The Importance of Having a Local SEO Company: 3 Ways It Benefits You | X3 Marketing Group

The Importance of Having a Local SEO Company: 3 Ways It Benefits You

by with No Comment Digital AdvertisingLocal SEOSEOSmall Business SEO
The Importance of Having a Local SEO Company: 3 Ways It Benefits You | X3 Marketing Group

The Importance of Having a Local SEO Company: 3 Ways It Benefits You

When it comes to good SEO, data rules the day and defines strategy as well as the measurement of ROI. However, a local SEO company that knows a particular market is invaluable. Today we’re going to take a quick look at the importance of a local SEO company and how working with one – like X3 Marketing Group – can affect your bottom line

Local SEO Company

How does it benefit you? It works in different ways for every business. You get the ability to know your local competition. You get to understand what your own strategy looks like when compared to the competition. You get to know where to direct your message in order to garner the most attention.

Also, the local SEO company has access to a wider range of data that will show you where you stand in terms of keyword competition, competitive keywords, and much more. This is invaluable in terms of understanding what you’re getting for your money. A local SEO company in Northglenn, Colorado for instance knows that their city is completely surrounded by the cities of Westminster and Thornton. With the population density in these cities, someone like X3 will understand that simply marketing to one city will miss out on a huge audience of potential customers.

The Importance of Having a Local SEO Company: 3 Ways It Benefits You | X3 Marketing Group
A local SEO agency will understand the local community better. They are aware of what the website ranking is and how they can improve their rankings.
The Importance of Having a Local SEO Company: 3 Ways It Benefits You | X3 Marketing Group

Marketing with Data

A local SEO company has analyzed the typical customer profiles and made predictions based on these metrics. These predictions are based on the assumptions that a company will spend a certain amount of money to improve the position of their site in Google search. By employing an effective local SEO strategy, the company will get the following benefits:

Improved ranking in local search
More visibility in local business directories
Increased reviews from local customers to drive trust
If the local SEO company works with their clients to drive strong social signals, the company will have their customers ranked better (higher) in search results and social mentions.

The importance of local SEO for your business

While many small businesses take on the responsibility of doing their own SEO, data and measurement aren’t their forte and they have no idea what type of numbers to look for. A local SEO company can provide a myriad of data to both inform and implement your SEO strategy within the best SEO packages. It’s not just your website that needs a little boosting, but all of your digital efforts. The Importance of Having a Local SEO Company: 3 Ways It Benefits You | X3 Marketing Group Even if you’ve done your research and picked the perfect keywords for your website, the traffic you receive on a monthly basis isn’t always good. For instance, we were once looking to work with a client in Loveland, Colorado called Affordable Plumbing. On average, their website got about 500 visitors which is a good amount of traffic for a local plumbing SEO effort. However, when we dug deeper, what we found was that because of their name, much of their traffic was coming from across the country. In addition to that, the searchers which were coming to their website were simply bargain shopping and seldom actually turning into a customer. Without a local SEO company, you won’t have the local insights to help you understand the exact reason why your website is not doing well in the search engines.
near-me-search-rarely-work-for-seo-marketing-x3-bw

Why “Near Me” Searches Rarely Work For SEO

by with No Comment Google My BusinessLocal SEOSEOSmall Business SEO

Sure, your business needs to show up for your neighbors, but is that the best way to show up in a Google search?

So many business owners we talk to have this overwhelming urge to seek out SEO ranking for “near me” searches. For instance, an HVAC repair company may want to show up in the top ten Google results for something like “air conditioning repair near me”. But how effective are “near me” searches?

What is a “near me” search?

A “near me” search is when someone is looking for a specific product or service they know you offer. A shopper goes to a local retailer or service, runs into the owner, and says, “I’m in the market for a new air conditioning unit. What’s out there?” The store owner searches Google for the same term and shows up at the top of the results. How do you show up as a top search result? Since you won’t get the first “near me” results, you need to consider what others are ranking for this term. It’s probably not the exact same brand name. Make sure your website or sales copy is not competitive and should not try to trick a searcher into searching this term on your behalf.

The fact of the matter is though that while “near me” searches have surged in popularity over the last five years or so, since 2020, people searching for things have gotten much more specific in their queries. In other words, someone looking for a place to hike in Golden, Colorado may not simply search for “hiking near me” but rather something like, “places to hike with teenagers in Golden, CO”.

Why should I care about “near me” searches?

One of the leading reasons that businesses still want to show up for these “near me” searches is because Google loves businesses with physical locations because the overwhelming majority of people searching for a product or service they can’t order online, want to find that product or service. within five miles of their home. This means that business is IN their community and as such, there is a certain amount of trust that is more easily gained by someone close by.

Near me SEO. The basics

Search volume – A local business needs to have a large enough volume of searches to rank for the local keywords. This means that the business needs to rank for enough other terms to make up for the keywords that don’t show up in the results.

Search quality – This means the phrase or words being searched for the need to be ‘good’ or ‘great’ for a local search. This means the phrase or words being searched for the need to be ‘good’ or ‘great’ for a local search.

What is the impact of “near me” searches on my business?

“Near me” searches aren’t as effective as you may think. I’ve previously written about the “narrow view” SEO, and why this is a good strategy for some things. But “near me” searches are typically limited to Google, which means they can’t filter out a lot of other search results (not to mention user-generated content). As a result, it’s hard to expect you’ll get a lot of traffic from “near me” searches, no matter how high you rank. But it’s worth understanding what they are in case you want to help your business. Because, while “near me” searches certainly are far from worthless, keywords more specific to your business or products are going to be far more effective.

What do small business SEO packages include? X3 Marketing Group

What Do Small Business SEO Packages Include?

by with No Comment Digital MarketingLocal SEOSmall Business SEO

How to find the best digital marketing and small business SEO packages

What should small business SEO packages include? || X3 Marketing Group

Let’s be honest here: how many of you business owners or decision makers reading this have looked at digital marketing and SEO strategies with this look on your face? I’m betting right around ALL of you.

In 2021, and online marketing strategy is an absolutely must-have piece of making  sure that your business is thriving by driving emails, phone calls and other engagement that begins with search engines and social media platforms. But where do you begin?

Does my small business NEED SEO? || X3 Marketing Group

First, if you’ve gotten this far you probably already have a website. You probably also know that simply having a website with no monthly traffic being driven to it is something like having a billboard in the middle of the desert. We get into that a bit more in our article, “Do I need a business website in 2021?“.

Now that you’ve gotten your shiny new website and you want some traffic coming to it to build your business, you’ve probably looked at which direction you want to go with your digital marketing. You can go the digital advertising direction and pay for each click – which is very effective (and which we also do for our clients). Today though, we’re going to really focus on the key elements of small business SEO packages and what you should expect to spend for your monthly budget.

SMALL BUSINESS SEO PACKAGES INCLUDE:

  • Keyword Mapping and Research
  • Business-Specific SEO Strategy
  • Website Optimization
  • Backlinks Strategy
  • Regular, Detailed Reporting
  • Customer Service

Keyword Mapping and Research

You probably have a decent idea of what a keyword is and what relevant keywords you’d like your business website to be found for by prospective clients using search engines. However, there are a couple of things we should point out here:

1. YOU are not your potential client. As a business owner, you are an expert and as such, your knowledge and understanding of what YOU would type into a search engine versus what a prospective customer would search for could possibly be VERY different.

For instance, if you’re a roofer in Colorado you surely know about all kinds of roofing technologies like Class 4 shingles, EPDM and fluid-applied coatings. However, if you’re simply someone who needs to have their roof replaced because of a hail storm, you’re simply going to search for something akin to “best roof replacement near me”. We take these things into account to make sure that the keyword rankings we’re aiming for are backed by specific needs of customers.

2. Competitive keywords deserve constant attention and ongoing work. In 2020, Google’s Algorithm had 12 major updates and HUNDREDS of smaller updates that took place daily. As such, your SEO company should be actively working on strategy with you and other SEO clients to actively pursue the best strategy.

Obviously, national SEO packages aren’t necessary for most local businesses but it is important to look at the geography of your business and how it affects how to generate keyword lists that are most effective for your business.

Regardless of the size of our client’s businesses, we do all the in-depth research necessary to make sure that the keyword strategy we deploy will bring search ranking, and website traffic on an ongoing basis.

Business-Specific SEO Strategy

The other day a potential client of ours shared with us their monthly reports from their current business SEO agency. To be completely transparent while SEO content was part of the report, much of it focused on digital advertising (pay-per-click, PPC, Google Ads, etc.). What was astounding to us was that they had clearly not taken the time to considered the actual business to generate keyword list ideas or strategy. They’d simply set the Google Keyword Planner tool to “broad match” (which pulls in keywords that are even distantly linked to a category and often results in things that have no real association with business clients).

At X3 Marketing Group, it’s our job to consider things like business goals, budgets, geography, ideal customer profiles and an almost infinite list of other aspects which business partners hold as vital aspects of their specific business. Business SEO solutions are not a cookie-cutter solution and each client should have their digital marketing agency as their partner rather than simply a mercenary.

Website Optimization

There are a ton of free website builders out there but the old adage of, “You get what you pay for.” certainly holds true for most of them. Having a website is fine because it gives a business some presence online but for the most effective SEO marketing, any good digital marketing agency worth their salt will advise you to make sure the nuts & bolts of your website are just as well thought out as your content writing and content optimization.

Right out of the gate, your SEO company should make sure that your site speed is addressed. Google themselves have explicitly stated that page speed affects rank not only in organic traffic as a result of search engine optimization but also in paid search and Google Ads. Anything over about 1.68 seconds of page loading speed is unlikely to ever find itself on first page search results (outside of business name searches).

Looking back at the keyword mapping section above, something else important to consider is how the actual structure of your website is handled. Think about it like this:

If you walk into the grocery store and everything you need is there as always, but it’s in a giant pile on the floor. Imagine how long it would take you to wade through the mess to find anything specific!

Now imagine the same grocery store but it’s as normal. Well-organized aisles which are clearly labeled. Now, you’ll still have to wait for that guy standing in the middle of the aisle choosing one of the 56 varieties of peanut butter available but at least you’ll be able to find everything.

If your website isn’t well organized, a visitor looking for quality content won’t be able to find it. They’ll “bounce” quickly and this will affect your Google rankings because they’re paying attention to how long people stay on your site and pages. This is also known as the “bounce rate”.

There are many other aspects of website optimization for good SEO and we’re constantly working to make sure that our client’s results reflect every advantage we can give them.

Backlinks Strategy

What the heck is a backlink? Simply put, a backlink is a link from one website to another. In this way, site A linking out to site B is putting their virtual trust or credit in site B. For instance, we trust Google’s mobile speed tool so we, at X3 Marketing Group are going to give a link to it HERE. With that, we’ve indicated a certain amount of trust.

What do small business SEO packages include? X3 Marketing Group

Now that you understand what a backlink is, it’s important to know that now all backlinks “weigh” the same. High-quality, relevant backlinks can be considered in several different ways.

First, do Google and other search engines have general trust in the outbound site? Building that sort of trust take a lot of time and expert content creation, inbound backlinks of their own and many other factors that drive organic search traffic.

Second, is the outbound-linking website important to a specific industry? For instance, one of our clients is CCG Roofing (🤏🏻 Notice the backlink to CCG!) based here in Northern Colorado. Being that they’re in the extremely competitive roofing industry, if the Colorado Roofing Association themselves links to CCG, that is a much more important than a link from Brandon’s Cat Blog (which doesn’t exist because I’m allergic to cats) whose roof CCG just replaced.

Building authoritative backlinks is one of, if not THE most difficult and time-consuming parts of a good SEO campaign. Part of it also involves citation campaigns which aren’t as specific as, “Hey, go check out Brandon’s Cat Blog! [LINK]”. Rather, they’re simply citing a business – mostly with a link –  with included NAP (Name, Address, Phone) information. This is important, especially when done through authority sites. Think of it as them giving your business a tiny bit of their good juju with each link which, in turn, builds your own good juju.

Regular, Detailed Reporting

Even the most solid SEO strategy in the world does not bring world-changing traffic to your website overnight. For the first 1-3 months a good digital marketing company like X3 Marketing Group will be handling much of the aspects we’ve covered above as foundational pieces of great business SEO plans. After the first month, you may see some initial results showing in reporting although those first 2-4 months of results are more often than not the result of page indexing.

At X3 Marketing Group, trust, results and clarity are the cornerstone of what we do. As such, being able to provide our clients not simply with some 8-page report which you’re left to interpret on your own. While we do provide weekly and monthly reports as well as longer-term quarterly reports, the X3 Marketing dashboard gives our clients the ability to see unfiltered data so they can see exactly where their money is going.

Digital marketing strategy can be a very intimidating world and we believe it’s part of our job to pull back the curtain on all that jargon and mystery. In the SEO world, organic search traffic is what we’re looking for and since other people in your industry are working to beat you in organic search results, we also work hard to monitor competitors to give our clients great results.

Customer Service

One of the most important things we see from clients looking for great business SEO services is next-level customer service. At X3 Marketing Group, we have an in-stone meeting with our clients every 6 weeks at the very least. Understanding that SEO costs can be a significant piece of budget for those people means that it is our job to be able to show them how their online marketing campaign is working for them.

At X3, making sure that popular search engines find your business above your competition is paramount. Every single keyword matters to being found in organic search but also on business listing and increasingly important platforms like Google Maps. Our team works hand-in-hand with yours to help you dominate your competition online.

FAQ's for great HVAC marketing

A Few FAQ’s For Great HVAC Marketing

by with No Comment Digital AdvertisingDigital MarketingGoogle My BusinessLocal SEOSEOSmall Business SEO

Finding great HVAC marketing is a job in itself. Curious about what digital marketing for HVAC businesses looks like or where to start? We’re here to help you in…

What are the best HVAC lead generation marketing ideas?

  1. Use Local Search Engine HVAC Marketing. This is often referred to as HVAC SEO – or just simply Search Engine Optimization. A good SEO strategy will show your business in organic search results on platforms like Google above your competitors. SEO is a cornerstone of any good internet marketing campaign.
  2. Run Google Ads For HVAC Advertising. Today, many traditional advertising ideas and techniques have been replaced by laser-focused digital advertising campaigns. HVAC service companies can hone their marketing efforts to reach very specific potential customers. For instance, someone who has Carrier Air Conditioners cooling their home wants to find and HVAC business who specifically works on Carrier products rather than any old air conditioning repair company. a good HVAC PPC (pay-per-click) campaign can focus only on potential customers searching for that.
  3. Use HVAC Google Local Service Ads. This part of your digital marketing strategy is meant to truly focus on people looking for and HVAC business’ online presence that shows them as being nearby.
  4. Gather Lots Of Customer Reviews For Trust & HVAC Marketing. If you’re an HVAC business owner, by now you’re very likely familiar with Google My Business and many other online reviews. This is a crucial part of a good digital marketing plan and will show people who their neighbors trust.
  5. Publish Great HVAC Blog Content. Frequently referred to as content marketing, this is a piece of a marketing plan which can take a lot of time and energy. A good marketing partner like X3 will help with the burden of generating good, SEO-rich content to help build SEO.
  6. Use YouTube To Build Your Brand & Trust. A platform like YouTube can be used in both organic SEO campaigns as well as advertising campaigns and even in a good email marketing strategy. These videos can pick up where things like Google My Business leaves off and help establish familiarity and trust.
  7. Use Email Marketing To Build Recurring HVAC Jobs. An email marketing plan is a good way to stay in touch with existing clients and to potentially drive more business from those who already know you. This can help save on some of your marketing budget and drive Google reviews as well as connecting those same customers to your social media marketing for even more customer service.

If you are only using billboards, Yellow Pages or phone book to generate leads, you’re missing out! Click HERE to read more about our work with HVAC companies in Colorado’s Front Range and beyond.

X3: What is Small Business SEO and Why is it Important for Your Business?

What are Local Service Ads?

Google Local Service ads are another HVAC marketing idea offered by Google to help HVAC contractors reach their customers.

What are Google Search Ads?

Like traditional HVAC ads, Google Search ads appear whenever a customer types in a specific search query. The advertising which X3 and good marketing teams use are mostly pay-per-click ads which means that you – the HVAC business owner – only pay when someone clicks on an ad. VISIT GOOGLE ADS

What Can You Do With These Ads?

If you power through the tedious steps to activate your Google Ads account, you will see that these ads can help you drive qualified leads and find more HVAC jobs! Probably the best reason to use an advertising platform rather than solely SEO (or word of mouth, networking, etc.) is that you can be very focused on exactly the right prospective customers. Want so find someone in a specific zip code? Online business listings can get you pretty close but that can also spill outside of the desired location. Let’s say one of your business ideas was to market only to someone in Denver, Colorado in a specific zip code, who (on Facebook) likes horses, reads books by Dean Koontz and who speaks English and Mandarin. Ideal customers who fit that profile would be the only ones to see those advertisements making them the right (albeit, very narrow) customer base your HVAC business is looking for.

X3 Small Business SEO Packages

What is Local SEO?

Local SEO is a specialized type of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) that helps you reach people close to your business and service area.

What do other search engines use to list my business?

You will need to do the following if you want to enjoy the benefits that come from local SEO: Add Contact Information To All Pages: Google and other search engines use your Name, Address, and Phone Number (NAP) to list your company on local SEO directories.

What are the best ways to get more local SEO results?

Be sure you claim your listings and generate citations in the top local directories for the best results. SEO is an ongoing marketing technique which X3 specializes in. It can be the biggest bang for your buck for bringing is good sales leads over time but it is definitely more of a long-term strategy as opposed to a right here, right now form of advertising.

X3 Digital Marketing: Marketing for HVAC, heating cooling service technician leads

What are Google Ads?

Google Ads is a Pay Per Click marketing platform that allows you to tailor a unique message based and target your ads based on several variables like specific keywords, audience demographic, and geographic location.

What are the benefits of Google Ads?

Here are a few of the benefits that HVAC companies enjoy with Google Ads (AKA Google Adwords): Efficient Cost & High ROI: You only spend money when someone clicks on your HVAC ads.

How do I use Google Ads?

Google Ads offers a wide range of benefits for HVAC marketing, and HVAC contractors can use Google ads to drive more sales and calls.

What are the benefits of reviews?

As you can see, reviews are an essential part of your HVAC marketing strategy, and you can use customer reviews to show the value you offer and help customers choose your HVAC services over your competition. Online reviews such as those on Google My Business do what business card cannot; they play a major role in sharing with potential customers what happy customers (and not-so-happy customers) have to say about your air conditioning or heating company.

Abstract vector created by vectorjuice

How can I generate more customer reviews?

One of the best ways to generate more customer reviews is to reach out to past and current customers to discuss their experience. Customer relationships can be similar to friendships and can lead to more business across the board if properly cultivated.

What is blogging?

Blogging is one of the least used HVAC marketing tactics, and this means that you can use blogs to help you stand out from your competition, get found in Google, and increase trust with customers. Basically, blogging is writing long-form, industry-specific content which people can read for further information. This article you’re reading right now? This is a blog.

Bottom Line: What you should expect from a good digital marketing company.

Benefits can range from brand awareness to online sales (if you have products that are sold online) and everything in between. At the end of the day, we at X3 Marketing group pride ourselves on showing a fantastic return on investment by bringing the best HVAC leads in the door (or phone or email or social media and on and on) of your business. You should expect an increase in potential business by way of leads which you can close.

What’s the next step toward success with your online marketing tactics? Reach out to us now!

Curious to see how small business from X3 can hep you DOMINATE YOUR COMPETITION ONLINE? Get in touch!

4 + 2 = 

Denver SEO: how to get your business found online by X3 Marketing Group

Denver SEO: How To Get Your Business Found

by with No Comment Digital AdvertisingDigital MarketingLocal SEOSEOSmall Business SEO

Recently, when sitting down with someone they called search engine optimization “black magic”. He’s not wrong. Probably the biggest reason he said that is because SEO isn’t simply ONE thing. Rather, it’s a series of techniques which are used to varying degrees depending on strategy and goals of a business. With X3 Marketing Group’s home state of Colorado being something of an emerging tech hub, finding the best Denver SEO agency can be a job unto itself. Sifting through big promises of agencies to find those who put trust, results and clarity for their customer first is challenging at best.

An SEO expert understands the need to have a powerful, yet flexible search engine optimization strategy to increase online visibility, bring lots of good site traffic, provide powerful user experience through design and make sure the proper target audience full of potential customers are those finding your business online.

Global spending on digital marketing nears $100 billion: study

What is SEO?

SEO simply stands for search engine optimization. Now in its fifth decade, this tactic has evolved to become an integrated part of web design, development, content creation and inbound marketing for businesses. As with many other business strategies, SEO has become much more sophisticated over time. Today there are more than 60 billion monthly online searches around the world. Many of these searches are looking for something geographically nearby with local business owners. Yet for most businesses, they will only see about 20 percent of those searches translated into conversions.

Why do websites fail? No matter the industry you work in, the most common cause of website failure is site speed. People can instantly tell when a site is loading slowly or not loading at all. As we’ve discussed, websites are not static objects; they are changing and updating all the time.

X3: What is Small Business SEO and Why is it Important for Your Business?

What are the basic tenets of SEO?

Search engine optimization is more than just matching keywords to particular content marketing assets. In many cases, that’s the bare minimum, but many tools and strategies exist for SEO. When done correctly, they help businesses show up in search results more often. Topical Analytics An analytics tool allows for a more in-depth understanding of what the business is doing for an individual keyword. This might be, “What pages are ranking for our company name? What pages are ranking for our phone number?” The common denominator here is that when people search for a service or product, they aren’t necessarily looking to read about your competition, but what’s out there that meets their needs.

We’ll also take a second here to mention digital advertising using platforms like Google Ads or any number of paid marketing options including social media marketing. These things should also be a large part of a good digital marketing strategy but can often be overlooked. While SEO has probably the best long-term return on investment (ROI), since it takes time to implement and shift if needs be, digital advertising makes for a much more nimble and fast-reacting marketing strategy and, depending on a particular business model, these types of internet marketing services can serve to bolster SEO by quite a bit.

X3 Small Business SEO Packages

What makes Denver SEO challenging?

Denver has a large and unique blend of companies within the larger metro region when it comes to Denver SEO. There are those who employ ‘black hat’ tactics to game the system, and then there are those that keep an open mind, offer training and use optimization techniques in an ethical, accurate manner. For the industry as a whole, the first problem is getting a handle on the industry itself. People get away with deceptive SEO for the simple reason that it’s hard to see.

What is black hat SEO? Can it be used against a website? Can you trust a company to not go around using tricks that could leave your site defenseless against the wolves of the internet? these are a few of the questions any good agency providing reasonable SEO services should be able to address without hesitation.

SEO tips and tricks

Think carefully. Yes, there are some solid specialists out there. But if a small company is already working with a digital marketing strategy they can get from a service like Google Ads, they can probably save themselves the hassle of finding an SEO specialist. As an added bonus, look for an agency who has a client list. If you know for sure that you are willing to take on a couple of new clients and you have a firm understanding of their marketing goals for the upcoming year, asking if they do work with businesses similar to yours might go a long way. Beyond just their website content, the Denver SEO agency you choose should be taking on more of the effort to improve a company’s overall site presence.

While we may be a bit biased since X3 Marketing Group does handle everything in the digital marketing arena, it’s important to add to the above the fact that having and agency who has a holistic view of all your businesses digital marketing services and needs can be crucial. A digital marketing agency such as X3 takes into consideration the proper focus for each of the arms of digital marketing. Does your social media marketing needs to be increased? Great. Do your Google ads need a higher cost-per-click to reach the ideal audience? Let’s do it. Are most of your potential customers looking for businesses like yours on Google Maps? Let’s make sure you’re doing everything you can to be found there.

Bottom Line: Finding the best Denver SEO is hard. X3 Marketing Group is here.

All this information is likely confusing and possibly even counterintuitive, but at the end of the day, the value in it comes from how well it can inform a business’ search engine optimization strategy. There’s no silver bullet when it comes to getting Denver search engine optimization results, which is why it’s important to find a seasoned agency with a proven track record of results for clients. This goes not only for Denver but for the entire state of Colorado.

We’d love to take a good look at how your business is getting customers online (or not) so please tell us about yourself!

Just remember that SEO is a never ending pursuit with some new techniques popping up all the time, so it’s the job of a good SEO company to continually research, refine and make informed decisions about SEO strategy based on business traffic goals and outcomes.

What’s the next step toward success with your online marketing tactics? Reach out to us now!

Curious to see how small business from X3 can hep you DOMINATE YOUR COMPETITION ONLINE? Get in touch!

7 + 10 = 

X3 Marketing Group: Do I need a business website in 2021?

Do I Need A Business Website in 2021?

by with No Comment Digital AdvertisingLocal SEOSEOSmall Business SEOWeb Design

We’re going to get into the “Why?” of this question below but first, let’s get the main answer out of the way:

Yes, your small business definitely needs a website. And it needs it yesterday. 84% of today’s consumers think a website makes your business more credible than companies who only have social media profiles (themeisle.com). On top of that, 72% of consumers that perform a local search visit a store within 5 miles of their current location.

Does my small business need a website?

Does my small business need a website?

What's the best website builder for small business?

What’s the best website builder for small business?

How about Google My Business websites?

How about Google My Business websites?

What about those "Free" website builders?

What about those “Free” website builders?

Does my small business need a website?

As we said unequivocally above, yes. 100%. Why though? Frankly, it’s all about legitimacy and appearing above your competitors in Google Search. By the end of 2019, 97% of consumers looking for a local business did so by using a search engine and 91% of the time, that search engine is Google.

X3 Marketing Group Mobile and Digital Marketing

When we search for a local business – let’s take a mechanic in Northglenn, Colorado where our office is, for example – we’re looking for a business that is close by so we don’t spend a huge amount of our day driving to and from and we also want a mechanic who comes recommended by our neighbors and people we know.

If we search for this mechanic and there is simply a Google My Business listing which hasn’t been “claimed” by the business owner and whose information is incorrect and whose phone number is incorrect. Out of the gate, that business is losing credibility and frustrating a potential customer. In this scenario, let’s say that the customer keeps looking for a way to get in touch with the mechanic and they go digging for a website. If no website exists, the auto shop has almost certainly lost that potential customer.

When we, as an agency that provides local SEO services, work with a client the very first thing we look at is whether that small business has a website where we can drive traffic using one of our strategic SEO packages or digital advertising services. If you don’t have a website to accompany your marketing efforts, it will affect all of your online marketing plans and no amount of customer service can help if no customers can find your otherwise successful business online.

As a final point, a full 80% of online search engine usage takes place on a mobile device. If you don’t have a site at all, you’re not going to show up on mobile either.

What’s the best website builder for small business?

We’ve certainly covered this in other X3 Marketing Group articles but since HOW your website is built is almost as important as having a website at all, we’ll touch on it again. Here are some of the most popular ways to build a small business website ranging from “Free” to quite expensive, custom website builds:

Weebly: This is a reasonable way to just get an online presence but it’s extremely limited in its ability to generate leads for heating and air conditioning repair and service (or any other leads for that matter). Not good for SEO.
Wix: Similar to Weebly in that it’s a decent stop-gap while your “big kid” website is under construction with X3 (#shamelessplug). Generally speaking, there’s quite a bit of “you-get-what-you-pay-for” when it comes to online marketing and there are challenges with Wix which would make it less than ideal for reaching and engaging a loyal customer base through SEO.
Squarespace: While it’s still missing some of the SEO tools of other platforms, Squarespace is known for visually appealing websites that incorporate beautiful images on a bit of a budget. Easy to work with, it requires almost none of the technical skills that may give you pause.
WordPress: Open source and very customizable, WordPress is primarily what we build on (ahem) and makes for a solid solution. There is a world of plugins by third-party developers to make WordPress very customizable to your needs. Can be a bit sluggish from time to time if not properly optimized.
Custom: There are a couple of very important things to consider when looking at a fully custom coded website; 1. the cost will likely be significantly more than other platforms and 2. the development time will certainly be longer (typically about double) than most estimates given at the outset of a project. On the other hand, a fully-custom Python build, for example, can be fast, powerful and do pretty much everything a company of any size could need (and pay for).
In order for an agency like X3 Marketing Group to bring a small business the best local SEO services as well as giving the most bang-for-your-buck with pay-per-click and other other digital marketing and advertising methods, your website needs needs to be at the forefront of marketing efforts to effectively capitalize on a wide range of the available marketing tools.
X3 Marketing Group: Squarespace
X3 Marketing Group: Weebly

X3 Marketing Group: Wix

X3 Marketing Group: WordPress

What about Google Sites?

Speaking frankly, we wouldn’t consider Google Sites (Google My Business free websites) a true “website builder”. It can be a temporary placeholder while your website is under construction but its functionality is very limited and while it may answer basic questions your perspective customers may have, customer behavior tells use that a well-organized and visually appealing website is what causes a prospective customer to reach out. Google sites simply don’t have enough functionality.

X3 Marketing Group: Google Sites

Additionally, Google sites don’t offer the ability to have a custom domain – this means you don’t truly have your own .COM. Google’s sites instead have a long URL string beginning with “sites.google.com/yournamehere”. This means that any traffic you get isn’t owned by your business and things like social media channels will reflect this. At the outset of this article, we talked about the credibility factor of having a website and not having your own URL is a big no-no in the world of online marketing.

What about a free website builder?

We touched on this above when talking about some of the types of website builders available but we’ll expand a bit more here. Free website builders are certainly a tempting option – especially for those small businesses who are starting out and simply need a web presence. These free options often act as the hosting provider, WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) website editor and, to some degree, design company.
Most free website builders will give you some templates from which to select your website layout and even access to royalty-free, high-quality images to use. You can include functionality like a contact form. With some free website builders you can have your own custom domain with whatever domain extension you’d like (.com, .net, .tv, .co, etc.) but others will restrict your URL to being a subdirectory or subdomain of their site (like the sites.google.com/yournamehere mentioned above).

Another drawback of these free website builders is that they often require their own branding to remain on YOUR site. This is akin to handing someone your business card and it having “Kinko’s!” printed across the top.

As a marketing tool, your website helps establish and, over time, build credibility. It give people who have found you through and online review a place to click to to find out more about your business success. If it appears unprofessional and/or isn’t engaging, potential customers will leave and look elsewhere.

When it comes to websites, there are widely varying degrees of “you-get-what-you-pay-for” for sure but few (if any) digital marketing professionals would agree that a “free” website is much more than a placeholder while you grown-up site is being built.

Motivation From David Goggins: Be Uncommon

Motivation From David Goggins: Be Uncommon

by with No Comment Local SEOMotivational QuotesSEOSmall Business SEOSocial Media Marketing

A post shared by X3 (@x3dominate)

David Goggins has seemingly never been one to offload his need for motivation to others. He’s never been given anything and other than his incredible strength of will and plain old grit, he’s become a Navy Seal and now, high level endurance athlete.

In business, your goals and the type of motivation you use to achieve them have one thing in common: you. When we wake up each day, we have an opportunity to stand out from the pack, to overshadow our competition and to succeed because we must.

Each of those days we have a chance to be uncommon in a world of common people.

14 + 14 = 

X3: Finding the best digital marketing services in Denver, Colorado

Finding The Best Digital Marketing Services In Denver

by with No Comment Local SEOSEOSmall Business SEO

In 2018 and 2019 Denver ranked in the top 10 for high-tech job growth. During that time the Mile High City added almost over 9,900 jobs in the tech space which accounted for 34% of all jobs added during that period. With that kind of growth, the amount of digital marketing agencies is not only included as a part of the number but those same agencies are also here to help their fellows in the tech space grow and expand their digital channels.
With X3 being a Denver, Colorado-based digital marketing agency, today we’re going to take a look at what potential customers should be looking for when searching for the right digital marketers to bring along with them trust guided by results and clarity.


Global spending on digital marketing nears $100 billion: study

What Are Digital Marketing Services?

Honestly, there is a lot to unpack in that simple question but I’m betting that any person reading this is probably looking for a quicker answer rather than a complex web of digital marketing tactics specific to Denver. So, back to the answer; these services are a blend of digital marketing channels and techniques, applied consistently which can help your business reach not just customers but the right customers with the most value and ROI. Some of these services which X3 offers to our clients, not just in Denver, but around the globe are:

  • Search Engine Optimization, also known as SEO
  • PPC or pay-per-click which is also frequently – and deservedly – conflated with “Google Ads”.
  • Web-based, media promotion
  • Website construction and optimization
  • Content marketing strategy
  • Social Media Marketing, both paid and organic
  • Email marketing
  • Link building

With regular and consistent digital marketing activity a business can increase its reach where its customers are looking. For instance, if you want to be found by customers looking for the “HVAC near me” – which is a great keyword but with a LOT of competition – it may be a more valuable strategy to focus on a keyword like, “HVAC Denver” or, to get even more granular, “HVAC repair Cherry Creek”.

Online marketing can also help a business to find the right employees with the right credentials and experience as well as those who are already nearby. For instance there isn’t much reason for a Denver-based roofing company to seek out potential hires in Norfolk, Virginia.

X3: What is Small Business SEO and Why is it Important for Your Business?

What Services Do Digital Marketing Agencies Offer?

Well, we make sure that businesses reach the right customers at the right time in the right area. At X3 we understand that the ways in which search engines drive engagement and revenue must be strategic and part of a broader brand-forward digital marketing campaign.

The digital marketing services include:

  • Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
  • Re-targeting
  • Email Marketing
  • Affiliate Marketing
  • Social Media Marketing
  • Quality Link Building
  • Website Strategy
  • Content Marketing and Optimization
  • Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
  • Integrated Online Marketing Strategies

Are all of these digital marketing services a need-to-have or a want-to-have? Well, Colorado is a pretty competitive landscape with much of the population being located in the Front Range. This means that which the state of Colorado itself is much larger, the actual population is fairly concentrated along the I-25 corridor cenetering on Denver. Marketers in the Centennial State need to not just have and idea of digital marketing strategy from a technical side but also how and where to execute it. Otherwise, Denver by itself could suck up all the marketing “juice” since it carries the highest population in the state.

X3 Small Business SEO Packages

Do Businesses Need Digital Marketing Services?

Absolutely. Yes. Why do you need digial marketing to find and reach potential customers? Because online is where people shop today. U.S. consumers spent more than $860 billion in 2020 in online shopping. Apart from those people who were looking to buy a product or service online, 55% of Americans looked for online reviews and recommendations before engaging with companies both online and in the real world.

Many Colorado businesses have at least begun to look at digital marketing efforts as a necessary way to find opportunity but there are still many who are opting for a more traditional approach to marketing.

X3: Cost of digital marketing versus traditional marketing.

As you can see in the image above, the cost of traditional marketing is exponentially higher than that of the digital marketing discipline. It also allows Colorado businesses to focus their marketing program to specific people in specific areas. This can help dictate the customer journey and use those digital marketing skills to turn someone from a “shopper” to a customer.

Of course, not all businesses or marketers are going to use each piece of the digital marketing puzzle. One of the aspects of marketing and advertising we at X3 look at the most is which platforms are best. For instance, is Facebook a place where promoted posts for a Denver roofing company are going to be most impactful? Probably not, BUT, what if a person who was searching Google for the “best roofer near me” earlier in the day gets “retargeted” on Facebook or Twitter on their mobile devices and sees your advertising content? Then you’re likelihood of that person engaging with your message becomes much higher.

X3: what is retargeting?

Achieve Measurable Results with Targeted Digital Marketing Services

You know what many small businesses consider “measurable results”? Leads. Business owners and decision makers want good leads for their products and services. Furthermore, these businesses rely on digital marketing agencies like X3 to be able to develop and deploy the best digital marketing plan which highlights brands and their offerings and gets the content on their social media platforms and website in front of the eyes of as many (of the right) people in Denver, Colorado – for example – as possible. That is their primary goal.

But what if you want intermediate benchmarks to measure how well your digital marketing plan is working? Being able to understand how much time, energy and money it takes to trace the customer journey is part of making sure the efficiency of a marketing plan is effectively overcoming those challenges and providing the best value

At X3, our clients have access to a backend dashboard 24/7/365 where they can see everything from their Google Analytics to their reviews, social media platforms, Google Ads, SEO and (drumroll, please) their leads in the form of phone calls, chatbots, constant forms and much more. While we do provide those same clients with weekly and monthly reports, we want to help build trust by showing clear results. This is where we get our values: Trust, Results and Clarity.

Custom Digital Marketing Strategy

The way that any craftsman has a set of tools to use, digital marketing with X3 in Colorado has a set of tools to use as well. Just like those craftsmen, the expertise with which those tools are used and using them in unique, inventive ways is what sets us apart among the crowded Denver marketing space.

For X3 each customer, even customers in the same vertical (HVAC, roofing, e-commerce, etc.) have unique value propositions and goals and we address each of our clients as their marketers without making assumptions (other than a fantastic ROI). For instance, not all of our clients want to use emails to reach their customers and not all of our clients will want to use paid advertising. However, those are resources which need to be weighed into their larger marketing messages, as well as how and where they find their clients.

At a 30,000 foot view, here are some of the ways we help a client begin to define the hows and whys of their digital marketing strategy:

  • Define your brand: This encompasses several things including branding (colors, logos, etc) as well as a mission statement and set of company values. A strong brand also benefits with strong brand awareness.
  • Construct your buyer personas or avatars: You may think you know who your ideal customer is but the practice of defininng them is a challenging one. Many clients of ours see their product or service through their own eyes instead of the customer’s eyes and their expertise can be vastly different than what a real customer would be searching the internet for.
  • Generate your SMART objectives: Don’t know what that means? CLICK HERE
  • Pick your digital marketing strategy: As mentioned earlier, this is a spot to figure our where and how your ideal customers will find you. Find the corner of the internet where they spend the most time and target it. Is it on different social media channels or some other digital platforms? Maybe. Is it on a desktop rather than a mobile device despite the trend in the other direction? Let’s figure it out.
  • Set your budget: While there’s a pretty typical guideline that a marketing budget should be about 5% of annual revenue, that can vary widely depending on goals. It’s also very important to understand that: MARKETING IS FREE. You’re probably saying, “Wait, free?!?!?!” Yes, free. When done properly – as we do at X3 – if you spend $100 marketing and make $100 of revenue through marketing then your cost is $0. However, at X3 we aim for a MUCH larger ROI and typically see at least a 2X ROI.
  • Fix your strategy: Don’t just set it and forget it. A marketing campaign and the data available through toold like Google Analytics tells you where to make adjustments.
  • Promote your campaigns: If you’ve spent a lot of time on product development and branding, be sure that all parts of your business are there to support your revenue. Build brand awareness and bring the right customers in the proverbial door.
  • Keep an update on results: While we won’t speak for other Denver, Colorado marketing agencies we, at X3, give our clients access to all the data on their marketing picture. This includes SEO, PPC (Google Ads / Google Adwords, and other modes of digital advertising), reviews, website speed, visibility and – drumroll – LEADS and SALES.

Bottom Line: The Best Digital Marketing Agency in Denver, Colorado
At X3, these are some of our foundational pieces:

CUSTOM APPROACH: It is imperative to understand that no two businesses are alike – even if they’re competing with one another. Our approach means that each client is given time and attention to detail, specific to their business, which makes them stand out. No cookie cutters.

YOUR PARTNERS IN MARKETING: More often than not, business owners and decision makers have so many things to do to actually make a business run that getting clients to notice them through marketing takes a back seat. At X3, we make sure that your business is noticed, engaged with and dominant in the digital space. Your job is to run your business and it’s our job to work with you to make sure your marketing drives revenue and growth.

MULTIFACETED: Business owners understand that trust, results and clarity are of the utmost importance. Putting trust in those you work with is one of your highest priorities. X3 does that by pulling back the curtain with tools like a custom, in-depth dashboard as well as person-to-person meetings where any questions are answered and continuous work is done to refine your growth strategy.

What’s the next step toward success with your online marketing tactics? Reach out to us now!

Curious to see how small business from X3 can hep you DOMINATE YOUR COMPETITION ONLINE? Get in touch!

10 + 7 = 

X3 Digital Marketing: How long does it take to see SEO results?

How long does it take to see SEO results?

by with No Comment Local SEOSEOSmall Business SEOUncategorized

I suppose before we get into it, we should define just what SEO is, huh? SEO means “Search Engine Optimization” and what do THAT mean? SEO is a process which SEO agencies use to get your website to show up higher than your competition on popular search engines and for the most part, we’re talking about Google. The more pertinent information – for the keywords which people searching for your business are typing into Google – the more a website shows up in those searches.
There are several things which make organic search results different than other things you’ll see on a SERP (aka Search Engine Results Pages) and while we’ll be going into the anatomy of how SERP’s are created in a future article, the most obvious piece is what part of the “real estate” of the SERP an organic search result link holds. Below is a diagram explaining the different pieces. For the sake of this article, we’re going to specifically talk about the “organic results”:

X3 Digital Marketing: HVAC, Heating and cooling SERP (Search Engine Results Page)


Global spending on digital marketing nears $100 billion: study

How long does SEO take to show results?
First, what comprises SEO? Among other things it depends on upon how long your site has been live, the amount SEO has been done on it already, how good the structure and organization of the site is, how much content is on it, its backlink profile (how many other websites link to yours), and numerous other SEO factors. No two sites begin from the same spot, regardless of whether they’re in a similar industry and going after similar clients. Be that as it may, here is a conceivable situation for what your SEO endeavors may look during the underlying months, and the outcome you might see.

Month 1
Research and disclosure, site review, keyword strategy, and site organization. As is the case with all things, some websites start with a leg up on others. Whether this means that their content marketing strategy is already begun, their image quality and alt tags are already in place or they already have a base of at least some organic traffic, the goal is to bring all of these elements up to par as soo as possible so that people using major search engines (Google, Yahoo, Bing) can fine a particular website for their searches.
In many cases however, we find ourselves being hired to build a company’s digital presence from the ground, up. Not only does this mean that X3 is building out the company’s website, but it also means we’re setting up their entire strategy in order to bring them the traffic from search that they’re looking for.

Step 2: Create a detailed and CTA-driving description

Month 2
Begin specialized SEO work, making chages and updates to the site based on a manual review of the entire structure. Sometimes the site should be redesigned, and this can add time to the project. At X3 we make this determination prior to engaging a client which saves both time and money. Other SEO elements such as link building and creating high-quality content can take a place during this time. If you find yourself needing a rebuild of your site, both building quality links and good content can be done simultaneously to the structural changes.

In a case where you’re overhauling a website – as opposed to a brand new site build – the content and link building can go live when it’s ready and continue during the couple of months of updating and as such, they’ll begin to gain good SEO “juice” as soon as they’re live. However, in the case of a new site, businesses will want all of the pieces of content to be ready for proper “crawling” or “indexing” by platforms and search engine algorithms.

Month 3
Start zeroing in on content creation. Contributing to a blog, FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions), whitepapers, long-form content, client case studies and so on. In a perfect world you would have begun this work after the structure and keywords strategy was established in month one. Sometimes however, it’s not until later on in the process where it’s discovered that the copy on a website needs to be updated to actually result in an increase in traffic. Sometimes it is possible for new content to rank high out of the gate and then settle to a lower position. This can happen because search engines like Google can often prioritize new content. On the off chance that those rankings are converting into leads or deals that early in the process, fantastic! Understand though that those sorts of anomalies tend to be outliers.

X3: Small business SEO. Is it worth it?

Month 4
Continued creation of contents, technical SEO of the site, and advancement of a good backlink profile (which may incorporate tidying up bad quality links). By this month you should begin to see an incremental improvement in rankings, traffic, and the beginnings of lead generation. It won’t be anywhere near the uptick in traffic (and, commensurately, leads) you should see a year into your SEO endeavors; however, it should be very clear that your SEO is working and driving organic search traffic.

Month 5
By this month or maybe a bit sooner in the process, you may have begun posting on platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and other social media outlets as well as informational forums like Quora. This can prompt a solid, characteristic connection profile, and produce leads all by itself. As in the past months, you’ll want to continue content creation and maybe participate in some PR or local media outreach. You ought to be seeing increasingly more traffic rolling in from SEO now, and your leads ought to be developing subsequently.

X3: What is Small Business SEO and Why is it Important for Your Business?

Month 6
By this point we expect to see search engine traffic increasing in earnest. At this point we would also take the tack of refining site content depending on the type of leads that are coming in. For instance if you’re a roofer focused on roof replacement and the leads which are coming in are primarily for small repairs and ancillary services (like gutter cleaning, for instance), updating the content of the site to reflect that helps to focus the traffic you’ll get but it will also show Google and other search engines that the site is being updated – which results in it being re-indexed (crawled) and it’s rankings improved accordingly.

From here on, the things done to improve search engine visibility will largely center around content creation and updating, or you might be doing more inventive things such as integrating keyword-rich reviews.

Many SEO firms will tell you that it takes four to six months to begin getting results. For the most part, that is very true, yet remember this is when you start getting results, and SEO results develop more and more over time. Whatever outcomes you’re getting at six months should have improved markedly by the time you hit a year (or longer) of active SEO work. Eventually you will very likely see the traffic increase curve flatten a bit depending on your industry. At this point, if you’ve taken a break from working on SEO with an agency (cough, X3, cough) that would be the time to re-engage and begin again with a new or updated type of content, service offerings or even product descriptions.

Why Does SEO take so long to show results?
Consider the number of sites is out there. There are a lot of competitors with about two billion websites online right now (about four hundred million of which are active). Different locales are additionally attempting to sort out website improvement. There are likely organizations and sites out there that have been around longer than have more built up SEO juice even though the sites themselves are less than stellar. That is only the status quo. Newer sites need to experience the cycle similarly to jump ahead of older sites which have a very long history of being authoritative in a particular field. There are also agencies who have a much less consistent approach to SEO and that can certainly affect rankings as well. Not X3 though!

The Bottom Line
SEO can be a tricky beast. Apart from all the technical aspects (I’m looking at you, flip-phone owners!) the amount of constant and consistent updating can be a daunting task which doesn’t just take a one time job, it is the product of months and even years of work to get good results. At X3, part of our expertise lies in not simply executing for you (which we absolutely do) but also guiding your business to participating in the real-world follow through.

If you’d like us to do an absolutely free assessment of your current web presence and how we would suggest you improve it, please CLICK HERE to send us a message. We want to help your business DOMINATE YOUR COMPETITION ONLINE.

Curious to see how small business from X3 can hep you DOMINATE YOUR COMPETITION ONLINE? Get in touch!