Do you manage a business with a physical premises? Or maybe you are building a website for a business that does? Or maybe you don’t have physical premises, but you sell products through a network of distributors or stores.Either way, you need customers to be able to find where to get your products from, so having a store locator on your site should be a priority.In this article, you’ll learn how to add a store locator to your website in just a few steps and with no coding needed. Sound good?But first:
What is a Store Locator?
A store locator is a tool designed to help users find a physical store for a business, via a handy map embedded on a company's website. They look a little something like this:
Having an up to date store locator is essential for acquiring local customers.After all, did you know that 72% of people conducting a local search will visit a store within 5 miles? That’s a lot of potential sales you could be losing out on if people can’t find your business.Thankfully, adding a store locator to your site using Storemapper is straightforward:
How To Add A Store Locator To Your Website
Having a store locator embedded on your website doesn’t have to be a hard task. In fact, it can be as simple as copy and pasting some business information or uploading a spreadsheet.Here’s how to add a store locator to your website in 4 simple steps:
Step 1: Sign up to a Store Locator App
First up, you are going to want to sign up to use a store locator app like Storemapper. Don’t worry, there’s a 7 day free trial and you can install it in minutes with no coding.
Step 2: Add Your Stores
Adding locations to Storemapper is simple and you’ve got three options; manually through the dashboard, using a spreadsheet via the CSV Bulk Uploader or syncing to Google Drive.Let’s quickly look at how to do all methods:
Method #1: Adding store manually using the dashboard
Firstly, log into your account and from the dashboard, just hit Add New Store:
Then just fill in all the details. At minimum, you must fill in the Name and Address fields, but it’s a good idea to fill in the other store data fields too in order to give customers as much useful information as possible.If you have lots of store data to add, doing it this way is going to take you some time to get all your stores listed. Thankfully, there is a bulk upload feature to speed this up:
Method #2: Bulk upload your store locations
If you are going to bulk upload your store data, you need to have your locations ready in a spreadsheet.For Storemapper to grab your store data, the only requirement is that it is in .csv format. The rest is done during upload.You can read CSV bulk uploader in the Knowledge Base.
Method #3: Google Drive Sync
The final method of uploading your store data is super handy: Google Drive Sync.Premium Users can link a Google Sheet to a Storemapper account and sync up store data with a simple click of a button or even set it to run automatically per a daily schedule.Just contact Storemapper and request a sync setup and you’ll see this in your dashboard:
Once you click the Google Drive sync button, you’ll be able to manage your store data right inside your spreadsheet. You can find more about setting up Google Drive here in the Knowledge Base.
Step 2: Copy Your Code and Customize Your Locator
Almost there now.Once your store data has been added, all that’s left to do is copy your code and embed it on your site. (PS, Storemapper has been designed to seamlessly work on any CMS or e-Commerce platform)
Because StoreMapper generates standard HTML content right on your web page, the CSS files on your site will affect how StoreMapper looks, which is a big improvement over store locators that rely on an iframe.If you are using a platform like WordPress, the takeaway here is that your store locator will take on the CSS theme, helping to maintain a consistent brand across your store page and main website pages.Of course, if you need to make some additional CSS customisations and tweaks to the design, you can do that too. Having a store locator that looks part of your website (and not just an after through) goes a long way in keeping your branding consistent.
Step 3: Embed on Your Site
The final step is to take the code and embed it on your website.Simply copy and paste the code into your site and you're all ready to start driving customers to your store locations.Once added, your map will render fully on your page from the embed code. You only have to add the code once and changes will automatically upload to your site.So now you know how to add a store locator to your website, let’s look at why you should in the first place:
Benefits of a Store Locator
According to statistics, 88% of all consumers will research on the internet before they make a purchase at a store premises. Across the globe, 9 out of 10 people who research a product or service online will eventually purchase in-store.A store locator helps your prospective customers find out where your physical stores are, so they can visit and make a purchase. As a result, your in-store footfall and sales can increase.Your business may also benefit from adding a store locator platform to its website by:
Increasing traffic to your website
To find your store location offline, potential customers may first search for your business online, either by using Google or going to your website directly. Either way, while they are on your website, they may also explore it.
Improving your online visibility
Since store locators are essentially databases containing rich location pages and local content, they will help to improve your business’s local search rankings.Whether your customers specifically search for your brand or search for generic products/services in that area, your business will be more visible online with a store locator than your competitors that don't have one on their websites.
Saving time and money
Using a store locator means your website visitors will have all the important information about your business in one place.They won't need to contact your business to find out the opening or closing hours or request directions. What’s more, it'll save you time and money since you won't have to hire someone just to answer these queries.
How to Optimize Your Store Locator?
Once you’ve got your store locator live on your site, you should look at optimising it. Here are a few ideas that might help you:
- Add local and unique content - not only does it help your customers, but helps to improve your SEO as well. Include things like contact details, opening hours and any promotions/offers that are specific to that store location.
- Include keywords for SEO - for higher rankings, always choose specific, local keywords instead of the general ones
- Make the store locator mobile-responsive - today, most of your website visitors will use their smartphones to look for your store, so make it a priority to optimise your website for mobile. Storemapper comes with a mobile friendly layout, so users do not have to do anything specific to optimize for mobile.
Summary
As you can see, adding a store locator to your site doesn’t have to be time consuming.If you need more information about setting up or configuring your store locator app, be sure to check out the Storemapper Knowledge Base.[/et_pb_text][/et_pb_column][/et_pb_row][/et_pb_section]
