[December 15, 2014]

Multi-Location Brands Struggle with Implementing Local Search According to New Independent Research

SIM Partners (www.simpartners.com), a provider of local marketing automation technology, Velocity, today announced the results of a Forrester (News - Alert) Consulting study it commissioned to better understand how firms are leveraging local marketing strategies to enable more contextual brand experiences for their customers.

For the November 2014 study, titled, "Uncovering the Benefits of Local Search Marketing," Forrester Consulting surveyed a select group of senior marketers of multi-location brands to assess their approach to local search marketing and their perception of it. The study shows that while marketers believe local search strategies are a critical component of staying connected with customers - especially as it pertains to the future of multi-location businesses - in practice, their efforts are very limited when it comes to implementing these beneficial strategies.

"It was highly interesting to see this paradox where marketers know that local search can have a meaningful impact on their brand, and yet they are consistently not taking advantage of it in any meaningful way," said Jon Schepke, CEO, SIM Partners. "By and large, marketers have adopted a 'wait-and-see' approach to implementing local search, which means they are letting all the inherent benefits of the strategy pass them by."

A significant roadblock for marketers is that they do not feel there is a clear definition for local search. The study also points to three other major limitations that arekeeping these marketing professionals from fully embracing local search: lack of experience with local search; a need for more robust education on local search; and inadequate access to local search tools.

The study also discovered that those marketers who have implemented local search strategies reported measurable benefits such as improved brand awareness and quality of leads, as well as lift over traditional search programs.

"Local search is the next digital battleground for brands, but approaching it is foreign to many marketers, so it's understandable that they might be a little tentative about incorporating it into their strategies," said Schepke. "Based on our research and experience with customers, brands that have created and implemented a local search strategy are reaping big benefits by owning the market as well as increasing the quality of leads."

Based on these findings, SIM Partners has developed a number of recommendations for marketers, including:

• Developing thoughtful local search strategies integrated with broader marketing and branding strategies
• Understanding how to approach local search by using the Local Opportunity Matrix included in the Forrester study
• Identifying an approach for adopting local search
• Assessing the role of a local marketing automation tool set

Schepke will host a webinar on Tuesday, January 27, 2015, featuring Shar VanBoskirk, VP Principal Analyst, Forrester Research (News - Alert), Inc., on how multi-location enterprise brands can take advantage of the local search opportunity. To download "Uncovering the Benefits of Local Search" in its entirety, as well as register for the webinar, visit: www.simpartners.com/uncovering-benefits-local-search-marketing.

About SIM Partners

SIM Partners' Velocity technology empowers enterprise brands to maximize digital marketing results at a local level by optimizing location-specific content and business information to dominate local, mobile and social search results for hundreds or thousands of local entities. SIM provides a full suite of digital marketing technology, anchored by its SaaS (News - Alert) based local marketing solutions: Velocity and Velocity Social. A social CRM tool and extension of the Velocity platform, Velocity Social enables large brands to effectively manage social communities for multiple locations on Facebook, Twitter (News - Alert) and LinkedIn and empowers locations to build their businesses with social media while ensuring each post complies with brand standards. SIM Partners has offices in Chicago and San Francisco and authorized resellers in Australia and Germany. For more information, visit www.simpartners.com.

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