Flathead Guide Offers Assistance to Montana Tourists and a Marketing Boost for Local Businesses

Jan. 14, 2013 - PRLog -- The Flathead Valley of Montana draws millions of visitors each year attracted by Montana's magnificent resources such as Glacier National Park, Flathead Lake, and Whitefish ski slopes and world-class fishing and hunting.  Tourists need to locate restaurants, hotels, and RV facilities, Realtors, medical resources and virtually every conceivable product and service found in the Flathead Valley.

Veteran Internet entrepreneur, author and online marketing pro, Tom Heatherington, has announced a new smartphone-optimized online directory for businesses in the Flathead Valley of Montana.  Smartphones are becoming the default Internet access device for millions of Americans and within a short while will become the primary Internet access link worldwide.  

Capitalizing on this trend, the “Flathead Guide” (http://flatheadguide.com) provides information at your fingertips, a convenient search tool and business listing by category, city or keyword tags. Unlike social websites like Yelp or FourSquare, this guide is hyper-local to the Flathead Valley.

According to Heatherington, “Local mobile search is a game changer. To perform well in search results, a business website must be optimized for local information and the Flathead Guide provides two very important benefits.  One, a local link to the businesses primary website from a content-related local site, and secondly, the listing is actually a mini-website with text, images, contact information, a Google map and ‘Tap to Call’ functionality.“

Google’s Our Mobile Planet states that 66% of Americans have performed a search on their mobile after seeing or hearing an offline ad such as newspaper, radio, television, magazines, etc.  This makes it critical for businesses that advertise via conventional media to leverage all aspects of local search and the Flathead Guide helps to accomplish this.

Additionally, the use of QR Codes that are scanned by smartphones is increasing exponentially and many businesses are now including them in their print advertising.  Smartphones are becoming an indispensable element of the daily lives of Americans and maximizing this opportunity is the objective of the Flathead Guide.

About:

Founder of the Flathead Guide, Tom Heatherington, is a recognized Internet business author and online marketing consultant to small business.  His books include the "SEO & Social Media Marketing Guide" and "The Complete Small Business Internet Guide" (published by Macmillan/QUE).  Tom is the former President (co-founder) and COO of Opinioneering Corporation and President of Netcom Interactive.

For more information, please visit:  http://www.flatheadguide.net