ProManage unlocks key opportunities for growing businesses

Optimizing hyperlocal listings is estimated to have a remarkable impact on growing businesses. A brand is considered to be 2.7x more reputable when hyperlocal marketing is put into action. Audit research by Sulekha says brands with hyperlocal marketing are likely to attract and convert 70% of the searches into location/store visits. It is also observed that people are expected to visit the searched store in the next 24 hours.

With regards to the same, CXOToday has engaged in an exclusive interview with Mr. Satya Prabhakar, Founder and CEO of Sulekha.com & ProManage to discuss further on how hyperlocal marketing can benefit local and growing businesses.

1. What made Sulekha move to a hyperlocal marketing space?

This is not a shift of focus, Sulekha has always been in the hyperlocal marketing place. Sulekha’s core business is connecting a consumer looking for a service or a product with a service provider who can cater to that specific area.

For example, if you as a consumer are looking for an interior designer in Bangalore Koramangala, you will be connected to a service provider who caters to customers in that area. This product, ProManage is just an extension of hyperlocal marketing at a bigger scale helping Large enterprises.

2. How has the evolution of technology helped the growth of the brand?

ProManage in the latest technology that has helped Sulekha expand its TAM. While Sulekha caters to SMEs, ProManage caters to SMEs and Large enterprises with locations ranging from 100-5000+.

3. What type of business should opt for Hyperlocal marketing and why?

Any business which has a physical location/locations will benefit from ProManage. Almost 80% of a store’s business happens from customers in and around 5 KM radius. If you are a business owner with a single location or a large enterprise with 1000s of locations, ProManage helps with hyperlocal discovery leading to actions for a particular store.

4. How can SMEs be benefited from Hyperlocal marketing?

• The World Has Become All-Digital: 2700 local searches every second for products and services in India. It is massive, growing 50% every year, and has one unique trait that no other medium can claim: the immediate purchase intent of users.
• Consumer Expectations Have Changed: Consumers today expect to (1) discover products and services online, (2) engage with brands and businesses digitally, (3) expect the engagement to be personalized, quick, and meaningful.
• Technology Has Advanced Rapidly: Multiple technology innovations can be integrated to create amazing, enduring value to meet all the three customer expectations above.
• Every business needs to ace the hyperlocal marketing game to stay relevant and be in the consideration set of customers who are looking for a product or service.

5. What is the one key hyperlocal marketing strategy that has helped your clients and how?

• All hyperlocal searches are mapped to the following:
  1. Relevance
  2. Proximity
  3. Authority
  4. Reputation

• ProManage has a unique set of tools and initiatives to impact all of the above, a systematic customer success plan is laid out with great emphasis on profile health score designed by the internal team to help businesses grow in the hyperlocal marketing space.

6. Role of Google My Business play in hyperlocal marketing?

In today’s age GMB or as now it’s called, Google Business Profile (GBP) contributes to 90% of all discovery and actions. Other platforms are important as well, but they add more to the authority than to the actual actions. The presence of business in other platforms helps rank the business on GBP better as Google looks for authority of the business across the web

7. Is it Wiser to Spend on GMB Ads When there are other Alternatives?

GBP / GMB ads are extremely targeted, instead of targeting users at a larger scale, GBP ads can cater to customers as narrow as 3KMS from the store. This makes this advertising extremely focused. Less cluttered as not many brands are making use of this feature. Store-wise revenue can be directly impacted.

8. How have the brands benefited after collaborating with ProManage?
9. 20+ Large enterprise brands have benefited immensely from ProManage
10. Brands have standardized their digital storefront (Hyperlocal listings). While brands have an SOP in place for physical store branding, the digital storefront is not standardized. This results in a loss of business and trust.
11. ProManage helps brands standardize their digital storefront.
12. After the brand standardization work, the team works on optimizing each of the business listings for hyperlocal discovery.
13. Brands have seen anywhere between 40% to 1400% growth in actions via hyperlocal marketing.

9. Do you see global marketing changing with hyperlocal marketing?

Hyperlocal marketing will soon be a must-do for all brands. In today’s world, hyperlocal marketing and standardizing digital store storefront is more optional. This has become a must. All CXOs agree that this is a problem. All CXOs are aware this cannot be done by the thinly staffed marketing teams. They need experts who have direct access to partners like Google, Bing, Meta, etc to make progress

Soon all companies will treat GBP profiles like FB or an Instagram Page. The companies jumping onto to hyperlocal marketing now will be industry leaders in this space soon with vast majority of innovations waiting to happen.