ReachLocal
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By: Scam Risk - Expert Reviewer
ReachLocal Review: Is It A Scam?
ReachLocal Review
To make the most profit for the company, the marketing budget of small business owners must be used appropriately and efficiently.
Sad to say, they are exploited by giant, multinational “marketing” companies aiming for a fast and easy profit at their expense.
Is ReachLocal one of those who take advantage of these small businesses?
We’re going to review some things about ReachLocal that you won’t find in other ReachLocal reviews so that you can decide if it really is the best digital marketing system out there.
We’ll talk about whether ReachLocal is the right digital marketing system for you.
At the end, I’ll answer some of the most frequently asked questions regarding ReachLocal and online business in general.
And most important, I’ll show you the exact system I used to build my own internet marketing business to over $40,000 a month in mostly passive income.
This system made me swear off developing products for good, because it uses some of the same skills in a much more powerful and profitable way!
Check Out This Simple Way To Run A Digital Real Estate Empire Online
With no:
- Mortgages
- Property Taxes
- Bad Tenants
This is so simple, it should be illegal.
Table of Contents
ReachLocal Reviews: What Is ReachLocal?
Reach Local is an all-inclusive digital marketing system for small and medium-sized businesses. ReachLocal’s web marketing package contains solutions for the following:
- Search engine marketing (ReachSearch™)
- Web presence (ReachCast™)
- Display advertising (ReachDisplay™)
- Online marketing analytics (TotalTrack®)
- Lead conversion (ReachEdge™)
- Assisted chat service (TotalLiveChat™).
ReachLocal’s mission, according to their corporate website, is to “help local businesses all over the world reach more local consumers online.”
Do they deliver what they promise?
Keep on reading to find out.
ReachLocal, which was founded in 2003, has roughly 2000 people working for them across 68 countries.
The company offers a comprehensive range of internet marketing services to SMBs, including search engine advertising, website design, and social media marketing and management.
With so many staff, offices, and 24,000+ clients and counting, it appears ReachLocal understands what they’re doing.
Their clients, on the other hand, claim differently.
The majority of ReachLocal clients ended up losing a significant amount of money as a result of their investment in their marketing system and are completely dissatisfied with the quality of service they got, particularly the search engine advertising service.
ReachLocal Features
Email & Online Marketing Features
- Dynamic content
- Landing pages
- A/B split testing
- Mobile optimization
- List management
Lead Management Features
- Lead nurturing
- Lead scoring and grading
- Data quality management
- Automated sales alerts and tasks
Social Media Marketing Features
- Social sharing and campaigns
- Social profile integration
Reporting & Analytics Features
- Dashboards
- Standard reports
- Custom reports
Inflated Search Engine Advertising Prices
ReachLocal aggressively offers you Pay Per Click advertising through the Google AdWords system.
Running a PPC campaign is absolutely fine if that’s applicable and appropriate to your business goals, industry, and of course, your overall budget.
This is exactly where a lot of their clients who are small business owners lose their working, and at times, tight marketing budget – all while ReachLocal is solely reaping the “benefits.”
The outrageous upcharge is the most common complaint regarding the search engine advertising service of ReachLocal.
You see, AdWords works on a ‘click’ system, which means that some keywords pay more per click than the others which depends on a lot of factors such as location, competition, and a lot more.
Personally, what annoys me the most about ReachLocal is the amount they charge their clients per click.
If you go through the hundreds of user reviews online, you’ll find that these rates are astronomically inflated in relation to the actual cost per click.
Lack Of Reporting
A PPC campaign would need data and analytics to assess if it’s going to be successful or not.
Clients of ReachLocal lose control and access to their PPC campaigns, which not only leaves them at a loss but also empties their pockets.
With ReachLocal’s search engine advertising service, looks like you’ll be having a hard time getting your ad copy, understanding the number of clicks and impressions your ads obtained, knowing your keyword options, and other PPC metrics.
Your ReachLocal contact may give you a nice and neat baseline report, but what you really need is much more than this.
Using ReachLocal, you won’t really know the out the amount of money you could save if you run the campaigns yourself or hire a PPC specialist.
One of the reasons we created this ReachLocal review for 2021 is its grave lack of reporting.
Google Third Party Policies
ReachLocal is required to be completely compliant with Google’s Third Party Policies because they use Google AdWords.
Not really.
Take, for example, the information from the Moz Community forum. Yes, it’s a little out of date, but it’s still valid.
Google Third Party Policies, that PPC firms like ReachLocal and Titan Web Marketing Solutions must follow, say that clients should get cost per click, number of clicks, and impressions as the minimum requirement.
Given that it doesn’t say that these 3rd party companies should give this information to clients, it’s still considered as a best practice for PPC companies.
ReachLocal’s search engine advertising reporting methodology is a perfect example of providing customers with very basic metrics that are unlikely to help you make informed decisions on your campaign’s performance.
ReachLocal Direct Experiences
I know of a lot of ReachLocal’s clients who have attempted to quit the program. I asked them why for the purpose of this review. Their replies are all the same:
- Inadequate reporting
- Prices are absurdly expensive.
- Lack of communication
- Nothing changed once they were contacted.
- Overpromised and under-delivered projects
- Calls increased, but many came from areas well outside of their service region.
This ReachLocal experience is comparable to what clients of Hibu complained about. Hibu is another marketing company that offers a similar product.
Being a company committed to assisting local companies, you’d assume their expertise lies on driving local traffic to their clients’ businesses.
The ridiculous back-end is one of the most concerning aspects I discovered when I worked top switch over a client’s ReachLocal website.
They really don’t provide any information, i.e.,- reports, material, and etc., to their clients.
Review Trends For ReachLocal & Other Large Marketing Agencies
I have had clients who formerly worked with major marketing companies.
Some of them had wonderful experiences but still opted to leave for valid reasons. Some clients needed to cut costs.
Others were just disappointed with what they were receiving, while there are those who simply wished to switch directions.
Judging from the reviews of employees and customers, I get the impression that ReachLocal functions in a manner similar to DexYP, formerly Dex Media.
Typical Complaints
Lack Of Transparency
Assessing your outcomes might be tough for people who employ these companies’ PPC services.
The main challenge is to understand what you spend for clicks and what percentage of your budget goes to management costs.
Google has a clear policy in place on this. Businesses that handle Google Advertisements on behalf of their clients must submit the payments made to Google (the amount spent just on ads) as well as management fees.
Contract Issues
These businesses will require you to sign a contract with them.
And because of this, it would be difficult for you to get out of it or demand a refund.
If you ask me, don’t sign a contract with them at all. If they are truly sure about their product and their ability to deliver promised results, there is no need for a contract.
Clients should be free to leave at any time and not be charged any further fees.
Simply Not Delivering What ReachLocal Say They Can
This is not unusual in the case of large agencies.
They are just “too big” to deliver the quality and attention required to effectively assist small businesses in growing with digital marketing.
Consequently, ReachLocal receives a lot of complaints and negative customer reviews.
If you browse through ReachLocal complaints online, you’ll see that this issue comes up frequently.
FAQs
What Are the Top Competitors Of ReachLocal?
ReachLocal rivals include WordStream Advisor, Google Ads (previously AdWords), and Salesforce.com.
What Is ReachLocal's Best Feature?
With a score of 9.1, reviewers give the highest marks to Dynamic content, Lead scoring and grading, and Data quality management.
Who Uses ReachLocal?
ReachLocal’s most frequent users are small business owners and building materials industries.
Conclusion: Is It A Scam?
ReachLocal isn’t a scam and is a legit digital marketing system.
However, I’m not so sure about the system they employ. Judging from the negative reviews I’ve read, it’s best to take a bit of caution when considering this tool.
Don’t get me wrong though. There are a few positive reviews from customers of ReachLocal. Take, for example, a review given by an office manager as in below:
“Up to date design of websites and ease of implementation.”
“Communication is easy and readily available with ReachLocal employees I work with.”
“Our account is transparent and describes in detail our weekly/monthly/yearly progress.”
But in my opinion, a local marketing company would be more fitting to help you if you are a small business owner, and not some giant company who wouldn’t care if you succeed or fail.
You can try Titan Web Marketing Solutions if you need any PPC Ad services. They cater to small businesses across the United States.
It is entirely possible to build a profitable, successful business… But there are better ways to build a business other than with ReachLocal.
Because unlike a digital marketing system, it actually provides real proof of real success from real people as recently as a few days ago.
What Is Our Top Recommendation For Making Money Online In 2021?
Our review team has come across a program in the real estate industry that is next level!
Although it’s not real estate in the traditional sense, it’s all digital.
Where ReachLocal falls short is in scalability.
You can’t realistically expect to be able to make an infinite amount of phone calls every day, you are limited by time.
But what if you leverage it?
With this digital real estate program, you can have the phone ringing at every minute of the day and never have to pick up once!
Sound too good to be true?
Of course it does!
But it isn’t…in fact, business owners wish they had this skill!
All you have to do is build and rank a website and forward the jobs off to a business owner in town, you could even email it to them!
This works for literally any service based business, tree service, plumbing, towing, etc.
How do you get paid and how much?
Simple, after you forward the jobs off to a business owner and he makes some money off of them, you simply ask to make the deal beneficial for each other.
A fair price to charge per lead, depending on the industry is 10-20%…let’s just use the tree service industry for example and go by worst case scenario.
Let’s say you build and rank the site and only 10 jobs a month come in. The average tree service job is anywhere from $500-$2000!
That means at bare minimum you have an asset worth $500 a month!
See why they call it digital real estate now? That’s a rent payment.
The great thing is how easy it is to scale. You don’t have to answer the phone…all you have to do is get the phone to ring.
Remember ReachLocal talking about improving your bottom line?
This one actually allows you to collect that without being on the phone all day.
Truly passive income!
The training program takes making money online to a whole other level. The owner of the program walks you through how to build and rank a site hand in hand, with the occasional voice over when he is sharing his screen.
You will learn the importance of keywords, website name, how to send call notifications via email, backlinking, etc.
Once the training program is completed you will also have access to a Facebook group much better than the ReachLocal in our opinion. This group is much more active.
Unlike ReachLocal, where you’re the closer…these websites turn into your closer. A business will always want more leads and another job. In fact it doesn’t even matter that the job isn’t coming from their website name…they see it as it is…expanding digital real estate.
Unlike ReachLocal, more people have been able to walk away from their 9-5 job as well.
Now, I know you probably have tons of questions…
Things We Liked:
- Reach Edge Platform to capture leads
- Easy to use website
- Immediate lead conversion
- Chat support
Things We Didn't Like:
- Lack of transparency and reporting
- Doesn't deliver what they promise
- Contract issues