The Latest News From Melon Local

Stay in the know with the latest news in digital marketing, best practices and updates from Melon Local.

How AI Determines Which Business Is the Best

You know your business is the best. But when someone asks AI (Artificial Intelligence) for the best business nearby, does your name come up? And if another business gets recommended, what made AI choose it over yours? Let’s look at how ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude and Perplexity find business information and

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Sati Soulakhian, insurance agent, sharing five things she loves about working with Melon Local and its digital marketing services

5 Things I Love About Melon Local – Feat. Sati Soulakhian

Motivated by her passion for helping others and shaped by her upbringing in a hard-working immigrant family from Armenia, Sati Soulakhian knew she was on the right path when she opened her insurance office in Glendale, CA, in 2022. Her journey hasn’t been without its challenges—especially when it came to finding a digital marketing agency that truly understood her needs and local market. Fortunately, Sati found a fruitful partnership with

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Man speaking into a microphone beside the headline “Don’t Let Your Leads go to Waste!” on a Melon Local follow-up strategies blog graphic.

Converting Insurance Leads to Customers: Follow-Up Best Practices

You’ve invested in your paid search leads, but are they actually paying off? As Ernie said in our Melon Minute video above, you may not realize it, but quality leads may be hiding in plain sight, including places like day-to-day conversations with customers, your social media and Yelp. Let’s take a deeper dive into our lead follow-up tips so you can start closing more leads than ever before! Tip 1:

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Melon Local team member explaining the timeline for improving organic search rankings through SEO and long-term digital marketing strategies

How Long Does it Take to Improve Organic Search Results

Have you wondered how long it takes to grow your business’s organic search ranking? The truth is, there’s no clear consensus on this. Typically, it can take anywhere between 3–12 months to notice an improvement in your organic search results, but this can be contingent on a number of different factors — some in your control, others not so much. Let’s explore what factors influence your organic ranking and dispel

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Kieran Taylor, Client Success Assistant at Melon Local, featured in a “Melon of the Month” spotlight graphic.

Melon Spotlight: Kieran Taylor

Say hello to our August 2024 Melon Spotlight, Kieran Taylor! As our first-ever Client Success Assistant, Kieran has played an instrumental role in providing additional support for our agents and Client Success team, including helping with the onboarding process, optimizing Google Business Profiles, resolving map issues and assisting with reputation management. Watch our conversation with her to learn more about what she most enjoys about working at Melon Local and

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Man giving a thumbs-down gesture beside the headline “How Are You Handling One-Star Reviews?” on a Melon Local blog graphic.

How to Address One-Star Online Business Reviews

As a business owner, feedback should always be welcomed, but what should you do when you get a negative review? Digital feedback can be very influential for your business, considering over 75.5 percent of consumers put their trust in online reviews. We talked about what to do in the video up above, but now let’s debunk some common myths, as well as what it takes to remove unwanted negative reviews.

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Bryan Nowlin, insurance agent, featured in Melon Local's Interview with an Agent series discussing agency growth, leadership, and business success

Interview with an Agent: Bryan Nowlin

After spending four years learning about the ins and outs of insurance while working for his cousin’s agency, Bryan Nowlin fell in love with the industry and felt compelled to open his Fort Worth, TX agency in 2022. Having seen firsthand the success and results Melon Local was able to deliver while working as an insurance representative, he knew it only made sense to go with us for his own

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Christina Shields, Director of Client Success at Melon Local, featured in a “Client Success Story” graphic.

Client Success Story with Christina Shields

From delivering results for her clients to managing her own team’s marketing strategies, Director of Client Success and Client Relations Christina Shields plays a crucial role in forming fruitful relationships with all our clients at Melon Local. We caught up with Christina to learn more about how she “ex-seeds” expectations across the board. Need someone in your corner like Christina? Schedule a demo today!    

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Melon Local team member sharing key strategies to help insurance agents increase social media engagement and connect with customers online

How Insurance Agents Can Maximize Social Media Engagement

Social media isn’t just about posting content — it’s about engaging with your audience to build relationships, trust and, ultimately, your business. But what does engagement look like on different platforms? Let’s dive into what engagement looks like across Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and TikTok. Community Building and Interaction on Facebook Facebook’s engagement is driven by likes, comments, shares and group interactions. It’s a platform where community building is not just

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Melon Local team member sharing key strategies to help insurance agents increase social media engagement and connect with customers online

How Social Media and Organic Search Benefit Each Other

The intersection of social media and organic search optimization isn’t just a crossroad — it’s a digital superhighway to growing your business. Leveraging the strengths of both these digital realms can propel your online visibility to new heights, drive more traffic and, ultimately, help you dominate your local market. Let’s explore how these two powerful forces can be utilized together to grow your business! How Social Media Enhances Organic Search

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Latest Blog Posts

Melon Local team members posing together in the office to celebrate company culture, teamwork and a positive workplace environment

The Power of Positivity at Melon Local

From earning our Google Premier Partner status in early 2022 to increasing the number of our clients from 200 to 1,500 over a two-year period, we owe the majority of our success to creating a positive environment inside and outside our office! “Our culture is what has set Melon Local apart during and after the Covid remote work era,” says our CEO Whitney Green. “I have always been passionate about

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Smartphone displaying the Google Business Profile app with tips for optimizing a Google Business Profile

Utilizing Your Google Business Profile as an Insurance Agent

Having a fully optimized Google Business Profile (GBP) is one of the most important things you can do as part of your insurance marketing strategy.  There’s no reason not to have a GBP, considering Google is the most visited website and search engine in the world, and it’s free to create.  Think of your profile as a Yellow Pages listing that features everything people need to know about your business,

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Portrait of insurance agent Dennis Holland featured in Melon Local's Interview with an Agent series

Interview with an Agent: Dennis Holland

Before becoming an insurance agent, Dennis Holland had a rewarding 10-year career in credit lending. However, when the owners decided to shut things down, Dennis found a new career working for a friend and insurance agent in ​​Alpharetta, GA. Three years later, he was given the opportunity to take over a retiring agent’s office in nearby Cumming, GA. Since opening his agency on June 1, 2021, Dennis has been able

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Woman holding a laptop while comparing search advertising and display advertising strategies for insurance marketing

Search Ads Versus Display Ads in Insurance Advertising

When it comes to incorporating online ads in your insurance advertising campaigns, having the right display and search ads can make a difference in growing your agency. While both of these ad formats should be utilized by your agency, they each have specific advantages for different types of campaigns. You can also waste a decent chunk of your advertising budget if you’re not using the right ad types for your

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Man holding an Instagram like icon to represent social media engagement and audience interaction on Instagram

20 Ways to Use Instagram in Your Insurance Marketing Strategy

With over 1 billion users across the globe, Instagram is one of the most popular social media networks in the world and one of the best social media platforms to implement your insurance marketing strategy. Besides being a popular outlet for sharing video and photo content, it’s one of the biggest platforms for digital marketing, with over an outstanding 25 million active business accounts. If that’s not convincing enough for

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Portrait of insurance agent Dave Christy featured in Melon Local's Interview with an Agent series

Interview with an Agent: Dave Christy

Washington insurance agent Dave Christy is a “numbers guy” at heart.  Originally from Columbus, OH, Dave moved to Washington during high school and graduated from Washington State University with a focus in Math and Communications. After graduation, he put his skills to the test as a stockbroker for several years before becoming a licensed insurance agent in 1994. Following the success of his first agency in Spokane Valley, WA, he

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Man holding an Instagram like icon to represent social media engagement and audience interaction on Instagram

4 Do’s and Don’ts of Using Insurance Keywords

Using the right insurance marketing keywords can make a difference in how well your agency’s website ranks in search engines and can impact your leads.  If you’re not familiar with what keywords are, think of them as GPS coordinates for your Search Engine Optimization or Organic Search Optimization campaigns that help people reach your content online.  Having the right keywords can determine how popular your website is in search algorithms. Search

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Customer using a smartphone to leave a five-star review for a business

6 Ways You Can Generate Reviews for Your Insurance Agency

As part of your insurance marketing strategy and online reputation management, generating and encouraging online reviews is essential.  Online review statistics have shown over 54 percent of online shoppers read at least four product reviews before purchasing a product.  Having a substantial number of positive reviews is crucial for adding credibility to your agency’s reputation. On the other hand, negative reviews can also help you determine any unmet needs of

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Person using a tablet to perform a Google search, representing search engine optimization and online visibility

What to Know About Google’s Responsive Search Ads

Google will no longer serve new expanded text ads starting June 30, 2022 The world of paid advertising is constantly evolving, especially with Google, which is continuously updating how it runs its ad programs. If your business revolves around insurance marketing – let alone any kind of marketing – you should be aware of Google’s plans to scrap expanded text ads to instead focus on responsive search ads on June

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