In today’s data-driven world, predictive modeling is becoming increasingly popular as it enables organizations to anticipate future trends, behavior, and outcomes. It is a powerful data strategy that involves using historical data to create a statistical model that can be used to make predictions about future behavior. In this article, we will discuss five use cases of predictive modeling.
Predictive modeling can be used to forecast sales and marketing performance by analyzing customer behavior and purchase patterns. By analyzing historical data on customer demographics, purchase history, and marketing campaign performance, businesses can predict future sales and marketing trends. This can help organizations make informed decisions about product development, marketing strategies, and resource allocation.
Predictive modeling can be used to identify fraudulent activities by analyzing patterns and behaviors of fraudulent transactions. By analyzing historical data on fraudulent transactions, businesses can create a statistical model to detect and prevent future fraud. This can help organizations save significant amounts of money and prevent reputational damage.
Predictive modeling can be used to assess credit risk by analyzing past credit behavior and payment history. By analyzing historical data on customer credit behavior, businesses can predict future credit risk and determine whether to approve or reject loan applications. This can help organizations make informed decisions about credit approval and reduce the risk of default.
Predictive modeling can be used in healthcare to predict and diagnose medical conditions. By analyzing patient data such as medical history, symptoms, and lab results, healthcare providers can create a statistical model to predict the likelihood of a patient having a specific condition. This can help healthcare providers diagnose medical conditions early and provide appropriate treatment, improving patient outcomes.
Predictive modeling can be used to predict customer churn by analyzing customer behavior and purchase patterns. By analyzing historical data on customer behavior, businesses can create a statistical model to predict which customers are likely to churn in the future. This can help organizations develop targeted retention strategies to retain valuable customers and reduce customer churn.
In conclusion, predictive modeling is a powerful data strategy that can help businesses predict future behavior and trends. By using historical data to create statistical models, organizations can make informed decisions about sales and marketing, fraud detection, credit risk assessment, healthcare diagnosis, and customer churn prediction. These five use cases of predictive modeling are easy to blog about and can provide valuable insights for businesses and individuals alike.
Observing an individual on LinkedIn expressing their affection for social media raises a valid question about the authenticity of such sentiment. “I love #social media,” the thought leader instructed their following…
Initially, I was inclined to initiate a conversation by asking, “Have you considered taking a 30-day break from social media?” However, I realized that this could easily lead to an argumentative exchange. Hence, I opted to express my thoughts through this blog post instead.
In an era where most of the content on social media is algorithmic, and AI generates a significant portion of the content, it prompts one to wonder about the validity of these emotions. The dopamine high experienced through social media’s gamification is a manufactured sensation, not a genuine one, and the connections established through these platforms do not reflect true human connections.
It is apparent that many individuals may have a skewed perception of reality, leading them to believe that their experience within the virtual world of social media is an accurate representation of the world. However, this notion is flawed, and one must be cautious of the influence that social media has on their perception of reality.
“There’s growing evidence to suggest that some individuals can develop a dependency on social media that’s not unlike an addiction to alcohol or drugs,” says Paul G. Simeone, Ph.D., Vice President and Medical Director of Behavioral Health at Lee Health. “Their overdependence on social media has led to symptoms typically associated with substance-use disorder.”
In conclusion, it’s crucial to be mindful of the impact that social media can have on our emotions and perception of reality. To break away from the artificial high, it’s essential to practice moderation and take breaks from excessive usage. Additionally, seeking support from trusted friends or a mental health professional can be beneficial, before establishing a healthy relationship with social media, and regaining a balanced perspective. Remember, taking control of our digital habits can lead to a happier, more fulfilling life.
As a rather commercially successful author once wrote, “the night is dark and full of terrors, the day bright and beautiful and full of hope.” It’s fitting imagery for AI, which like all tech has its upsides and downsides.
What’s on deck for AI in 2023? Will regulation rein in the worst of what AI brings, or are the floodgates open? Will powerful, transformative new forms of AI emerge, a la ChatGPT , disrupt industries once thought safe from automation?
With the success of Lensa , the AI-powered selfie app from Prisma Labs that went viral, you can expect a lot of me-too apps along these lines. And expect them to also be capable of being tricked into creating NSFW images , and to disproportionately sexualize and alter the appearance of women.
Maximilian Gahntz, a senior policy researcher at the Mozilla Foundation, said he expected integration of generative AI into consumer tech will amplify the effects of such systems, both the good and the bad.
Stable Diffusion, for example, was fed billions of images from the internet until it “learned” to associate certain words and concepts with certain imagery. Text-generating models have routinely been easily tricked into espousing offensive views or producing misleading content.
Mike Cook, a member of the Knives and Paintbrushes open research group, agrees with Gahntz that generative AI will continue to prove a major — and problematic — force for change. But he thinks that 2023 has to be the year that generative AI “finally puts its money where its mouth is.”
Prompt by TechCrunch, model by Stability AI, generated in the free tool Dream Studio.
Prompt by TechCrunch, model by Stability AI, generated in the free tool Dream Studio.
“It’s not enough to motivate a community of specialists [to create new tech] — for technology to become a long-term part of our lives, it has to either make someone a lot of money, or have a meaningful impact on the daily lives of the general public,” Cook said. “So I predict we’ll see a serious push to make generative AI actually achieve one of these two things, with mixed success.”
DeviantArt released an AI art generator built on Stable Diffusion and fine-tuned on artwork from the DeviantArt community. The art generator was met with loud disapproval from DeviantArt’s longtime denizens, who criticized the platform’s lack of transparency in using their uploaded art to train the system.
The creators of the most popular systems — OpenAI and Stability AI — say that they’ve taken steps to limit the amount of harmful content their systems produce. But judging by many of the generations on social media, it’s clear that there’s work to be done.
“The data sets require active curation to address these problems and should be subjected to significant scrutiny, including from communities that tend to get the short end of the stick,” Gahntz said, comparing the process to ongoing controversies over content moderation in social media.
Stability AI, which is largely funding the development of Stable Diffusion, recently bowed to public pressure, signaling that it would allow artists to opt out of the data set used to train the next-generation Stable Diffusion model. Through the website HaveIBeenTrained.com, rightsholders will be able to request opt-outs before training begins in a few weeks’ time.
OpenAI offers no such opt-out mechanism, instead preferring to partner with organizations like Shutterstock to license portions of their image galleries. But given the legal and sheer publicity headwinds it faces alongside Stability AI, it’s likely only a matter of time before it follows suit.
The courts may ultimately force its hand. In the U.S. Microsoft, GitHub and OpenAI are being sued in a class action lawsuit that accuses them of violating copyright law by letting Copilot, GitHub’s service that intelligently suggests lines of code, regurgitate sections of licensed code without providing credit.
Perhaps anticipating the legal challenge, GitHub recently added settings to prevent public code from showing up in Copilot’s suggestions and plans to introduce a feature that will reference the source of code suggestions. But they’re imperfect measures. In at least one instance , the filter setting caused Copilot to emit large chunks of copyrighted code including all attribution and license text.
Expect to see criticism ramp up in the coming year, particularly as the U.K. mulls over rules that would that would remove the requirement that systems trained through public data be used strictly non-commercially.
2022 saw a handful of AI companies dominate the stage, primarily OpenAI and Stability AI. But the pendulum may swing back towards open source in 2023 as the ability to build new systems moves beyond “resource-rich and powerful AI labs,” as Gahntz put it.
A community approach may lead to more scrutiny of systems as they are being built and deployed, he said: “If models are open and if data sets are open, that’ll enable much more of the critical research that has pointed to a lot of the flaws and harms linked to generative AI and that’s often been far too difficult to conduct.”
Image Credits: Results from OpenFold, an open source AI system that predicts the shapes of proteins, compared to DeepMind’s AlphaFold2.
Image Credits: Results from OpenFold, an open source AI system that predicts the shapes of proteins, compared to DeepMind’s AlphaFold2.
Examples of such community-focused efforts include large language models from EleutherAI and BigScience, an effort backed by AI startup Hugging Face. Stability AI is funding a number of communities itself, like the music-generation-focused Harmonai and OpenBioML , a loose collection of biotech experiments.
Money and expertise are still required to train and run sophisticated AI models, but decentralized computing may challenge traditional data centers as open source efforts mature.
BigScience took a step toward enabling decentralized development with the recent release of the open source Petals project. Petals lets people contribute their compute power, similar to Folding@home, to run large AI language models that would normally require an high-end GPU or server.
“Modern generative models are computationally expensive to train and run. Some back-of-the-envelope estimates put daily ChatGPT expenditure to around $3 million,” Chandra Bhagavatula, a senior research scientist at the Allen Institute for AI, said via email. “To make this commercially viable and accessible more widely, it will be important to address this.”
Chandra points out, however, that that large labs will continue to have competitive advantages as long as the methods and data remain proprietary. In a recent example, OpenAI released Point-E , a model that can generate 3D objects given a text prompt. But while OpenAI open sourced the model, it didn’t disclose the sources of Point-E’s training data or release that data.
Point-E generates point clouds.
Point-E generates point clouds.
“I do think the open source efforts and decentralization efforts are absolutely worthwhile and are to the benefit of a larger number of researchers, practitioners and users,” Chandra said. “However, despite being open-sourced, the best models are still inaccessible to a large number of researchers and practitioners due to their resource constraints.”
Regulation like the EU’s AI Act may change how companies develop and deploy AI systems moving forward. So could more local efforts like New York City’s AI hiring statute, which requires that AI and algorithm-based tech for recruiting, hiring or promotion be audited for bias before being used.
Chandra sees these regulations as necessary especially in light of generative AI’s increasingly apparent technical flaws, like its tendency to spout factually wrong info.
“This makes generative AI difficult to apply for many areas where mistakes can have very high costs — e.g. healthcare. In addition, the ease of generating incorrect information creates challenges surrounding misinformation and disinformation,” she said. “[And yet] AI systems are already making decisions loaded with moral and ethical implications.”
Next year will only bring the threat of regulation, though — expect much more quibbling over rules and court cases before anyone gets fined or charged. But companies may still jockey for position in the most advantageous categories of upcoming laws, like the AI Act’s risk categories.
The rule as currently written divides AI systems into one of four risk categories, each with varying requirements and levels of scrutiny. Systems in the highest risk category, “high-risk” AI (e.g. credit scoring algorithms, robotic surgery apps), have to meet certain legal, ethical and technical standards before they’re allowed to enter the European market. The lowest risk category, “minimal or no risk” AI (e.g. spam filters, AI-enabled video games), imposes only transparency obligations like making users aware that they’re interacting with an AI system.
Os Keyes, a Ph.D. Candidate at the University of Washington, expressed worry that companies will aim for the lowest risk level in order to minimize their own responsibilities and visibility to regulators.
“That concern aside, [the AI Act] really the most positive thing I see on the table,” they said. “I haven’t seen much of anything out of Congress.”
Gahntz argues that, even if an AI system works well enough for most people but is deeply harmful to some, there’s “still a lot of homework left” before a company should make it widely available. “There’s also a business case for all this. If your model generates a lot of messed up stuff, consumers aren’t going to like it,” he added. “But obviously this is also about fairness.”
It’s unclear whether companies will be persuaded by that argument going into next year, particularly as investors seem eager to put their money beyond any promising generative AI.
In the midst of the Stable Diffusion controversies, Stability AI raised $101 million at an over-$1 billion valuation from prominent backers including Coatue and Lightspeed Venture Partners. OpenAI is said to be valued at $20 billion as it enters advanced talks to raise more funding from Microsoft. (Microsoft previously invested $1 billion in OpenAI in 2019.)
Of course, those could be exceptions to the rule.
Image Credits: Jasper
Image Credits: Jasper
Outside of self-driving companies Cruise, Wayve and WeRide and robotics firm MegaRobo, the top-performing AI firms in terms of money raised this year were software-based, according to Crunchbase. Contentsquare , which sells a service that provides AI-driven recommendations for web content, closed a $600 million round in July. Uniphore , which sells software for “conversational analytics” (think call center metrics) and conversational assistants, landed $400 million in February. Meanwhile, Highspot , whose AI-powered platform provides sales reps and marketers with real-time and data-driven recommendations, nabbed $248 million in January.
Investors may well chase safer bets like automating analysis of customer complaints or generating sales leads, even if these aren’t as “sexy” as generative AI. That’s not to suggest there won’t be big attention-grabbing investments, but they’ll be reserved for players with clout.
This human skeleton (shown from the waist down) from the island of Borneo bears evidence that the lower left leg was amputated roughly 31,000 years ago.
New scientific records are set every year, and 2022 was no exception. A bacterial behemoth, a shockingly speedy supercomputer and a close-by black hole are among the most notable superlatives of the year.
The first known surgical operation was a leg amputation ( SN: 10/8/22 & 10/22/22, p. 5 ). That’s the conclusion researchers came to after investigating the skeleton of a person who lived on the Indonesian island of Borneo about 31,000 years ago. Healed bone where the lower left leg had been removed suggests the individual survived for several years after the procedure. The discovery pushes surgery’s origin back by some 20,000 years.
Headlines and summaries of the latest Science News articles, delivered to your email inbox every Friday.
Bacteria normally dwell in the microscopic world. Not Thiomargarita magnifica . Averaging about a centimeter long, this newfound bacterium is visible to the naked eye ( SN: 7/16/22 & 7/30/22, p. 17 ). T. magnifica , which lives in the mangrove forests of the Caribbean’s Lesser Antilles, is about 50 times larger than other species of big bacteria and about 5,000 times larger than typical bacteria. Why this species evolved into such a giant is unknown.
A supercomputer named Frontier crunched numbers with mind-blowing speed this year: 1.1 quintillion operations per second ( SN Online: 6/1/22 ). That makes the machine, run by Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee, the first exascale computer — a computer that can perform at least 10 18 operations per second. The next fastest computer tops out at 442 quadrillion (that’s 10 15 ) operations per second. Exascale computing is expected to lead to breakthroughs in everything from climate science to health to particle physics.
Deep off the coast of Antarctica, icefish congregate in a breeding colony as big as Orlando, Fla. Some 60 million nests of Jonah’s icefish ( Neopagetopsis ionah ) stretch across at least 240 square kilometers of seafloor ( SN: 2/12/22, p. 12 ). Previously, nest-building species of fish were known to gather in only the hundreds. An abundant food supply and access to a zone of unusually warm water may explain the exceptionally large group.
By sifting through data released by the Gaia spacecraft, astrophysicists discovered a black hole that’s just over 1,560 light-years from Earth ( SN Online: 11/4/22 ). Dubbed Gaia BH1, it’s about twice as close as the previously nearest known black hole. But that record may not stand. About 100 million black holes are predicted to exist in the Milky Way. Since most are invisible, they’re hard to find. But when Gaia, which is precisely mapping a billion stars, releases its next batch of data in a few years, even closer black holes may turn up.
Erin Wayman is the magazine managing editor. She has a master’s degree in biological anthropology from the University of California, Davis and a master’s degree in science writing from Johns Hopkins University.
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Enhancing the local search engine optimization of your business is crucial, as it allows you to focus on a more specific, targeted audience rather than competing on a global scale. Achieving a top ranking for a highly sought-after keyword on a global level can be a daunting task, especially if your competitors have been actively optimizing for it for an extended period. By prioritizing local SEO, you can effectively reach a local audience through the use of relevant keywords, which are the terms and phrases that individuals enter into search engines when seeking specific products or services.
Below you will find 20 tips & tricks to increasing your ranking on local SEO searches.
Bold text is explained verbose below with multiple use cases!
Claim and optimize your Google My Business listing. This will help you show up in local search results and on Google Maps.
Use local keywords in your website’s content, title tags, and meta descriptions. This will help search engines understand that your business is relevant to people searching for local products or services.
Get listed in online directories, such as Yelp and Yellow Pages. These directories are often used by consumers to find local businesses, so it’s important to have a presence on them.
Encourage customer reviews and ratings. Positive reviews can improve your local SEO ranking and help you stand out from the competition.
Use social media to engage with customers and promote your business. This can help build brand awareness and drive traffic to your website.
Use long-tail keywords, which are more specific and targeted than short, general keywords. For example, “best Italian restaurant in downtown Los Angeles” is more specific than just “Italian restaurant.”
Optimize your website for mobile devices. Many people use their phones to search for local businesses, so it’s important that your website is mobile-friendly.
Use alt tags to describe the images on your website. This can help search engines understand the content of your images and improve your local SEO ranking.
Use local structured data, such as schema.org, to mark up your website’s content. This can help search engines understand the context of your website and improve your local SEO ranking.
Use internal linking to help search engines understand the hierarchy of your website’s content.
Use external linking to establish the authority and credibility of your website.
Use social sharing buttons to make it easy for visitors to share your content on social media platforms.
Use targeted landing pages to optimize for specific local keywords and locations.
Use Google Analytics to track your website’s performance and identify areas for improvement.
Use Google Search Console to monitor your website’s search performance and identify any issues.
Use a sitemap to help search engines crawl and index your website’s pages.
Use keyword-rich URLs for your website’s pages.
Use headings and subheadings to structure your content and make it easier for readers to scan and find what they’re looking for.
Use fast-loading, high-quality images to improve the user experience on your website.
Use a clean and easy-to-navigate website design to improve the user experience and make it easier for search engines to crawl and index your website’s pages.
Breaking down 1 through 9 below.
#1 Claim and optimize your Google My Business listing.
This will help you show up in local search results and on Google Maps.
Claiming and optimizing your Google My Business (GMB) listing is an essential step in improving your local search engine optimization (SEO).
Not only does it allow you to appear in local search results, but it also helps you show up on Google Maps, making it easier for potential customers to find and visit your business. In this article, we’ll explore three real-life examples of how claiming and optimizing a GMB listing can benefit your business.
Use Case 1:
Jane owns a small bakery in a busy neighborhood. She wanted to make it easier for customers to find her business, so she claimed her GMB listing and optimized it with accurate and up-to-date information, including her business name, address, phone number, and hours of operation. She also added photos of her bakery and menu items to give customers a better idea of what to expect. As a result, her bakery started showing up in local search results and on Google Maps, making it easier for customers to find her business and visit in person.
Use Case 2:
John runs a home cleaning service and wanted to expand his business to a new neighborhood. He claimed his GMB listing and optimized it with information about his services, pricing, and contact details. He also added photos of his team in action and customer reviews to build credibility. As a result, his business started showing up in local search results for keywords related to home cleaning in the new neighborhood, which helped him attract new customers and grow his business.
Use Case 3:
Sara owns a small boutique and wanted to attract more foot traffic to her store. She claimed her GMB listing and optimized it with information about her store’s location, hours of operation, and special promotions. She also added photos of her store and products to give customers a better idea of what to expect. As a result, her store started showing up in local search results and on Google Maps, which made it easier for customers to find her store and visit in person.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, claiming and optimizing your GMB listing is an effective way to improve your local SEO and make it easier for customers to find and visit your business. By adding accurate and up-to-date information and engaging photos, you can attract more local customers and grow your business. In the examples above, we saw how a bakery, home cleaning service, and boutique were able to use their GMB listings to improve their local SEO and attract more customers. Regardless of your business type, claiming and optimizing your GMB listing is an important step in increasing your online visibility and driving local foot traffic.
GMB is rather easy to operate however if it seems difficult, and it’s not setup, hire someone to help you immediately. Get an SEO Expert to give you 1 on 1 walkthroughs, as you don’t want someone else managing your core accounts, especially your GMB account!
#2 Use local keywords in your website’s content, title tags, and meta descriptions.
This will help search engines understand that your business is relevant to people searching for local products or services.
Incorporating local keywords into your website’s content, title tags, and meta descriptions is an important aspect of local search engine optimization (SEO). By using relevant keywords, you can help search engines understand that your business is relevant to people searching for local products or services. This can increase the chances of your website ranking highly in local search results, which can drive more traffic to your website and potentially lead to more customers for your business. In this article, we’ll explore three real-life examples of how using local keywords can benefit your business.
Use Case 1:
Mark owns a small hardware store in a busy neighborhood. He wanted to increase his website’s visibility in local search results, so he started incorporating local keywords into his website’s content, title tags, and meta descriptions. For example, he used phrases like “hardware store in downtown Los Angeles” and “local home improvement products” in his website’s content, as well as in his title tags and meta descriptions. As a result, his website started ranking higher in local search results for keywords related to his business, which led to an increase in traffic and sales.
Use Case 2:
Sarah runs a small flower shop in a tourist area. She wanted to attract more local customers, so she started incorporating local keywords into her website’s content, title tags, and meta descriptions. For example, she used phrases like “flower shop near the beach” and “local flower delivery” in her website’s content, as well as in her title tags and meta descriptions. As a result, her website started ranking higher in local search results for keywords related to her business, which led to an increase in traffic and sales from local customers.
Use Case 3:
Tom owns a small pizzeria in a suburban neighborhood. He wanted to attract more local customers, so he started incorporating local keywords into his website’s content, title tags, and meta descriptions. For example, he used phrases like “pizzeria in the suburbs” and “local pizza delivery” in his website’s content, as well as in his title tags and meta descriptions. As a result, his website started ranking higher in local search results for keywords related to his business, which led to an increase in traffic and sales from local customers.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, using local keywords in your website’s content, title tags, and meta descriptions is an effective way to improve your local SEO and attract more local customers. By using relevant and targeted keywords, you can help search engines understand that your business is relevant to people searching for local products or services, which can increase the chances of your website ranking highly in local search results. The examples above demonstrate how a hardware store, flower shop, and pizzeria were able to use local keywords to improve their local SEO and attract more local customers. Regardless of your business type, incorporating local keywords into your website’s content and meta tags is an important step in increasing your online visibility and driving local traffic to your website.
Most website building apps (wordpress, etc) will automatically help you with this portion but if they don’t you need to figure out how to implement this in your website or it will ultimately suffer.
#3 Get listed in online directories, such as Yelp and Yellow Pages.
These directories are often used by consumers to find local businesses, so it’s important to have a presence on them.
We use an app that helps us automatically put our information into directories at yelp, yellow pages, and around 80 more. It’s an affordable monthly payment that you can do yourself or have someone else manage. Often directories are blocked and the only path is finding these automated tools and paying the price. Is it worth the cost? If you have many locations, it’s a bigger deal, as managing all these across all your offering may be extremely challenging to do without these tools. Yext is one of the popular choices, I prefer a different variation that uses Yext under the hood. Shop around.
More on listings.
Getting listed in online directories, such as Yelp and Yellow Pages, is an important aspect of local search engine optimization (SEO). These directories are frequently used by consumers to find local businesses, so having a presence on them can help increase your online visibility and drive more traffic to your website. In this article, we’ll explore three real-life examples of how getting listed in online directories can benefit your business.
Use Case 1:
Lisa owns a small restaurant in a busy neighborhood. She wanted to make it easier for customers to find her business online, so she got listed in popular online directories like Yelp and Yellow Pages. She added accurate and up-to-date information about her restaurant, including her business name, address, phone number, and hours of operation. She also added photos of her restaurant and menu items to give customers a better idea of what to expect. As a result, her restaurant started showing up in search results on these directories, which made it easier for customers to find her business and visit in person.
Use Case 2:
Mike runs a small home cleaning service and wanted to expand his business to a new neighborhood. He got listed in online directories like Yelp and Yellow Pages and added information about his services, pricing, and contact details. He also added photos of his team in action and customer reviews to build credibility. As a result, his business started showing up in search results on these directories for keywords related to home cleaning in the new neighborhood, which helped him attract new customers and grow his business.
Use Case 3:
Sue owns a small boutique and wanted to attract more foot traffic to her store. She got listed in online directories like Yelp and Yellow Pages and added information about her store’s location, hours of operation, and special promotions. She also added photos of her store and products to give customers a better idea of what to expect. As a result, her store started showing up in search results on these directories, which made it easier for customers to find her store and visit in person.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, getting listed in online directories like Yelp and Yellow Pages is an effective way to improve your local SEO and make it easier for customers to find and visit your business. By adding accurate and up-to-date information and engaging photos, you can attract more local customers and grow your business. In the examples above, we saw how a restaurant, home cleaning service, and boutique were able to use online directories to improve their local SEO and attract more customers. Regardless of your business type, getting listed in online directories is an important step in increasing your online visibility and driving local foot traffic.
#4 Encourage customer reviews and ratings.
Positive reviews can improve your local SEO ranking and help you stand out from the competition.
Encouraging customer reviews and ratings is an important aspect of local search engine optimization (SEO). Positive reviews can improve your local SEO ranking and help you stand out from the competition. Not only do they provide valuable feedback for your business, but they can also increase the credibility and trustworthiness of your business in the eyes of potential customers. In this article, we’ll explore three real-life examples of how customer reviews and ratings can benefit your business.
Use Case 1:
Emily owns a small bakery in a busy neighborhood. She wanted to improve her local SEO ranking and stand out from the competition, so she started encouraging her customers to leave reviews and ratings on popular review websites like Yelp and Google My Business. You remember your friend GMB from step1, right? I assume now this SEO stuff is starting to add up in your brain and you’re feeling happy. She also responded to all of her reviews, whether they were positive or negative, to show that she values her customers’ feedback. As a result, her bakery started ranking higher in local search results and received more positive reviews, which helped her attract more customers and grow her business.
Use Case 2:
Chris runs a small home cleaning service and wanted to attract more local customers. He started encouraging his customers to leave reviews and ratings on popular review websites like Yelp and Google My Business. He also responded to all of his reviews, thanking his customers for their business and addressing any concerns they had. As a result, his business started ranking higher in local search results and received more positive reviews, which helped him attract more local customers and grow his business.
Use Case 3:
Nancy owns a small boutique and wanted to improve her local SEO ranking and stand out from the competition. She started encouraging her customers to leave reviews and ratings on popular review websites like Yelp and Google My Business. She also responded to all of her reviews, thanking her customers for their business and offering them special discounts or promotions. As a result, her boutique started ranking higher in local search results and received more positive reviews, which helped her attract more customers and grow her business.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, encouraging customer reviews and ratings is an effective way to improve your local SEO ranking and stand out from the competition. By actively seeking and responding to customer feedback, you can build credibility and trustworthiness, which can attract more local customers and grow your business. The examples above demonstrate how a bakery, home cleaning service, and boutique were able to use customer reviews and ratings to improve their local SEO and attract more customers. Regardless of your business type, encouraging customer reviews and ratings is an important step in increasing your online visibility and driving local foot traffic.
#5 Use social media to engage with customers and promote your business.
This can help build brand awareness and drive traffic to your website.
Using social media to engage with customers and promote your business is an important aspect of local search engine optimization (SEO). By building brand awareness and driving traffic to your website through social media, you can improve your local SEO ranking and attract more local customers. In this article, we’ll explore three real-life examples of how using social media can benefit your business.
Use Case 1:
Jason owns a small restaurant in a busy neighborhood. He wanted to improve his local SEO ranking and attract more customers, so he started using social media to engage with his customers and promote his business. He created a Facebook page for his restaurant and regularly posted updates, specials, and photos to keep his followers engaged. He also used Instagram to share photos of his dishes and encourage customers to visit his restaurant in person. As a result, his restaurant’s social media following grew and his website received more traffic, which helped him attract more customers and grow his business.
Use Case 2:
Laura runs a small home cleaning service and wanted to attract more local customers. She started using social media to engage with her customers and promote her business. She created a Facebook page for her business and regularly posted updates, specials, and photos to keep her followers engaged. She also used Instagram to share photos of her team in action and encourage customers to book her services. As a result, her social media following grew and her website received more traffic, which helped her attract more local customers and grow her business.
Use Case 3:
Paul owns a small boutique and wanted to improve his local SEO ranking and attract more customers. He started using social media to engage with his customers and promote his business. He created a Facebook page for his boutique and regularly posted updates, specials, and photos to keep his followers engaged. He also used Instagram to share photos of his store and products to give customers a better idea of what to expect. As a result, his boutique’s social media following grew and his website received more traffic, which helped him attract more customers and grow his business.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, using social media to engage with customers and promote your business is an effective way to improve your local SEO ranking and attract more local customers. By building brand awareness and driving traffic to your website through social media, you can reach a wider audience and grow your business. The examples above demonstrate how a restaurant, home cleaning service, and boutique were able to use social media to improve their local SEO and attract more customers. Regardless of your business type, using social media to engage with customers and promote your business is an important step in increasing your online visibility and driving local foot traffic.
#6 Use long-tail keywords, which are more specific and targeted than short, general keywords.
For example, “best Italian restaurant in downtown Los Angeles” is more specific than just “Italian restaurant.”
Using long-tail keywords, which are more specific and targeted than short, general keywords, is an important aspect of local search engine optimization (SEO). By using long-tail keywords, you can improve your local SEO ranking and attract more qualified traffic to your website. In this article, we’ll explore three real-life examples of how using long-tail keywords can benefit your business.
Use Case 1:
Amy owns a small Italian restaurant in downtown Los Angeles. She wanted to improve her local SEO ranking and attract more qualified traffic to her website, so she started using long-tail keywords like “best Italian restaurant in downtown Los Angeles” and “authentic Italian dishes in Los Angeles.” By using these more specific and targeted keywords, her website started ranking higher in local search results for keywords related to her business, which led to an increase in traffic and sales from qualified customers.
Use Case 2:
Brian runs a small home cleaning service and wanted to attract more local customers. He started using long-tail keywords like “best home cleaning service in Los Angeles” and “affordable house cleaning in Los Angeles” to improve his local SEO ranking. By using these more specific and targeted keywords, his website started ranking higher in local search results for keywords related to his business, which led to an increase in traffic and sales from qualified local customers.
Use Case 3:
Caroline owns a small boutique and wanted to improve her local SEO ranking and attract more qualified traffic to her website. She started using long-tail keywords like “best boutique in downtown Los Angeles” and “unique fashion items in Los Angeles” to improve her local SEO ranking. By using these more specific and targeted keywords, her website started ranking higher in local search results for keywords related to her business, which led to an increase in traffic and sales from qualified customers.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, using long-tail keywords is an effective way to improve your local SEO ranking and attract more qualified traffic to your website. By using more specific and targeted keywords, you can help search engines understand that your business is relevant to people searching for specific products or services in your local area. The examples above demonstrate how an Italian restaurant, home cleaning service, and boutique were able to use long-tail keywords to improve their local SEO and attract more qualified traffic. Regardless of your business type, using long-tail keywords is an important step in increasing your online visibility and driving qualified traffic to your website.
#7 Optimize your website for mobile devices.
Many people use their phones to search for local businesses, so it’s important that your website is mobile-friendly.
As more and more people rely on their phones for accessing the internet, it becomes increasingly important for businesses to optimize their websites for mobile devices. By making sure that your website is mobile-friendly, you can increase your chances of attracting potential customers and improving your search rankings. Here are three use cases for optimizing your website for mobile devices.
Use Case 1: Local Businesses
If you own a local business, chances are that many of your potential customers will be searching for you on their phones. By optimizing your website for mobile devices, you can make it easier for these customers to find and interact with your business. This can include making sure that your website loads quickly on mobile devices, using large buttons and fonts for easier navigation, and ensuring that all of your content is easily readable on a small screen.
Use Case 2: E-Commerce Websites
For e-commerce websites, optimizing for mobile devices is even more important. With many consumers using their phones to make purchases, it’s essential that your website is easy to use and navigate on a mobile device. This can include making sure that your product pages are easy to scroll through, that your checkout process is streamlined, and that your website is secure for mobile transactions.
Use Case 3: Blogs and Content Websites
Even if you don’t own a local business or an e-commerce website, optimizing your website for mobile devices can still be beneficial. If you run a blog or content website, for example, mobile optimization can help improve your user experience and make it easier for your readers to access your content on the go. This can include optimizing your website for faster loading times, using responsive design, and ensuring that all of your content is easily readable on a mobile device.
Conclusion:
In today’s digital age, it’s more important than ever to make sure that your website is optimized for mobile devices. By considering the needs of your target audience and the type of website you have, you can make sure that your website is easy to use and navigate on a small screen. This can help improve your search rankings, attract potential customers, and enhance the overall user experience of your website.
#8 Use alt tags to describe the images on your website.
This can help search engines understand the content of your images and improve your local SEO ranking.
Alt tags, also known as alternative text, are a crucial element of website accessibility and SEO. By adding descriptive alt tags to the images on your website, you can help search engines understand the content of your images and improve your local SEO ranking. Here are three use cases for using alt tags to describe the images on your website.
Use Case 1:
Product Pages If you have an e-commerce website, adding alt tags to your product images can help search engines understand what your products are and improve your local SEO ranking. For example, if you sell shoes, adding an alt tag like “red high heels” to an image of red high heels can help search engines understand what the image is showing. This can also help users who are using screen readers or have images turned off on their devices access your content.
Use Case 2:
Blogs and Content Websites Alt tags can also be useful for blogs and content websites. By adding alt tags to your images, you can help search engines understand the content of your images and improve your local SEO ranking. For example, if you have a blog post about hiking trails in your local area, adding alt tags to your images of the trails can help search engines understand what the images are showing. This can also help users who are using screen readers or have images turned off on their devices access your content.
Use Case 3:
Local Business Websites Alt tags can also be useful for local business websites. By adding alt tags to your images, you can help search engines understand the content of your images and improve your local SEO ranking. For example, if you own a restaurant, adding alt tags to your images of your menu items can help search engines understand what the images are showing. This can also help users who are using screen readers or have images turned off on their devices access your content.
Conclusion:
Alt tags are a simple but powerful tool for improving the accessibility and SEO of your website. By adding descriptive alt tags to the images on your website, you can help search engines understand the content of your images and improve your local SEO ranking. This can help attract potential customers and enhance the overall user experience of your website.
#9 Use local structured data, such as schema.org, to mark up your website’s content.
This can help search engines understand the context of your website and improve your local SEO ranking.
Using structured data, such as schema.org, to mark up your website’s content can seem like a tedious task. However, it can greatly improve your local SEO ranking and help search engines understand the context of your website. Here are three use cases for using local structured data to mark up your website’s content.
Use Case 1:
Local Business Websites If you own a local business, using structured data can help search engines understand the context of your website and improve your local SEO ranking. For example, you can use structured data to mark up your business hours, location, and contact information. This can help search engines display this information in search results and make it easier for potential customers to find and contact your business.
Use Case 2:
E-Commerce Websites For e-commerce websites, using structured data can also be beneficial. By marking up your product pages with structured data, you can help search engines understand the context of your products and improve your local SEO ranking. This can include marking up your product descriptions, prices, and availability. This can help search engines display this information in search results and make it easier for potential customers to find and purchase your products.
Use Case 3:
Blogs and Content Websites Even if you don’t own a local business or an e-commerce website, using structured data can still be useful for your website. By marking up your content with structured data, you can help search engines understand the context of your website and improve your local SEO ranking. For example, you can use structured data to mark up the titles, authors, and dates of your blog posts. This can help search engines display this information in search results and make it easier for readers to find and read your content.
Conclusion:
While it may seem like a tedious task, using structured data to mark up your website’s content can greatly improve your local SEO ranking and help search engines understand the context of your website. By considering the type of website you have and the information you want to mark up, you can make the most of this powerful tool to attract potential customers and enhance the overall user experience of your website.
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The Department of Energy announced Tuesday that U.S. scientists have made a major breakthrough in nuclear fusion: the reaction that powers the sun and that could one day provide a near limitless and zero-carbon source of energy here on Earth. In an experiment at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, researchers used nearly 200 lasers to heat a tiny pellet of hydrogen plasma to more than 180 million degrees Fahrenheit. The hydrogen atoms then fused and released vast amounts of energy — more energy, crucially, than it took to start the reaction.
This achievement “will go down in the history books,” Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said.
The fusion reaction lasted for only 100 trillionths of a second; scientists caution it will take decades to turn what is currently an experimental technology into a large-scale power plant.
The federal Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, which uses a process called inertial confinement fusion that involves bombarding a tiny pellet of hydrogen plasma with the world’s biggest laser, had achieved net energy gain in a fusion experiment in the past two weeks, the people said. Although many scientists believe fusion power stations are still decades away, the technology’s potential is hard to ignore. Fusion reactions emit no carbon, produce no long-lived radioactive waste and a small cup of the hydrogen fuel could theoretically power a house for hundreds of years. source; https://www.ft.com/content/4b6f0fab-66ef-4e33-adec-cfc345589dc7
