Okay, children, sit down, and Grandma X is going to tell you a story. Once upon a time, we had to look up companies (and people) in printed telephone books. Businesses were listed in the Yellow Pages, arranged by type of business, and then the listings were in alphabetical order. So if you were, say, a print shop, you might have thought it was really clever to call yourself AAA Printing. That way, when someone looked up “Print Shop” in the Yellow Pages, you would be first. Great.
So, let’s say print shops, XYZ Printing and AAA Printing, are both located near a university. This university’s master’s students need to deliver their thesis in five hard copies bound in magenta. XYZ creates a website with their location, directions on how to get there, their services and prices, and in the months of May and June, a lead magnet that they have a special on magenta hard covers and if you deliver the text by Tuesday, they can have it ready by Thursday. AAA decides not to bother and only has a standard Google listing with their name, address, and telephone number. Are you still with me? The old search was “town + print shop,” so both would pop up, and you could call. Now we say to Chat, “find me a place close by that I can get my master’s thesis printed and bound.”
Guess which print shop pops up? And why? How do I ensure Chat finds me? Well we have to do the work to help answer the question.