As an example,  yesterday the auto locking system on my car stopped working and I couldn’t lock the car. It was a mini emergency and I wanted a quick fix.

I pulled out my iPhone, selected the Google Icon which activated the voice search feature and I spoke the following query:

“auto electrician tuggeranong”

I was in Tuggeranong at the time and wanted to find a  auto electrician nearby.

I wasn’t expecting too much from the search results because Tuggeranong is a real tongue twister for me and I thought the Google voice app would struggle interpreting the phrase.

But to my amazement the results were accurate and the first listing was a local Tuggeranong auto electrician. I clicked the phone number displayed in the listing and I was speaking to the auto electrician within seconds of starting my voice search.

The electician said he could check out the car immediately, the business premises were only a few minutes away. I dropped the car in, went for lazy  lunch and returned to find my car repaired.

I was really delighted with the service and noticed the auto electrician also performed steering and wheel alignment work, so I booked my car in for a wheel alignment next week.

So thanks to my iPhone, Google and local search I’m a very happy motorist and the auto electrician was delighted at the thought of new technology delivering him new customers.

The results Scott has received for his efforts have been extraordinary and in this video you can see and hear what Scott has to say about local search and what can be achieved.

Hotfrog allows businesses to list for free but one of the major benefits of listing on Hotfrog is Google Maps appears to rate listings highly as a SEO factor for Google Local Search listings.

So if you have a business listed in Google Local Search make sure you also list the business on Hotfrog.

We have just listed one of our clients Canberra Plasterer AGS Interior and expect the listing to become a positive seo factor when Googles algorithm calculates page rank for the local search listing.

The way people use Internet search is changing rapidly and with the proliferation of smart phones such as the Apple IPhone businesses should be preparing themselves to take advantage of such technologies.

Current and prospective customers are now using smart phones and gadgets to seek information about a businesses services and products.

As you view this video John Townsend will explain and demonstrate how consumers and businesses interact via smart phone technology and Google local search.

You would certainly enjoy a stream of new prospects but only if your listing was highly ranked so people search could actually see your listing.

The good news InfiniteLeads can setup, optimise and manage your local search listing for you. And realising you are busy we’re offering a Free consultation to local business people. We’ll come to you.

You can claim your free consultation by printing out our offer coupon and presenting it at the consultation.

I wouldn’t be far off the mark in stating, few or non at all,  use Yellowpages as their homepage.

This leads to a very good reason why Google local search rules and will do so for a long time to come.  As the awareness of Google local search grows it will become second nature for people to use Google when searching for information about businesses in the local area.

People mostly want fast results when it comes to search so why would anyone who have Google has their homepage surf over to Yellowpages to search for local business when Google can provide accurate search results in a fraction of the time.

Perform a test for your self, assume that you have a leaking pipe in your home and need an emergency plumber fast. Visit www.google.com.au and perform a search for “plumbers canberra” and in less than a second you will have ten plumbers from Canberra listed at the top of the search results.

Now visit  www.yellowpages.com.au   and perform the same search. The first thing you’ll notice is that Yellowpages was  slower to load than Google and the search was slower to complete.

But the speed of performace is secondary, the results that Yellowpages produce are really no more relevant than Google so why would you bother surfing to Yellowpages  if you were already on the Google search page.

There is the rub for Yellowpages, they are doomed, and as the top search engines become the tool of choice for local search Yellowpages will slide into oblivion.

It also highlights why it is very important for local businesses to embrace local search especially Google and make sure their listings are highly optimised to produce the best results.

These initial listings provide minimal information about a business and usually only locality is provided.

You can take your  business  listing to a higher level and include overviews, comprehensive information and even provide video’s and photos of your business. Providing this kind of information to prospects who are using local search would be priceless for you and shove you ahead of your competitors who are lagging in their knowledge of Google local search.

Before you can submit more details to google to be included in your listing you must first claim your listing and veify that you are actually the owner or are acting on behalf of the  business.

To claim your listing, search for your business on Google Maps and then click the “Edit” link followed by the “Claim your business link”

You are invited to watch this short video which demonstrates the difference between a claimed and an unclaimed listing.

Generic search results would be what you are probably used to seeing when you perform a search at Google.  But times are changing and more people now realise that Google present local search results if an area is appended to the search.

For example a search on “plumbers canberra” performed at www.google.com.au will produce the following results.

You can see it is very important to have your business listed in the Local Search section of the Google search results.

It’s going to become more important has time goes on as people start to use local search extensively on both their home PC’s, laptops and smart phones to locate local businesses.

Google local search or Google Maps uses one of three methods to authenticate a listing.

• Snail mail to the address of the business.
• A phone call to the phone number entered in the listing. This phone call will deliver a PIN number to be used to authenticate the listing.
• SMS sent to the mobile number entered in the listing. The SMS will contain a PIN number to be used to authenticate a listing.

If a business lists on a business directory that uses similar authentication methods that Google use  it’s probably safe to assume Google’s local search algorithm will award some points to the listing if the business details listed match the details listed in Google Maps.

The king of directories that Google would rank highly would be a paid listing in YellowPages, after all if a business pays to be listed (especially at YP rates) there is an excellent chance Google rates them with some high level of credibilty.

So if you want to give your listing a leg up in the rankings look to listing your business in directories that use some form of validation. That’s not to say you shouldn’t list your business in directories that do not validate listings, but it seems logical to assume that Google would judge validated listings as more credible.

Knowing that only local results are being requested Google will display results that contain information about businesses from the local area stipulated in the search. in our example shown below plumbers from the Canberra area are being displayed at the top of results and above Google normal generic search results.

If you were a plumber who operates in the Canberra region you would certainly want to be appearing in these search results and it’s the same with every category of business who offer services to local communities.

Local search is also a big feature of smart phones and the benefit to consumers and businesses to interact whilst people are on the move and shopping in particular localities.