Have You Claimed Your Free Business Listing At Merchant Circle Yet?

If you are operating a small business (or a big business), then it is in your interests to understand that the world is on to you. People are looking for your business, and if they are not finding you they are wondering why. If the are looking for what you provide as goods or services in your local area and they are not finding you, then YOU should be wondering why.

Merchant Circle is a directory service that goes beyond listing your basic details (which it does, as they appear in the public record). They take this basic information that is readily available, and provide you with free space to add the information about your business that your customers need, and you should want them to have...as well as handy and simple tools to use to keep in touch with prospective customers and existing customers alike. 

Profile page, newsletters, your own ready-to-go blog, coupons, advertisements, direct feeds of your blog to your regular website if you have one, customer reviews... all these and more are waiting for you now to go claim and start presenting the face for your business, that you want your customers to see.

Whether you are an experienced web designer, an amateur web builder or a complete novice, you can have a professional face for your business on the internet in minutes.  And if you have a website already, then adding this to your Merchant Circle profile can turbo charge the ease with which your business can be found by an internet search. 

If you do only one thing today to promote your business... make it this.

Join Me On The Merchant Circle Forum

The forum is designed for members of Merchant Circle to get together, and swap idea, get help, and provide tips and support for each other as we connect and build a community.  Connecting with members in your local area, and all around the USA allows you to share your advertisements for your business on the pages of all the members with whom you connect. 

The forum allows you to get to know other members and make friends and colleagues around the country, all with a view to supporting you and your business. 

Click on the link, claim your listing and  come visit us on the Merchant Circle Forum. We want to meet you and find out about your business, and help you make your business on the internet a success.

Come and Connect!

See you there!

 

Merchant Circle Forum Moderator

Do You own a business in the US? Come and join me in connecting on Merchant Circle.I may be Merchant Circle's biggest fan! Check it out and let me know what you think.

 

What's The World Saying About Merchant Circle? Take a look...

MerchantCircle Is In the News!

Think MySpace, but for Local Businesses

"MerchantCircle provides a search-optimized Web site where business owners can advertise and network free. The company's next task? Figure out how to make it pay"

Creating an online place where owners could post business profiles, advertise, network, and endorse one another for free, thought Yamamato and Smith, would result in the introduction of millions of businesses not currently online to the Web... read more

 

 

Media Newcomer of the Year

MerchantCircle aims to help small businesses get more local customers through the power of referrals, making online advertising accessible, affordable, and effective for local merchants and service providers. Businesses get a simple MySpace-like profile. It lets them promote themselves on the Internet to local users and lets them create affiliate n etworks, with referrals to other businesses on MerchantCircle that they trust... read more

 

Rev Up Your Local Web Marketing

"Need to drive more business to your door? Use our practical guide to rev up your local web strategy."

The Blonde Bear's MerchantCircle.com site combines a business description, reviews, a blog, coupons, a map and links to other businesses listed on MerchantCircle.com. All those Kenai businesses on the site got there through word-of-mouth; Showalter estimates she's brought 30 other businesses onboard to help build up the cross-promotional and networking benefits of the site. Look for more services like MerchantCircle.com to hit the scene as the local web market heats up... read more

MerchantCircle on TheStreet.com

To attract customers, small businesses are turning to online social networks. see the video

MerchantCircle Aggregates Local Search Listings for Small Businesses

Thanks to the AlwaysOn.com Media 100 "special awards for market disruption," I've discovered a wonderful service, MerchantCircle.com that gives small business owners a convenient way to access (or add) local search listings on most of the important local search directories (only Google seems to be missing) including Yahoo Local, City Search, YellowPages.com, Verizon Superpages, Yelp.com, Insiderpages.com and more.... read more

Local Advertising Made Simple

"MerchantCircle provides the kinds of easy to access tools that will allow local merchants to maximize their online advertising efforts and effectively penetrate all of the natural local search markets."

MerchantCircle connects you with customers in your area - and interested in your business. Compared with traditional advertising like the Yellow Pages, MerchantCircle gives you key advantages for FREE: Easily track where customers are coming from. Update business info and limited-time offers anytime... read more

A New Resource for Local Search

"MerchantCircle is led by an experienced team and funded by investors who share our vision and believe in the power of local businesses."

If you're a small business owner, I recommend you check out this new website designed to "connect you with customers in your area." I first read about MerchantCircle in a post on John Jantsch's Duct Tape Marketing Blog. There's also a CNET brief as well... read more

SBS: Local Search Marketing Guide

"In essence, it's an automated referral service. It's easy to think of a real estate agent or agency inviting mortgage companies, home appraisers, even home cleaners or moving services that the agent/agency likes to work with, and creating a network of recommended business - each giving the other some extra exposure from being in the same circle of friends."

After a couple weeks worth of research, I've finally completed ... no, wrong word ... I've finally gotten far enough along with a guide to local search marketing to make it public here on SBS...read more

MerchantCircle to Crush Yahoo! Local Listings with Local Business Networking

"MerchantCircle makes it profitable (from a presence perspective) for business owners to invite other business owners into the fold."

... As folks increasingly use the web they will decreasingly use the Yellow Pages print offering, and though I don't know the Yellow Pages' online offering, I suspect that MerchantCircle considerably trumps what's currently available from a customization and local networking perspective...

read more

Searchblog: MerchantCircle

"MerchantCircle is trying to get local merchants to play the search game on their own terms, and I like that idea."

The week's buzz is rising on MerchantCircle, a local search play with a twist. I spoke to CEO Ben Smith this week, and he got me smart on the idea behind it. In short, MerchantCircle is trying to get local merchants to play the search game on their own terms, and I like that idea... read more

Service Helps Local Advertisers Maneuver Online Marketing

"MerchantCircle aims to help small companies establish a Web presence and navigate the often intimidating worlds of online search and contextual advertising."

Getting people to search for local businesses online is one thing, but getting local businesses online to greet them is quite another. While Google, Yahoo, MSN and others are making it easier for consumers to connect with local merchants through local directory, mapping, and customer review programs, the newly-launched MerchantCircle aims to help small companies establish a Web presence and navigate the often intimidating worlds of online search and contextual advertising... read more

MerchantCircle.com Helps Local Businesses Connect with Customers & Community

MerchantCircle "might help change the face of small business marketing forever."

Most small business advertising is lousy. I say this because almost all advertising and marketing done by small businesses is about them. It's all about their products and their services and their features and their prices and their guarantees and on and on... read more

MerchantCircle: World's easiest small business Web sites

"[T]here may be no quicker way to establish an online presence ... advertisement management is the real value of MerchantCircle ..."

Thanks to location-specific services (like Google and Yahoo maps), the Worldwide Web is becoming a great resource for local business. In fact, I believe all small and local businesses should have their own Web sites. But many don't... read more

Going local with MerchantCircle

"The 'circle' in the company's name comes from the idea that merchants will create networks of affiliated businesses by adding their names to their profile pages and swapping ads with each other."

They say one of the traits of a successful entrepreneur is persistence, the ability to keep pounding away on your original idea until you can shape it into something viable. That's what Ben Smith has been doing with MerchantCircle, and it may pay off... read more

MerchantCircle: Zero Customer Acquisition Cost

"What's different about MerchantCircle is the composite dimension of the offering - web presence + search marketing + CRM tools (newsletter, blog)."

The not-so-stealth small business platform-cum-CRM tool-cum website substitute, MerchantCircle, officially launched today. (Here's the release and here's CEO Ben Smith talking about MerchantCircle on video: "Use Google to fight back against the big guys.")... read more

MerchantCircle: SEO-Friendly Services for Small Businesses

"[MerchantCircle is] an online 'marketing solution' for U.S. small businesses."

What is MerchantCircle you ask? It's an online "marketing solution" for U.S. small businesses. Depending on your definition, that category could include anywhere from 10 million to 17 million or so entities. Like many others, MerchantCircle takes aim at the yellow pages services market ... read more

Cnet - "MerchantCircle: World's easiest small business Web sites" - What about HomeStead and OfficeLive?

"[W]hat I like about MerchantCircle is that it's optimized for LOCAL businesses."

I saw Cnet's headline about MerchantCirlce, "World's easiest small business Web sites" and had to take a double look. I have not tried MerchantCircle but I have tried HomeStead and Microsoft Offive Live and I know they are VERY easy to use. However what I like about MerchantCircle is that it's optimized for LOCAL businesses... read more

MerchantCircle Connects Local Advertisers to Local Businesses

"[MerchantCircle] hit the 5,000 merchant mark, a tally that's been steadily doubling every 4-6 weeks, and contains more than 14 million listings and aggregates more than 10 million RSS feeds full of local business and marketing information."

Online local business network MerchantCircle has launched publicly today. The MerchantCircle local business network helps businesses connect to their local community and reach local internet users through marketing channels like blogs, email, advertising, coupons, and SEO... read more

MerchantCircle: Small Business Blog of the Day

MerchantCircle "utilizes solid techniques for giving you great local exposure over the internet."

I received an email a few days ago from Stacey Paris of Breakaway Communications. She recommended I check out today's website as a resource for small businesses, but I quickly found that they had a pretty good blog... read more

Online startup done right: launch your blog first

"Genius - merchants see blogs as communicating. Kudos to MerchantCircle."

MerchantCircle know how to build buzz before a launch: they launched their blog in November 2005; the company launches on June 5, 2006. Excellent. When you see a company doing this, you know they understand the online environment... read more

MerchantCircle Targets Local Ad Market

"A key differentiator for MerchantCircle is that each member can create and participate in local commerce networks."

MerchantCircle has a simple goal, but challenging-displace the old fashioned printed Yellow Pages and bring local business into a more social Web of commerce. I talked to Ben Smith, CEO of the startup, who told me that the 14 million local merchants who advertise in the Yellow Pages (some online as well as offline) want a better way to express themselves online and to reach customers... read more