Giving a Voice to 500,000 Merchants

A little more than a week after our 2 Year Anniversary, it's an honor for me to announce the passing of 500,000 merchants. While we've been the largest online network of local business owners for some time, it means more to us at MerchantCircle that our business owners across America are finding new customers and able to connect with merchants everywhere.

In June 2006, when we launched, we were committed to listening to what our merchants wanted and needed in an online business network to find new customers. Two years later? Absolutely nothing has changed. We listen to our merchants, just like merchants listen and help out each other in our MerchantCircle Forum. We've continued to add new functionality and features that makes merchant life easier.

While we've often spoken out about 'giving a voice' to local merchants on the web to 'fight back' against big box retailers, we should also make note that that 'voice' is now 500,000 strong and growing. Another common theme throughout the last two years has been that of the Yellow Pages and their long, fixed-term contracts, and expensive costs. I would have to say after these two posts (here and here), many merchants agree. No other blog posts drew as much discussion on our comment board than posts about the relevance of Yellow Pages.

One of the themes we encountered in our ongoing campaign of interviewing merchants in all 50 states, is that the Yellow Pages were inneffective and expensive. Don't get me wrong, we have some merchants who are still finding customers through print, but the majority are fed up. Our discussions with merchants on the phone and through surveys led us to come up with a portfolio of various online advertising products that fits every merchant's needs. As an early indicator, just six months after launch, we went from 500 paying merchants in late December to 5,000 by June.

You can read what our merchants in every state are saying by clicking here. It's been an exciting two years, filled with lots of announcements, and you can count on many more to come. The best part of those announcements? Our merchants and their 'voice' will be a part of them every step of the way.

Sincerely,
Ben Smith
Chairman and Co-Founder, MerchantCircle

P.S. The pictures above are who we're about.

Creative Business Names

Some merchants can be so creative when naming their business. A friend sent me this list of The 50 Best Pun Stores and it's a pretty funny list. Here are some of my favorites:















Enjoy,
Kevin
Community Relations

MerchantCircle's 2 Year Anniversary

Today is MerchantCircle's 2 Year Anniversary. We celebrated the occasion with some BBQ, pinatas, water balloons, and most importantly, family.

We wish you all the best in your future business endeavors and may God bless you and your family! Thank you for your support.













Sincerely,
Kevin
Community Relations

How the Groundswell Can Help Your Business

I had a chance to meet Charlene Li yesterday at the Under the Radar Conference at the Microsoft Campus in Mountain View, CA. Charlene is a Principal Analyst at Forrester Research and we've previously communicated over phone and emails.

I've been reading her book, co-authored by Josh Bernoff, called Groundswell. In their own words, Groundswell is a book 'with practical, data-based strategies for companies that want to harness the power of social technologies like blogs, social networks, and YouTube. Featuring 25 full case studies, a complete road map for social strategy, and data from around the world.'

The book has a lot of relevant content for local business owners that, first of all, explain all these web terms, like Tagging, RSS, and Widgets, and how they can help your business. Many of the case studies come from big multi-national companies, but can and should be applied in your local markets. In Chapter 6, Talking with the Groundswell, Charlene and Josh profile Blendtec, a company that created a website called willitblend.com, spent $50 on five videos that became hits on YouTube and increased Blendtec's sale of blenders by 20%. The 'will it blend' website and videos drove traffic back to Blendtec's home website. Look below for the video:



The key is to think outside of the box! Every case study they site, try and relate it to your business and whether it could work. I've done that with MerchantCircle and found two scenarios I'd like to try out, one, using the example of BMW's Mini Cooper. Stay tuned!!!

Sincerely,
Kevin
Community Relations

50 Merchants / 50 States - What Our Members are Saying

For the past month I've been working on a new campaign highlighting merchants in all 50 states who have used MerchantCircle to grow their business. Here's a sampling of my conversations:

"MerchantCircle has by far, been the most effective, cost-efficient way for me to market my business. It's hands-down, the best bang for my buck. My (ROI) return on investment sky-rocketed. In my first month, spending $30, I made by $1000 in trackable business. I've tried almost everything - Email Campaigns, banner ads - they were a waste of money," said Tuan Hoang, owner of Sky Printing and Graphic Design Services in San Diego, CA.

"Too many people want to sit back and wait for money to roll in - it doesn't work that way. I tell people that MerchantCircle is a combination of the Yellow Pages, Better Business Bureau and Myspace rolled into one. Using MerchantCircle has helped me pay the bills and grow my business," says Tina Elmore-Wright, owner of Scents of Peace in Archer, FL.

"It's important to stick with ways that work, while not missing out on the next opportunity and MerchantCircle has helped us come up at the top of Google search results. MerchantCircle and our website is the only thing we're doing that we consider 21st century," says Tish Whillhite, manager of Border Express Co. in Fort Smith, AR.

"I didn't have the money to build a website, and MerchantCircle was free and easy-to-use. I was able to post my business information, pictures, send out newsletters and coupons to my customers, and the best thing was I was getting about 3,000 hits to my listing a month," says Michael Weaver, owner of Carriage House Cafe in Livermore, ME.

Thanks for the great conversations!
Kevin
MerchantCircle Community Relations

Why Won't the Yellow Pages Wakeup?

We recently got back from a Yellow Page Association Conference, and as much I'm pulling for the industry - they are still far behind in terms of innovation and ability to move quickly. With the stock price of industry heavyweights such as Yell, Idearc, and R.H. Donnelley dropping by as much as 80% from their 52 week highs, you would figure there would be a complete strategy overhaul. Or maybe even a bigger portion of revenues going towards research and developments for new products. As it is, the Yellow Page industry is still firmly planted in a 'print' world; when everyone else is moving online and complimenting those efforts, the Yellow Page industry refuses to believe print will ever be out-placed by the internet .

Neg Norton, President of the Yellow Pages Association, used a large portion of his speech to tout the virtues of Yellow Pages and how 'healthy' the industry is, amidst a sea of criticism and doubt. A defense-laden speech is never one to remember. A keynote should offer innovation, optimism and direction. Undoubtedly, print Yellow Pages still have a wealth of value and many people still use them - but if anyone believes they will stand the test of time - they are kidding themselves.

Here's a portion of Norton's speech:

Print usage is stable, not declining, both here in the U.S. and in
Canada. Domestically there were 13.4 billion print references in 2007, the same
as in 2006. That's roughly 60 times per adult, per year. In Canada, usage of
print Yellow Pages also remains stable. Seven out of ten Canadians have used a
print directory over the past month and two-thirds of business searches still
come from print. These are significant numbers in an environment where many have
decided that "no one uses the Yellow Pages anymore.

Norton goes on to list stats and figures, even using two examples of merchants finding value advertising in the Yellow Pages, as if he had to sell people in his own industry. Out of his entire speech, maybe 1/20 of it was dedicated to any mention of internet and its implications.

Let me ask you: Do you think there is one college kid who's graduated in the last 10 years that didn't have to use the internet in college? Do you think any of those same graduates, who grew up on the internet, and cell phone searches, are ever going to go to the Yellow Pages you and I grew up on?

Out of all the 'old media' industries that have been affected by the internet - music, television, newspaper disrupted by the likes of Napster, iTunes, YouTube, craigslist - Yellow Pages has responded by changing the least. While YP is still largely profitable, the inclination and pressure to change is not as immediate. As publicly traded companies, it may be hard to balance quarterly revenue goals with long-term thinking. On the other hand, one of the most innovative 'old media' companies, Viacom, has rebuilt its brand by focusing on building out almost 300 hundred DIFFERENT sites around its brands!

Norton in his speech also says:

The tone and tenor of the entire advertising industry is anxious--- in fact
just one week ago, TNS Media Intelligence reported that U.S. ad spending was
flat in '07 vs '06 and that the 4th quarter '07 ad spend was slightly negative.
Yellow Pages, as a member of that industry, are fighting similar headwinds as
well as misperceptions because we are among the least understood of all
media.

If in fact the Yellow Page industry is the 'least understood,' much of it would have to do with everyone looking in from the outside and seeing so many missed opportunities from a media juggernaut. For now their Yellow Page Conference, titled New Tools New World, presented almost no new tools for an industry that has a vantage point that could easily transition them to industry leaders in another space: Local Internet.

Sincerely,
Kevin
Community Relations

The Blog is Mightier Than the Sword

I recently had a chance to stop by The Wild Bird in Poulsbo, WA and say hi to Scott Pomtier, the owner. Scott’s been a MerchantCircle member since September 2006 and one of our Top Merchants. In the past, I’ve spoken with him by phone and email, so it was nice to finally put a face to the words and voice.


Scott was telling me how he recently wrote a blog post on his MerchantCircle blog about the new restaurant that was opening up next to his store – Taprock Northwest Grill. Later that day, his blog post was already coming up when people searched for the restaurant on Google. He even received a bad review on his listing from someone thinking his was Taprock! (He can delete that review if he wants).

The fact of the matter is that the content he’s been creating on his page (blogs, coupons, pictures) helps his MerchantCircle listing show up on search engines and has boosted the page views on his listing from a few dozen, to over 1,000 page views each month. The content he’s creating shows up on search engines as well, even writing about Taprock early, has put that blog on searches that are returned on Taprock!

Statistically, a claimed MerchantCircle listing with no created content gets 12 page views a month. A listing with at least one written blog, one created coupon, one uploaded picture, one written newsletter and one review gets just over 200 page views a month. Those with all created content AND are a member of our lowest-priced ad package (at $29/month) get an average of 588 page views a month!

Scott is doing everything right, when it comes to utilizing his MerchantCircle listing. It’s one thing to claim your listing, upload a picture and write a blog – all that helps – but it’s very important to continue to do this. It’s unique content, which the search engines love!

Sincerely,
Kevin L.
Community Relations