Optimize Your Jewelry Website
for Local Search

© by Rena Klingenberg; all rights reserved

What is "local search"?

People are using the Web more and more to find products and services in their local area.

Even when they're planning to actually shop and purchase offline, they "pre-shop" online first. That way they can

• find out which local businesses carry what they're looking for
  
• compare prices
  
• read product or store reviews
  
• find sales, discounts, or online coupons they can use to save money when they arrive at the store.

Optimizing your jewelry business so it can be easily found online by these local customers can be a very profitable move. I've put together a list of quick and easy ways you can do it yourself:

Optimizing for local search is especially important for jewelry artists who serve local clientele by doing home parties, trunk shows, art / craft shows, custom orders, jewelry workshops, etc.

Also, many customers are starting to use local search to make their shopping easier before heading out on the busiest shopping days of the year - including Black Friday (the day after Thanksgiving) and the day after Christmas.

The days leading up to these big shopping days are also heavy local search times online, as people plan their big shopping trips. On these occasions people's searches often include phrases such as "sale", "clearance", "discount", "deals", "coupons" "online coupon", etc., in addition to product and local-area keywords.

Other technologies are incorporating local search capabilities now too. Google is currently testing its new Google Voice Local Search to make local searches possible via phone. This free service is intended to let users search for a local business by voice, and then choose to either be connected directly to the business' phone number, or receive a text message with more info - including a link to a map of the business they've selected.

The bottom line is this:

If your jewelry business targets customers in your local area, you stand to benefit increasingly by optimizing your jewelry website for local searches. Remember this is a very fast-growing trend, so the sooner you start, the more you'll benefit from it.

However, for jewelry artists who focus on making most of their jewelry sales via their online storefronts and ship orders to customers anywhere, optimizing for local search may not be worthwhile.

Note: If you live in a metropolitan area that consists of cities that have grown together, try using these techniques for several of the cities in your metro area.

Focus on optimizing for local search and / or being listed in these places online, where most local searches take place:

• General search engines (Google, MSN, Ask, Yahoo)
  
• Local search engines (GoogleMaps, MSN LiveLocal, Yahoo Local)
  
• Online yellow page listings (YellowPages, SwitchBoard, SuperPages)
  
• Local business directories and content websites with local information.

• Your Website's Footer

  In a footer at the bottom of each page of your website or blog, put

  • your business name
    
  • a keyword or two related to your business
    
  • your city and state (or if you're not in the U.S., your city and province or country).

  Important: This footer should be actual text, not a graphic, so it can be read by the search engine spiders. For example:

  Jane's Jewels – jewelry and gifts – Cityville, Texas

  Now when people search for things like . . .

  jewelry Cityville, Texas
  gifts in Cityville
  cityville texas jewelry

  . . . they should find the Jane's Jewels website in the search engine results.

• Include Nearby Cities

  If you live in a metropolitan area that's made up of several cities that have merged together, consider including the names of each of these cities in your website / blog footer - such as "Jane's Jewels has the hottest new jewelry styles for the Phoenix area, including Chandler, Tempe, Scottsdale, [... etc.] Arizona."

• Include Your City's Nickname

  If your area has a popular nickname (such as "Twin Cities" for Minneapolis/St. Paul), include it in your footer too.

• Include Addresses of Your Shows and Shops

  Include pages on your website where you list the names and physical addresses of all the local art and craft shows you do, plus all the shops or galleries that carry your work.

  Consider including photos of your booth next to some of your show listings on your website, along with a paragraph or so of text discussing each of them. All of these natural mentions of your city and local area will increase search engines' association of your locality with your business.

• Choose the Best Keywords for You

  Consider carefully which keywords best represent your jewelry business, which people also use when they do online searches. (Your website or blog's traffic statistics should be a big help in showing you the keywords that bring visitors to your site.)

  For example, depending on your jewelry business, you might use keywords like "jewelry parties", "jewelry shows", "wedding jewelry", "mother's bracelets", "silver jewelry", "jewelry making classes", "men's jewelry", etc.

• Keep it Real

  Remember, your goal is to include these keywords and place names naturally - without "keyword stuffing" your pages, which can get your site banned from the search engines.

• Include Your Zip Code

  Many local searchers use zip codes in their search keyphrases. So you may want to consider putting your own zipcode (or the main zipcode for your city) on your website.

  I highly recommend that you do not post your home or jewelry studio's physical address on your website. But you can definitely include a full P.O. Box address (if you have one), with zip code, which would help optimize your site for people who search for products and services by zip code.

• Include State Abbreviations

  Consider also including abbreviations for your state (such as "MT" and "Mont" for Montana). Find a natural way to include these somewhere on your site.

• Include Alternate Words

  Make sure your website, blog, and product descriptions include synonyms and related keywords for your products and services.

  Customers don't always use the same jargon we do for jewelry (many of my customers call my pendants "necklaces", and refer to goldfill as "gold"). So along with the words in the "local search" footer you created, having synonyms naturally occurring throughout your pages will help you cast a wider net to catch local searchers.

Increasingly, people are relying on other peoples' ratings and opinions to help them decide where to shop and what to buy. (For example, have you ever used the user ratings and comments on Amazon.com to help you decide whether a particular book or CD was worth buying?)

Many online business directories and local search engines also have "rate and review" features, where customers can rank their experience with a particular business and leave comments. Some of these sites cater mainly to big cities (but are growing fast, adding businesses in more cities constantly), but most of them include businesses everywhere

Here are some of the main ones:

CitySearch

GoogleMaps

MerchantCircle

MSN Live

ShopLocal

SuperPages

SwitchBoard

Yahoo Local

YellowPages

Yelp

Your jewelry business may already be listed in some (or all) of these places, especially the online yellow page sites and the local search engines. They get their information from many different sources - so even having your phone number with area code just once somewhere on your website may get you listed.

Check each of them to see whether your business is already listed there - and if so, whether the listing is accurate. If it's inaccurate or if you'd like to change something, these sites typically have a way for you to register and edit your listing. If you can't find a way to edit it yourself, then use the site's contact form and ask the webmaster to make the change for you.

So how can you get reviewed on these sites?

Why not email some of your best customers (or friends who wear and love your jewelry), and ask them to put in a quick review and rating of your jewelry business on a few of these listing sites? Include a couple of links directly to the recommendation page of these sites (or directly to your listings if you're already on there), so your customers can quickly and easily enter a rating and review for you.

You can also ask all of your customers to rate and comment on your jewelry business, by including a link with your request in your next email newsletter that goes out to your customers. Not everyone will actually go and leave feedback on your business, but having even a couple of positive reviews is better for your business than having no feedback at all.

These directories are especially active before major gift-giving occasions, when local searches often include words such as "review" or "reviews", as people try to prevent gift-giving mistakes by finding items other people have had good experiences with and rated favorably.

The more (and better) your ratings, the more traffic and potential customers will click through to your website.

If your city has any local online business directories, get listed in as many of them as you can. Some are free, while others charge a fee to list your business.

• Experiment with a Paid Listing

  Consider trying one or two of the larger paid local directories for six months to one year (whatever their minimum term is), and track the traffic you get from them. Gaining just one good client from this listing can pay for your inclusion fee many times over.

• Request a Volume Discount

  If you list your jewelry business in more than one category in a paid directory, ask whether you can have a discount on the second listing.

• List in Your Surrounding Cities

  If you live in a metropolitan area that's made up of several cities that have merged together, consider getting listed in local directories targeting each of these cities. If a major percentage of your jewelry customers are from one of the cities in particular, you may want to be sure to have a listing that targets that city.

• Get in the Chamber of Commerce Directory

  If you're a member of your area's Chamber of Commerce, see whether they have a local printed or online business directory where you can be listed. Many of them have both formats. (There are also lots more reasons why you should join your Chamber of Commerce - it's a very smart way to grow your jewelry business fast!)

• Try Your Online Newspaper's Directory

  Most local newspapers have an online version, and many of these online newspapers include a local business directory. Find out how you can be listed in your local online newspaper's directory. (If you live in a metro area of several cities, each city probably has its own online newspaper. See about getting listed in as many of them as possible.)

It's also extremely helpful to have links coming into your site from the websites of other local businesses.

These incoming links are likely to help your website perform better in local search results, as well as being a tremendous help in bringing you interested local customers who found you by following your link on the website of another local business.

• Trade Links

  A link coming to your site from another business your visitor knows and trusts is almost as good as a personal recommendation from a friend! And in return, you should consider having a helpful “local businesses” links page on your site.

• Ask Local Business Owners You Know

  If you have any friends (or friends of friends) who own local businesses with websites, ask if they'd like to do a link exchange with your website.

• Find Influential Local Sites

  Do a Google search for your city's name. Visit every site on at least the first five pages of your search results, and see whether they contain a listing of local businesses or local links. If so, contact the webmaster and ask how you can be included in the listing. If they publish articles of local interest, offer to send them some photos and an article about your jewelry business.

• Get Links from Local Show Organizers

  Check whether any of the local art/craft shows you participate in have websites, especially if they're well-established shows. Often the organization that's responsible for the show will at least have one page somewhere on the Web about the event. Hunt down these pages and ask the webmaster whether they'll link to your site, or trade links with you.

If you haven't yet named your jewelry business, here are two things, which you may or may not want to do, that can help your website get more local search traffic. (However, if your jewelry business is already named, I don't recommend changing the name just to incorporate these tips!)

• Include a Relevant Keyword in Your Name

  You may want to consider including an important keyword in the name (such as "jewelry", "jeweler", "silversmith", or whatever best expresses your particular business). This not only helps your site appear for searches including that keyword, it also helps people searching local directories understand immediately what kind of business you have.

  Compare a business name like "Mary Jones" to "Mary Jones Jewelry"; or "Garcia Enterprises" to "Garcia Silversmith". If you're searching for a local jewelry business, the more descriptive title will always catch your eye first.

• Start with the Letter "A"

  You may want to consider having the first word in your business name begin with the letter A. That's because directory listings nearly always list businesses alphabetically, which means that the earlier in the alphabet your business name starts, the more people will see it in directory listings.

  I wouldn't recommend getting too carried away with this technique (like the way businesses in the printed telephone books go overboard with ridiculous names like AAAAAAA Taxi)!

  However, "A" names like "A Jewelry Tree" or "Adornment GlassWear" will definitely receive more exposure in alphabetized directories and other online lists. (Many linklists on content websites put sites in alphabetical order so as not to appear to give anyone preferential treatment.)

Applying even a few of these techniques should help your website or blog do quite well in local searches. As always, track the results you get from the new things you experiment with on your website, and see what works the best for you.

Good luck!

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