generation is the process of attracting potential customers in a particular geographic area. It involves a combination of traditional and digital marketing strategies that are tailored to reach those potential customers. That “particular geographic area” being referred to is usually the business’ location.

You can use local marketing focused on the surrounding community to find your quality leads. But, businesses can also go beyond their nearest area and reach for markets that are far away. This especially makes sense, if you offer digital services, like SaaS products.

Say, you’re already selling products in the US and want to promote your Shopify store to people from the UK. You’d need to do several things to get noticed.

You’d need to introduce some content marketing changes to get noticed. Adjusting your vocabulary to the local market, or translating, are just examples. If you don’t localize your content, you most probably won’t make it as a business. Also, your product and the way you market it needs to comply with local legislation, etc.

The advantages of local lead-generation are numerous. Here are the main three ones:

Targeted Audience

When implementing local lead-generation strategies, it’s important to consider who your target audience is. This knowledge will help you tailor your marketing activity to reach the right people.

Once you know who you’re speaking to, you can then focus on creating campaigns that are tailored to their needs and interests. You can focus your marketing efforts on people who are more likely to be interested in what you sell.

You can meet up with your potential customers face-to-face. It’s easier to develop relationships in person than over the phone or through email marketing.

Once you become a recognizable part of your community, people will trust you and your brand. From there, your marketing will become more cost-effective than when trying to reach a broad market.

Improved Conversion Rates

Another advantage of local lead generation is improved conversion rates.

When you target potential customers in a specific geographic area, you are more likely to convert them into customers. This is because you are targeting people who are more likely to be interested in your product or service and are more likely to take action.

Once you have onboarded enough local customers, you’ll benefit from word-of-mouth marketing. This is free advertising, which means that your marketing campaigns will require less and less financial investment. The result? Increased conversion rates and revenue.

You can encourage this by implementing a referral program. Offer incentives to your current customers for spreading the word and recommending your brand or products.

Spending fewer resources on marketing means you’ll be able to spend more time on developing relationships.

Increased Visibility

When you focus on your local market, you work towards getting your message in front of a potential customer base in their local area. This helps build brand awareness and get more customers through your doors.

Soon, people will get to know your brand and associate it with your products. They will be more likely to buy as a result.

Once you get there, you can use your brand recognition by supporting other local businesses and initiatives. Becoming active in the community, and being recognized for it, is a great way to build a strong brand.

One great example of a company that keeps increasing its visibility locally (and beyond) is Glasdon.

Glasdon manufactures and sells outdoor trash cans, but the company is well known for its support to the local community. Its dedicated social responsibility webpage is full of posts highlighting various events and initiatives.

The result? A great relationship with local authorities, businesses, and the community who keep ordering Glasdon’s products to equip local premises.

4 Strategies for Generating Local Leads

Generating local leads is an essential part of any successful business. It can be a challenging task. But, with the right strategies, you can create a steady stream of qualified leads that are interested in your products or services.

Here are four of the most effective strategies for generating local leads:

1. SEO

One of the most effective strategies for local lead generation is Search Engine Optimization. By optimizing your website for local organic search terms, you can increase your chances of appearing in local SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages).

This practice is also part of a process that you may know as International SEO.

If you were an accounting business owner from Capitol Hill, Seattle, you’d publish content, such as blog posts, or videos, focused on local keywords like, ‘Seattle accounting services and advice’.

This will get you to rank higher in search engines when someone is searching for an accountant in the same area.

Make sure you claim your Google My Business Profile and select your location. Your listing will attract potential customers who are searching for products or services in your area.

Adding geotags to the images you add to your Google business profile can also help you acquire more local leads. Each tagged photo is added to a photo map, which shows the locations of all tagged photos.

2. Social Media

Social media is also a great way to reach potential customers in your local area. By creating content that is tailored to your target audience, you can create an engaged following that is more likely to take action.

You should utilize local hashtags to ensure your content is reaching the right people. Search for a hashtag on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook that’s related to what you sell and combine it with the location.

This way, you’ll make it easier for people to find you when they’re searching for something specific within your area.

The local hashtag #bostongym is a good one, for example. When you search for the hashtag on Instagram, it brings over 12,000 results.

Geo-targeting is a process of sending different content to consumers based on their geographic locations. Social media platforms allow you to choose a custom audience for posts.

So, if you’re creating an offer to locals, you can restrict the post to that target audience. Your followers from outside the area won’t see it.

Tag your location in the photos you post on Instagram, just like what the florist from Louisville, Kentucky did below. Posts with a tagged location get 79% higher engagement compared to the ones without.

In other words, this strategy can help you get Instagram likes from people from your area who are interested in your offerings.

Finally, make sure all your social profiles show the location you’re targeting. People like to check out a brand’s online presence. The more information you display in your bios, the more trustworthy your brand gets.

3. Run Local Ads

Localized advertising is another great way to reach potential customers in your local area. By leveraging local publications, radio, and television, you can get your message in front of potential customers in your area.

Local lead generation ads on the internet prove to be very effective. With Google ads, Google maps ads, or social media ads you can target people located in specific locations.

This way, you’re only spending ad money on customers who can realistically buy from you, based on their area.

Here’s an example of a sponsored result for a search query ‘Jewelry Stores’ near New York. The ad enclosed in a red box appears at the top, right before any other matching results.

Running local ads is an effective way to increase brand recognition and generate more leads.

4. Get Listed in Local Directories

Finally, you should make sure that your business is listed in local directories. This will help you increase your visibility on local search engine results pages. Plus, you’ll make it easier for potential customers to find your business.

Additionally, it can help you build trust and credibility with local customers. People are more likely to trust companies that ‘exist’ beyond their websites. So, if someone sees your business in a local directory, they are more likely to reach out for your products.

In Conclusion

Local lead generation is an important strategy for business owners who want to attract more customers in specific market areas.

There are several effective strategies for local lead-generation campaigns. This includes SEO, social media, localized advertising, and getting listed in local directories.

Leverage the above tactics to enjoy the advantages of local lead generation. This includes increasing your brand’s visibility, building relationships with local customers, and ultimately generating more leads that can be converted into sales.