Apparently Turner had let his domain name (cleonturner.com) expire and Foran picked it at some point a few months ago according to reports.

MA State Capitol

I have been involved in domain names for over a decade, so I couldn’t leave this story alone.

Both politicians got what I would consider an equal beating according to the public comments that were left on the various blogs. They both had to eat a bowl of blog chowder on this one.

This should also turn out to be a good lesson in online reputation management for both the politicians and whoever may be reading this.

I am not going to get into the ethics of this incident, because this is politics, and unfortunately ethics aren’t really an issue in politics. Plus, I don’t really care and actually find the whole thing including the interests and “wordplay” of some of the “news” outlets rather comical.

Here’s why this was an epic fail on the part of both politicians

Mr. Turner:

Letting your domain name expire in an election year is a massive fail on your part. It basically means that you do not have your sh1t together and does not portray you as an “on the ball” 21st century politician.

You are actually lucky that Foran picked up the name and not some russian p0rn spammer, so you may want to thank him for that…

Mr. Foran:

I don’t think you did anything illegal as was alleged and you apparently transferred the name back to Turner without incident, but at any rate here are a few tips for next time:

Apparently you used private registration which was kinda smart, but you were supposedly backtracked by your email address via a phone call to the registrar.

Next time get an anonymous email address (whatever@gmail.com) and make it look foreign, really foreign.

Something like (deepash_shanzil2336@whatever.com) should suffice.

You could also save yourself the $8 for private registration by using an address and a phone number in a foreign country, like Thailand or Russia for instance. You could use the address and phone number for a hotel in one of these countries which could be had in 2 seconds via a Google search.

The whois info would be false and would likely lead to you not being able to renew the domain, but who cares, at least it would screw up your opponent for quite some time while they chase the boogieman in some foreign country.

Also buy the domain on a prepaid credit card for a one off transaction on a brand new Godaddy account just for this purchase. This way you could effectively give the domain away to whoever. Like maybe post the whole Godaddy account login info on Craigslist or some foreign equivalent with the title “Free Domain Name”.

If you are really paranoid, you could even use an open wifi connection at one of the local libraries, or a coffee shop to register the name via a proxy, that way it could not be traced back to you by an IP address.

All is fair in love and politics… lol

Local State Rep. Domain Name Follies is from CapeLinks Internet Marketing Blog located on Cape Cod.

These businesses cover a wide range of niches, so I have had a really good look at the Cape Cod area local search listings scene. From what I have seen in my research for clients, there are many local businesses missing out on more customers by not optimizing their local search presence.

What is local search marketing?

Local search marketing involves making sure that a company’s listings on Google Local, Yahoo Local, Bing Local, Merchant Circle, Yelp, etc… are up to date and optimized to capture leads on the hyper-local level.

By now you must have seen the local map listings on Google, Yahoo and Bing. Here is an example of a Google Local result for “landscaping supplies” targeted to the West Dennis area:

Local Search Optimization

Optimizing your website for local search

The second part to a good local search strategy is making sure your website will also pull visitors from regular web searches, outside of your free local map listings.

Most search queries these days are more than four words long. This means searchers are getting better at searching and they know that the more keywords they use, the more accurate their search results will be.

“One out of five searches on Google are related to location” says Google Maps, Earth, and Local VP John Hanke.

In the local search arena, this means instead of just typing in “house painter” people are typing “interior house painter wellfleet ma” which will yield better results and enable them to find just what they need in less time.

Now you might say, I can add a list of all the towns that my business serves to my website somewhere, like in the footer, or make a page for each city/town that is basically the same except for the city or town name. That may work to some extent, but much of that is considered keyword stuffing or spamming and may work against you or even trigger a penalty.

There are many other techniques that can be applied to your website that will yield fantastic local search rankings and results without it being seen as keyword stuffing or search engine spamming.

Why is local search such a big deal?

Apart from regular internet users looking for goods and services in your area, mobile internet usage is growing at an astounding rate and local search is a perfect companion. You punch “pizza” into Google on your smartphone and you get all the pizza places right around you wherever you are. Or you punch in “gift shop”, or “auto repair”, etc… you get the picture, it’s huge.

Excel at local and you can really increase your bottom line.

Now you might say I already updated my business info at all these places, so I am all set. Well, you might be, but chances are that you missed the boat.

You see there are many tricks that the average business owner will not be aware of when adding or updating a local business listing at any of these places. If you don’t take advantage of these opportunities you may be missing out on tons of local referrals.

In most cases a small business’ best customer is in their immediate area, in their neighborhood. This is the kind of customer you will get through local search optimization if it is done right.

Unfortunately, your competition is also competing for these same customers in your neighborhood. Unlike Google Adwords and Facebook Advertising which costs money, most of these local listings are free of charge, which makes the barrier to compete non existent.

Just because these listings are free doesn’t mean that they should be taken lightly. These listings if done right, can make or break your online presence. This is an excellent opportunity, especially in today’s economy, to drive leads and more business.

Guide to Learning Local SEO and Local Search Optimization gives us the following list of what goes into a proper local search optimization strategy and the order of the tasks at hand.

1. Market Research
2. Keyword Focus and Use of Local Modifiers
3. Optimizing Your Website for Local SEO
4. Creating or Claiming Existing Local Business Listings
5. Optimizing Local Business Profile Listings
6. Building Citations and Links to Enhance Listing Rankings
7. Encouraging Customer Testimonials and Reviews
8. Staying Up to Date with Changes in Local SEO

The only other thing I would add to this list is ongoing online reputation management. Monitoring your online presence for new reviews and other citations which is believed to have a big impact on local search rankings.

If you want to learn more about Google Local ranking factors, Dave Cosper takes a crack at explaining it in Layman’s terms.

Ranking = Location + Information + Corroboration + Input +

There is much to consider when mapping out a local search optimization plan for effectively marketing your business and a lot at stake here.

Choose the wrong keywords, write ineffective or off target business description/website copy, or get a few bad reviews and you may be dead in the water.

If you are serious about your Cape Cod website competing in local search, you should contact CapeLinks for a free consultation.

Local Search Marketing & Optimization is from CapeLinks Internet Marketing Blog located on Cape Cod.

Last week when the news broke that Toyota would be recalling millions of it’s top selling models because of a “sudden acceleration” problem with the vehicle gas pedals or floor mats, I started to monitor the search results for “Toyota recall” to see who would be jumping on the advertising bandwagon first.

I noticed a few things within the first two days of the story breaking:

Toyota was running a damage control ad. To their credit, this campaign is also running on Bing and Yahoo which are both empty of competing “recall related” ads as I am writing this:

Toyota Recall “Toyota Takes Care of its Customers. Read the FAQs at Toyota.com”

GMC and Buick were showing the following ads, but these ads were already running under a previous campaign and likely just triggered for the broad match keyword “Toyota”:

May the Best car Win “On New GMC Models, Assurance Comes Standard. Get Details Here.”

May the Best car Win “See How Buick Stacks Up to the Competition. May the Best Car Win.”

Now a few days later we have Mazda and Ford pitching “reliability” and the lawyers jumping on:

Consider a New Mazda “Check out the reliable vehicles from Mazda and find a great deal.”

Ford Vehicles “Drive Safe and Reliable Ford Cars.

Browse Large Inventories Today.”

The lawyers:

Toyota Recall 2010 Update “Sudden acceleration danger. Free case review for injured.”

Toyota Accident Victims “Toyota Sudden Acceleration Recall. Free Evaluation, 1-866-***-****”

The Local Angle

One thing that I do not see is any local dealers geotargeting their own local market with ads yet.

Even though Toyota.com is running the ad above, this would be a great opportunity for a local Toyota dealer to target their own customers with self branded ads like:

Local Dealer Toyota Customers “We’ll take care of you. Call us now, 1-800-***-****”

Send the visitors from your local market to a simple landing page with a quick video, an “answer line” phone number to call, an email form to build an email list for broadcasting recall updates, etc…

I did hear a local Toyota dealer on the radio today running spots telling their customers to call the dealership and assuring their customers that everything will be fine.

Now the radio ads are great, but you have to figure every affected Toyota owner is going to look for information on the internet.

This is an opportunity for the local Toyota dealers to hold on to their customer’s trust, but also a great opportunity for competing local dealers that sell GM, Ford, Honda, etc… to also target these people in their local market.

Local Other Brand Dealer “Worried about your Toyota? Maybe it’s time for a change…”

With local geotargeting and recall related keyword PPC advertising campaigns on Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc… any local car dealer could probably ride this story a long way on short money.

When setting up the campaign don’t forget to also target the makes and model years affected. Include keywords like “camry recall”, “highlander gas pedal”, “toyota floor mat”, etc… It shouldn’t take to long to make a good keyword list for this local campaign.

• 2009, 2010 RAV4
• 2009, 2010 Corolla
• 2009, 2010 Matrix
• 2005-2010 Avalon
• 2007-2010 Camry
• 2010 Highlander
• 2007-2010 Tundra
• 2008-2010 Sequoia

If you are a local dealer that doesn’t sell Toyotas, now would be a great time to bid on your local Toyota dealers business names and run an ad trying to get people to switch to your brand of vehicles.

Here’s a good example from Twitter. A Ford dealer is trolling for distraught Toyota owners by offering a $1000 extra rebate.

Trade in your #Toyota and receive $1000 rebate extra on top of all offers when you buy a new #Ford.

A local Facebook ad campaign might be a good way to capitalize on this opportunity as well.

Note: This was written based upon ads showing in the local market here on Cape Cod, MA. Your local market may look different. Your local car dealer may work with someone like me who told them to start taking advantage of this recall story already.

I posed this question to an old friend of mine, a sales guy:

How would you approach selling new Toyota’s given the recent news?

What a great question. When companies are hit with recalls, and defective products that put peoples lives at risk, selling is the last thing most folks are thinking about. Yet, the selling must go on.

Toyota Recall: Local Advertising Opportunity is from CapeLinks Internet Marketing Blog located on Cape Cod.