Google… Changing the Face of Offline Consulting
mariagudelis | December 17, 2009
Google knows the answer and is capitalizing on it.
A simple question for you…
Would you rather ask your friend for a referral for a dentist, doctor or plumber? OR go to Google and search for one?
Just think about it for a second…
80% of us talk to our friends and ask for referrals for services we need…
Only about 3-6% of us will go online, or look it up in the yellow pages.
Why?
We want someone we can TRUST.
A good friend of mine, John, let me in on some very cool news that will change the face of Offline Consulting.
Google has found a way to take human behavior to the next level. If you haven’t heard yet, Google has just launched an experimental feature… Google Social Search. It’s a new way to make your friends and contacts a key part of your searches online.
Go here to learn more about Google’s experiment and how it works
So, I’m asking you… What do you think about this?
Can you connect the dots on how AMAZING this will be for the Offline Consulting Business???
How will this define Offline Consulting moving forward? Can you see more technology such as this coming out in the next few years? Would love to hear your thoughts on this one!
This is Powerful! More social proof for Social Media Marketing. Local businesses need to jump on this now. And we are here to help them.
@Keith — you capitalize on this by educating your clients and working with them to develop a social media marketing strategy (i.e., the Social Media Package + Online Marketing blueprint).
Keith,
With the movement of the world from big business towards social networking I can imagine that an offline consultant will be moving their clients into as many social interactive places as possible. I saw this morning an old neighbor that now lives in Texas asking “if anyone could recommend a Vetinarian in her current hometown”. With a social search engine many of your friends may have already talked about vets in their blogs or mentioned it elsewhere in a chat(60 percent of the USA has at least one pet, 80 percent of pet owners have more than 1 pet). Now those results will be at the forefront in their search results. For you as a consultant you will be actively getting testimonials from your clients and helping them capitalize with ‘good’ testimonials. These can be placed on blogs of the vet with high keyword use for the area and like Tim said above “referrals from satisfied clients as part of payment.” Just as the celebrity ‘inclined’ will drop names to feel important, now a smart consultant will have their clients ‘dropping names” of new customers in their blog. I’m sure you could think of clever ways to do this, contests, congratulations to, etc.
Twitter: mariagudelis
says:
Mike you rock – you answered it better than me!
Well, I’m stumped. I’m not seeing a way to capitalize on this for offline consulting.
Can you connect the dots?
Twitter: mariagudelis
says:
Yes – one of the packages in my products I recommend you to offer to your offline client is called:
“Social Media Package”
Cheers, Maria
This will certainly bring more people online when they look for professional services and away from print ads. I know I can find results from Google and from my friends in their personal networks.
If we were smart, we would all start or ramp up our referral strategies. Some people currently, for example, ask a satisfied account to give them referrals as part of payment. Now, you might ask or require a satisfied account to make entries about you in their social networks.
Twitter: mariagudelis
says:
Absolutely Tim – great idea to move the ‘referrals’ into the social sphere!
Can put it in the contract too if you are managing their social media – allow – get permission from them to allow you to do like 5-7 a week on it or something