Footfall on the Parade is not the same as customers: what Leamington businesses get wrong about location
The Parade in Leamington Spa is one of the best trading streets in Warwickshire. Wide pavement, Regency frontages, the Pump Room Gardens at one end and Jephson Gardens a minute away. On a Saturday it is full. And yet I regularly talk to owners of businesses on and around it who say the same thing: “We get plenty of people in. They just don’t buy.”
That is because footfall and demand are two different things, and most local marketing confuses them.
Footfall is where people are. Demand is what they came to do.
Someone walking the Parade at eleven on a Saturday may be there for brunch, for the gardens, for a meeting, for a birthday present, or because it is the route from the station to the car park. Only one of those has anything to do with your shop. Standing in a busy place is a bet that some fraction of passers-by happen to want what you sell right now. It is a weak bet, and it is the bet most window displays and A-boards are making.
The people who are already looking for you are on their phones
Here is what happens instead. Someone in Leamington decides they want a specific thing. They pick up their phone and type it: “vintage furniture Leamington”, “dog friendly café Leamington Spa”, “emergency plumber Leamington”. Google shows them a map with three businesses. They go to one of those three. That is the moment demand exists, and the only question is whether you are one of the three.
This is the whole of local marketing, and it is why I spend more time with clients on their Google profile, their reviews and their service pages than on their signage.
Three things to do this month
Find out what people actually search for. Open your Google Business Profile, go to Performance, and look at the search terms. They are usually not the ones you expected. Write those words, in that order, into your website and your profile.
Be specific about where you are. “Leamington Spa” and “Leamington” are searched differently. Use both. Mention the street. Mention the nearest landmark and car park. Every one of those is something a customer types.
Count the right thing. Stop counting people through the door. Start counting calls, direction requests and website clicks from your profile. Those are people who came to do something, and those are the numbers that move when marketing works.
A quick test
Search for your own business type followed by “Leamington Spa” on your phone, standing outside your shop. If you are not in the top three on the map, the busy street outside is not helping you as much as you think, and it is fixable. I can usually tell you why in one call. Book a free call, or see how local SEO works.