According to a recent Marketplace.com article, the new industry buzz term is hyper-local marketing. In a nutshell, it’s search marketing with a local focus. And for those familiar with our marketing agency, we’ve been leading the industry in local search since 1967.

During today’s economic downturn, consumer spending is declining, making shoppers more difficult to reach. And as consumers limit their spending, companies in every industry category are affected. It’s no surprise that businesses have resorted to laying off employees, slashing budgets, carefully monitoring expenses and searching for cost-effective marketing methods. An increasing number of companies are beginning to realize that national ad buys are not only very costly but also vague and devoid of a market-specific focus, reaping a rather weak return on investment. Plus, some national brands are finding it tough to compete for customers in saturated markets.

With a bleak economic outlook, companies need a marketing plan that will produce a greater ROI on a limited budget. The answer? Marketers are cutting national ads and going local to target consumers where they live and shop. Some have called local marketing, or hyper-local marketing, a small-scale approach; however, it’s a solution that can connect companies with consumers more effectively.

According to Marketplace.com, “So-called hyper-local marketing tries to connect with consumers where they shop and get them to help spread the message for companies.” While it’s true that consumers search globally for their favorite brands, they tend to shop locally. In fact, our research suggests that approximately 85 percent of local business transactions occur within 15 miles of the consumer home or place of work. So if a company has no local marketing plan, its target consumers will not necessarily know where to access the brand locally. This is a missed opportunity to grow business, and companies are finally beginning to take notice with some urgency.

By going local, companies can tailor their marketing message more specifically to target consumers and niche markets, drawing attention to local brand outlets for increased sales. For example, national advertisers can target sports enthusiasts through far-reaching ad platforms such as Sports Illustrated to broadcast the limited release of a new Nike shoe; however, readers are local and may not know where to access the shoe, if it’s even offered near them.

Companies are hopeful that the strategy of engaging consumers locally will snowball into other marketing opportunities. “…By letting consumers get to know sales associates at their local…store[s], they’ll be more interested in getting to know the brand and its products.” Now more than ever, national brands need to assess their marketing campaigns on a city-by-city basis by reaching out to consumers on a personal level. If companies more relevantly speak to consumers by penetrating the local marketplace, then shoppers will be more apt to spread the word and create a buzz about brands (and local brand outlets, sales, deals, store openings or limited product releases).

With the growing features of the Internet, local consumers can more conveniently interact and share the word with other potential customers, thereby increasing brand awareness on the local level. And as social marketing continues to flourish, companies can even help create and monitor this social buzz, as well as stay connected with consumers through organic and influential platforms such as online communities, blogs, discussion forums and more. This social buzz acts as digital word-of-mouth advertising.

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