Being the mastermind behind all things technical at A-LINE Interactive, I have a good habit of regularly checking our search rankings online. Might as well practice what we preach and tend to our own search engine optimization (SEO), making certain customers in the Upstate (and around the world) can find us when they need us.
A few weeks ago, I realized that while our traffic was consistently looking great from Google, referrals from Bing had virtually come to a halt. And while I know that Google is the king of search engine traffic and the provider of choice for almost 70% of all online searches, Bing now comes in a strong second with 18% of all searches. Lose that traffic, and we're basically saying goodbye to nearly two out of ten potential clients looking for a Spartanburg web design firm.
I didn't like the sound of that. So I rang Charles to see what the little brother had done this time.
Turns out, almost a year ago A-LINE was in the midst of a move from Greenville to Spartanburg and Charles claims he "just dropped the ball" on setting up a local profile for the firm. Translation: he just forgot about it. Fast forward to a year later, the results were in and they weren't pretty: Bing suddenly didn't list A-LINE on the first page of results for searches on some of our most relevant services.
Charles scrambled and set up the Local Profile in just a matter of minutes. It didn't take him long to get the error corrected, but being indexed in any search engine takes time. We expect this change will start affecting us in a few months. We will be consistently capturing traffic from Bing again, and all will be well in the land of Refshauge brother harmony.
Moral of the story? Don't forget about all the opportunities to increase your local SEO. And never concentrate on just one product to the exclusion of others. Because 18% of potential customers is a number too high to miss.
Ready to claim your Bing Profile? Download our step-by-step guide here. And if you need help, give Charles a shout. He promises us all it's quite painless.
P.S. Charles, you owe us all a beer.
