E-commerce and social media have broadened the reach of businesses to an extent never thought possible. Today, every retailer from major national brands to single-location mom-and-pops can easily and inexpensively place themselves in front of the eyes of customers around the globe.
Connecting with customers wherever they live, work, and shop has never been easier. But despite this unprecedented era of worldwide reach, these days we’re seeing franchises and brands of all sizes significantly boosting their investment in targeted, hyperlocal marketing. There are numerous advantages to adopting this strategy, from improving brand awareness to increasing foot traffic. Hyperlocal marketing is also the best way for brands and franchises to get the most out of their ad spend, ensuring they’re reaching the audiences who are most likely to become customers.
The rise of hyperlocal marketing is no mere trend, it represents a permanent shift in the retail landscape. This means retailers who wish to remain competitive in the years to come must develop new strategies to attract and retain customers in specific geo targeted locations. Here are 5 tips for using localized content to help grow your franchise or brand.
- Leverage Your Local Knowledge
Audiences respond to what’s familiar. When creating hyperlocal content, it’s important to incorporate references and imagery that authentically capture the local flavor of your targeted geographic regions. This can include anything from names of a town, city, county, or neighborhood to recognizable local images. By thinking and acting like a local, you’ll imbue your brand with a greater sense of community, and build more emotionally resonant connections with your audience. When leveraging localized ads built by LiveRetail audience interaction rates are 3 to 5 times higher than non-local content.
- Hit Your (Local) Target
Purchasing ad space online is invariably a bidding war with other brands clamoring for the same digital real estate. By narrowing your focus to as specific an audience as possible, you’ll face less competition and can usually get what you want at a much lower price. Precision-targeted hyperlocal campaigns can reduce a company’s ad costs by more than 30%.
- Use Social Media to Your Advantage
Targeted social media advertising can be an immensely powerful tool for reaching local audiences. It’s an effective, low-cost method of driving brand awareness and engaging with your audience in a meaningful way. It’s also an opportunity to experiment with different ad formats like video or carousel ads to determine which resonate most strongly with your target audience.
- Stay on Message and Be Authentic
Hyperlocal marketing is an effective way of connecting with audiences, but it’s essential to do it in a way that stays true to your brand’s identity and core values. The same brand attributes that attract customers on a global scale can (and should) be custom-tailored to appeal to local audiences. But audiences can spot inauthentic attempts to seem relatable from a mile away, so you’ll want to do your research before modifying your message for specific locations.
- Data Is Your Friend
You can more effectively iterate and improve on hyperlocal marketing strategies when you track your progress. Different regional audiences may respond better to certain marketing channels or ad formats than others. So you’ll want to maintain an accurate sense of what’s working and what isn’t, and adjust your strategy accordingly.
Conclusion
Making authentic connections with customers at the local level has never been more important. Fortunately, it’s also never been easier. By leveraging the tools at your disposal, and following the above tips, your business can make a meaningful mark in whatever geographic locations your marketing efforts target.
About LiveRetail
LiveRetail is a software platform that enables multi location brands to create digital assets at scale that are on brand and personalized for each location. Get more out of your local marketing reach and budget with ready-to-run ads for brands, franchises and MDF. For more info visit https://liveretail.com
