Ever since the creation of mega stores, local small businesses have been in steady decline. Is it possible that local Internet marketing could be just the thing to reverse that trend, and ultimately revive main street?

We've seen the headline time and time again, “Another Walmart is set to open in...” Although there are some instances where the locals put up a fight, it rarely makes a difference, the store is soon open for business.

Of course, we all know the impact these Supercenters have on the communities they infiltrate. Not long after the doors open, the small mom and pop stores go out of business leaving empty storefronts and broken dreams. They simply can't withstand the competition from those large conglomerates.

One of the reasons is, because of the fact they buy such a large volume at one time, they get their merchandise at a much lower cost. As a result, they can drastically under cut the small business in retail price. In fact, there are many instances where the superstore can actually sell a product for a price that is lower than what the small business owner can buy it for at wholesale cost.

Another reason that makes it hard for the small business to compete is the cost of advertising and promotion. The larger stores have a seemingly endless supply of capital available for that purpose. The problem is, smaller operations don't have near as much money to invest in advertising.

Local Internet Marketing is the solution to the problem.

There is a method of advertising and promotion that would level the playing field when it comes to attracting consumers. It's called local Internet marketing, and the fact that its success depends on knowledge, as opposed to money, puts the small business on even terms with the big business.

The process involves the implementation of proper search engine optimization strategies, whereas a small business can obtain a higher rank in organic (free) search results, than the superstore does. The goal is to get ranked in the top position of the search results listings for all of the keywords or phrases that are associated with your product or service, coupled with your geographical location.

With a number one rank, along with compelling text in the title and description of your listing, you'll get a high volume of visitors to your website. Then all you need is a good marketing strategy for converting those visitors into customers.

Some of the best marketing strategies include telling the visitors what it is about your business that makes it stand out over those mega stores. It might be the personal service you offer, a better warranty, or the simple fact that at your store, they don't have to wait in a checkout line for half an hour.

After you've developed your website visitors into satisfied customers, the final step would be to have them spread the word about your business. There is no better advertising than word of mouth, and in today's digital world this can be accomplished very rapidly through Social Media.

This whole process can be implemented through one of two ways, either by the business owner themselves, or by contracting with an local Internet marketing firm. The best part is, once it's put into place there is very little maintenance, and you don't have to keep investing money like you would with traditional advertising mediums such as Yellow Pages, Radio, and TV.

So, could local Internet marketing revive main street? Absolutely! If one by one, they take the steps to tap into the digital age, the possibility does exist for the small mom and pop businesses to flourish. What do you think?