Google Maps VS Yellow Pages – Part 1 of 2

This is a comparison of Google Maps (Google.com) and Yellow Pages (YellowPages.com) for the consumer. The second article is a comparison for the business owner. However, it would serve the business owner well to take a look at the consumer presentation because the things that affect the consumer can have a major impact on the business owner.

The easiest way to compare these two services is to take a look at a real world situation and see how the two entities stack up. Now if you are saying, “Wait a minute, what are you doing comparing Google Maps with the Yellow pages? They aren’t even the same thing.” That’s understandable. At first glance they seem different, maps and yellow pages.

Maybe Google made a mistake. Google Maps was previously know as Google Local Search. In Local Search you could look up businesses and get phone numbers and directions. Google probably changed the name to Google Maps because Maps is a much broader term and encompasses all that Google is doing with their maps. Bottom line, Google Maps is an excellent phone directory.

So, our real world scenario. Let’s say that we are looking for a cosmetic dentist is Santa Monica, Ca that takes Saturday morning appointments.

Let’s start by navigating to YellowPages.com. We are greeted with a pleasant website and what immediately jumps out at us are two text boxes. One says Find and the other says location. I’ll begin with a general search. Under Find I enter Dentist and other Location I enter Santa Monica.

Instantly the YellowPages returns a new web page with eleven different categories. I’m in luck. One of the categories is Dentist – Cosmetic Dentistry. I check the box and click the Find button at the bottom of the page. I’m then greeted by another page and at first I’m a bit confused. I see one dentist listing on the right and this dentist is in Thousand Oaks, easily more than 25 miles away. This certainly isn’t what I’m looking for. Wondering if I entered the correct information my eyes begin to scan the screen and in the left column I first notice a list of cities, Agoura, Agoura Hills, Beverly Hills, Calabasas, etc. My thoughts are it should be easier than this. I’ve already entered data and I’m two clicks into the search and I don’t seem to be very close to the finding a dentist in Santa Monica.

Then at the top of the column on the left I notice that I can refine my search and there is text in black letters that doesn’t look like a link but says Santa Monica Listings Only. I click on the link and go to my third web page and I see a list of dentists. The top dentist looks like a paid listing. The phone number is listed with a link to automatically dial it from a mobile phone. There is also a link to the dentists website, a banner ad and links to more info about the dentist like the products and services that he offers and how long he has been in service.

Beneath the paid listing are the regular listings which seem to be listed alphabetically. These listings include the dentists name, the address and the phone number. There is also a link to a map and more info.

At the very bottom of the listing is a link to send the info to a mobile phone (nice). Thre are also links to Map It, Email it, Get Directions, Save the Listing and Save a note if you have a YellowPages account (very nice).

So far there is enough information to make a call. The phone number is listed. But I want to find a cosmetic dentist so I click on the Dentist name. This opens up a new web page that has the same basic information plus some Business Details which contains General Information, Maps and Directions, and User Reviews.

The same menu for sending info to mobile, emailing, directions etc is also on this page.

Let’s now look at the same search on Google Maps and compare the two. I navigate to maps.Google.com and am greeted with a rather familiar looking interface since I do all of my searches on Google anyway. There is only one search box so I simply enter “cosmetic dentist santa monica” and click Search Maps.

Google immediately returns the top ten search results. The dental offices are listed on the left side of the page with alphabetically lettered place markers and a large map is on the right side showing where each of the dental offices are located.

I already feel better about Google. There was one search box. I didn’t have to enter the business category in one box and the location in another. Also, I have instant results and in the right city. I didn’t have to select from a menu of different types of dentist and then refine the search again by city. At this point Google seems much easier to use.

Like the Yellow Pages there is a paid listing at the top of the list. However, it’s obvious that this listing is a paid advertisement because it has a different background color. This clearly separates the paid listing from the organic search results. Beneath the paid listing are the top ten search results lettered from A to J.

These listings aren’t alphabetical and seem in random order until you learn that Google returns results which it thinks are the most relevant to the search words used. A listing consists of the name of the business, the address, and phone number. If a dentist has a customer review there is a blurb from the review beneath the listing.

If you click on the business name or the lettered place marker a large information box almost resembling a cartoon bubble launches from the corresponding place marker on the maps. This place marker contains the same basic information about the business plus a link to the businesses website if the business has one.

This is great. If there is a dentist that looks appealing I can click on a link to his or her website and get much more information. True, the paid dental ad on YellowPages.com had a link to that dentist’s website but none of the other dentist had a web link. That’s probably because at businesses on Yellow pages have to pay a premium to get a web link. Since this service is free on Google, more dentist will have web links which mean there will be much more information for consumers.

If you click on the More Info in the information box a new menu appears that has some of the same information provided by YellowPages.com like reviews and details, but there are also four features here that YellowPages.com doesn’t have; photos, video, user content and web references. Of the four I particularly like the photos and video. Although not many business are using video yet, more are sure to catch on to this opportunity and provide a wealth of information about their business.

In summation I like Google maps more than YellowPages.com. It is easier to use, you can get the exact information that you want with fewer clicks, it allows the business owner to present photos and videos. YellowPages.com is good. A nice clean professional interface. But it’s more time consuming to initiate a search, often requires too many clicks to find the exact information you are looking for and doesn’t allow regular businesses to link to websites unless they pay a premium. Two features I really like on YellowPages.com is the ability to send a business listing to a mobile device and the abilitiy record personal notes on a business listing.

Facebook Fan Pages – Key to Social Media Marketing

The phrase “Social Media” is everywhere these days, and if you are like me, you may be a bit unclear about what it actually is… the infamous phrase “I’ll know it when I see it” comes immediately to my mind!

I went looking online for a short, easy to understand definition and found this analogy:

Think of regular media as a one-way street where you can read a newspaper or listen to a report on television, however, you have very a limited ability to share your thoughts on the matter.

Social media, on the other hand, is an active two-way street that gives you the ability to communicate and respond.

As the internet develops and evolves, the various Social Media websites are also growing and changing. Several years ago, MySpace was the place to be but it is now, generally, considered to be on the wane. Likewise, on MySpace, 33% of its users are aged 17 or less.

Ravalry is a relatively new, large community based around knitting with over 1,200,000 registered users. As you would expect, its membership is primarily female and the average member age is not available.

Facebook provides this information about its users:

  • More than 500 million active users (I recently saw the number 600 million, but it hasn’t been changed yet, on the Facebook site)
  • 50% of our active users log on to Facebook in any given day
  • Average user has 130 friends
  • People spend over 700 billion minutes per month on Facebook

As you can see, each Social Media site appeals to and has a different user base than any other site.

One of the powerful considerations about using a Social Media web site is the fact that most of them provide a level playing field when it comes to small business owners vs the big boys. For instance, you can build a Facebook Fan page for your offline business and so can a major automobile manufacturer. Within those Facebook Fan pages, both you and the multi billion dollar car maker have the same tools and resources. On Twitter, as another example, both you and the big companies are limited to 140 characters per tweet. They can’t buy more characters and blast you out of the competition.

When considering which Social Media site to use with Social Media Marketing, you should consider the site’s membership but you should also evaluate its culture and how the members interact. It is important that any Social Media site have a population whose interests are in line with your goals and, also, that it have a structure and pattern of interaction that is compatible with your objectives.

In addition, you must keep in mind that things change on the Internet, sometimes at breakneck speed. As an example, between March 2011 and May 2011, Facebook implemented some major changes which changed the whole landscape of using it for business. Suddenly, controlling the content on a business Fan Page and using product images to build a brand became game changers… for those who knew how to do it!

While a particular Social Media site may be a good fit now, be aware that it may not always be a successful marketing vehicle for you! Monitor the efficacy of any Social Media site you are using AND also keep an eye out for the next big thing!

With all of that in mind, at the current time, I consider Facebook and Twitter to be the Social Media sites most likely to be compatible with the majority of offline businesses and their needs.

In this article I am going to briefly cover Facebook, its structure as it pertains to Social Media Marketing, discuss some of the pitfalls, and propose some strategies appropriate to it.

Facebook Marketing for Small Business

Facebook’s membership has exploded and is currently greater than 500 million, according to its own website.

It originally began as a way for college students to keep in touch with fellow students. As a result of that, the basic Facebook community seems to start from an academic basis, joining students and former students with friendship circles widening out from there. If you are like me, you will be shocked at how many members from your high school class seem to appear out of nowhere!

As part of the Facebook mechanism, possible Friends are suggested to you, based on Friends that you and the other person have in common. While you can do searches, it is hard to find and befriend a person that Facebook doesn’t think you should know. On the other hand, Facebook makes suggestions that will extend your network, based simply on friends you may have in common with someone.

Another important mechanism is the Facebook Like option, which has now been extended beyond Facebook Profile pages and Facebook Fan Pages and out into the web at large.

A third and exceedingly important Facebook mechanism is the ability to link between websites, Facebook Fan Pages, and Twitter accounts. This can be done with a variety of website creation software options. At the moment, I am encouraging my clients to use the blogging software, WordPress, for non blog websites.

With WordPress as your website management system, once you have signed up for the Networked Blogs Facebook App(lication), you can set your website to show any changes on your Facebook Fan Page and your Twitter account. Your Twitter Account can be set to show Facebook Fan Page Comments along with Posts from your WordPress website. In addition, your Tweets will be displayed on your Facebook Fan Page and your website.

Now, I know that the previous paragraph was confusing so let me give you the abridged edition! In my example, you have three web presences for your business – A Facebook Fan Page, a website built with WordPress, and a Twitter account. Any Post made on one of those three sites will automatically appear on the other two sites.

This is VERY powerful and is a REAL time and energy saver IF you take the time to plan your web marketing strategies with this capacity in mind!

With the potential of getting a three to one benefit from any of your Social Networking posts, as described above, let me go a bit deeper into the opportunities afforded to an offline business by having a Facebook Fan Page.

NOTE – It is important to understand that while a Facebook Fan Page can be considered a potential web site substitute, it offers long term hazards that, in my opinion, are not worth the risk.

Building your business’s primary web presence on a third party web site is taking the time, effort, and money to build a nice new house on land that you DO NOT OWN! You might be OK in the short term, but later down the road, you may lose you house, simply because you do not own the land.

While you may decide that it is efficient to start with a Facebook Fan Page, you should also plan to build your own website ASAP! As a business owner, you should be careful to own and control as many of your business assets as possible.

With that warning out of the way, before utilizing any Social Media site for your Social Media Marketing, take the time to read the site’s ToS or Terms of Service. Do NOT assume that you know what is allowed and what is not.

As an example, you may have multiple Twitter accounts, but each account must be tied to a different email address. Any email address can have only ONE Twitter account.

With Facebook, any human is allowed ONLY ONE ACCOUNT! This means that any Facebook Fan Pages built for any businesses will be offshoots of your primary, personal Facebook account.

If for some reason, you do not want a Facebook Fan Page to be obviously tied to your personal account, you can set the Privacy setting to obscure the connection. In the case of most offline businesses, this would not be a concern. However, I have a number of online businesses, some of which I am open about and others that I have chosen to run from behind the scenes. There is nothing questionable about doing this, I just prefer to keep the connection quiet to minimize others copying my business model. However, ALL of my business Facebook Fan Pages are offshoots of my SINGLE personal Facebook account.

Part of the evolution of the Facebook Culture is that, in most instances, it is considered appropriate to ask other members to share with their Friends about your Facebook Fan Page or your new post or any of a number of other Facebook interactions. This is markedly different from other websites and their culture, and as a business owner, it is a powerful tool.

It is perfectly OK to ask others to LIKE your Facebook Fan Page. In fact, this can be an important traffic builder for your Facebook Fan Page!

Google AdWords vs Facebook Ads

Another online marketing benefit offered by Facebook is the option to use their Pay Per Click advertising. In the Facebook universe these are known as Facebook Ads – which seems obvious, but online, things are not always obvious!

Last night, I was on a call with one of my consulting clients and she mentioned that she had just gotten a $100 voucher for Google AdWords. She wanted to know if this would be worthwhile. I said that I thought that using Facebook, creating a Facebook Fan Page for her business, and spending her limited budget on Facebook ads would be a better use of her resources, even considering her $100 AdWords voucher.

I explained it to her this way:

Google AdWords and Facebooks Ads are Pay Per Click… each ad is shown (this is called an impression) and you pay when someone actually click on the ad.

While the mechanism for figuring ad payments is the same (PPC or Pay Per Click) the basis for showing an ad differs drastically between Google AdWords and Facebook.

On the surface, the ads themselves are similar. While they may or may not have a picture included, the text or content of the ad is short and presented in plain and simple text. Ads are displayed off the side in vertical stacks or within the body of the page’s content. For the most part, these ads are subtle and unobtrusive.

However, the Ad Display Criteria is where the biggest differences lie.

In Google, AdWords are shown on the pages generated with Search Results as well as on website pages related to the Ad’s specified search term. This means that Google AdWords are displayed using a mechanism of which terms are being used in online searches. As AdWords have developed, in some instances they are also displayed according to the geographical location of the person doing the Search.

Facebook actually takes an entirely different approach – Facebook Ads are displayed in front of PEOPLE who meet the demographic requirements that you have chosen.

To simplify further, Google AdWords are displayed based on the content of the page where they are shown and Facebook Ads are shown based on the interests, and even the physical location, of the person doing the looking!

As you can see, there is a radical difference between Google AdWords and Facebook Ads.

This is one of the reasons that I feel that Facebook Ads may be far more beneficial for offline businesses.

It is also important to note that when creating a Facebook Ad, you have the choice of sending people who click either to an offsite web page or to a specific Facebook Fan Page.

All in all, I consider Facebook a strong option for offline businesses, since you have the ability to target both demographically and geographically. The potentially viral effect that is inherent in the Facebook culture is another good reason for adding Facebook in to your online advertising mix.

WordPress works well for integrating Social Media options

Finally, if you are using WordPress to build your website to blog, it is relatively easy to integrate WordPress Posts, Facebook Fan Page Posts, Twitter Tweets, and possibly even, your Autoresponder Service messages, so that each one appears on the others… AUTOMATICALLY!

Between the timesaving automation available and the three for one currently available combining WordPress, Facebook, and Twitter, spreading your company’s message across the internet has gotten MUCH easier!

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