Your website
Is the phone number visible on a phone without scrolling? Is there one page per service and one for each part of the county you serve? A single page that lists a long string of suburbs does little for any of them.
A presence audit for a county of many place names 
5.0 Rating on Google
Cook County IL Online Marketing and Internet Marketing, Audited First
Online marketing and internet marketing are one job in Cook County: a customer should be able to find a business, believe it and reach it, in every municipality it serves. GetPhound is an online marketing company, and it looks at what a customer sees before anything new is bought.
5.0 Rating on GoogleThe online customer
Who is searching: Cook County next to the typical Illinois county
Start with the people on the other side of the screen. These are survey figures, not live counts.
| What is measured | Cook County | Median Illinois county | Median U.S. county |
|---|---|---|---|
| Workers who work from home | 14.2 percent | 6.4 percent | 7 percent |
| Commutes of 30 minutes or more | 26.8 percent | 14.7 percent | 14.3 percent |
| Adults with a bachelor's degree | 41.3 percent | 20.3 percent | 21.1 percent |
| Residents 65 and older | 15.2 percent | 20 percent | 19.4 percent |
| Spanish spoken at home | 20.7 percent | 2 percent | 2.9 percent |
American Community Survey 5-year estimates for 2018 through 2022. A median county is the middle one, not an average.
Names and addresses
An address in Cook County is harder to match than it looks
Chicago online marketing and suburban online marketing run into the same problem. Directories, maps and AI assistants all try to decide which place a business belongs to, and Cook County, Illinois, gives them plenty of ways to guess wrong. The county has nearly 130 municipalities, 29 townships outside Chicago and Evanston, and a small area of unincorporated land. Pockets of unincorporated Maine Township carry Des Plaines mailing addresses, so a mailing address is not the same as a municipality. Cicero is its own town and not part of Chicago, even though it borders the West Side. Both airports sit inside the City of Chicago, so their addresses are Chicago addresses even when the nearest suburb is Des Plaines.
Then the loose names. People say North Shore, Southland, the Loop and Chicagoland, and the three sides of Chicago have disputed edges. Western Avenue is called Dixie Highway in Harvey. Lake County, Illinois, and Lake County, Indiana, both border Cook County, which causes mix-ups for anyone searching from outside. If your site says Chicago, your Google Business Profile says Des Plaines and a directory says Maine Township, a search engine sees three names for one door. Online marketing for a Cook County business starts by deciding which name you lead with, and then making every listing agree. That holds for a village shop and for a Loop office, and it holds across Cook County, Illinois, from the lakefront to the Southland.
Six surfaces
Where a Cook County customer meets your business before calling
We go through these in the order a customer would. The result is a short, ranked list of fixes, not a binder.
Google Business Profile and map listings
Check the category, the service area, the hours, the photos and the pin. For a business in a village with a Chicago mailing address, the pin and the primary name are worth a careful look.
Directory and citation names
Compare the way your business name, address and phone are written across directories. In this county, differences between a village name, a township name and a mailing city are the usual culprit.
Reviews
Read what is there, what is unanswered and which place the reviewer names. Reviews that mention the suburb help a business show up for that suburb.
Social profiles and Meta pages
Hours, photos and a recent post matter more than followers. If the business also runs Meta Ads (Facebook and Instagram), the page is what people check after seeing an ad.
Email, text and call tracking
A tracked number per zone, a form that sends to a monitored inbox and a text reply that goes out the same hour turn visits into jobs.
Who works here
The biggest sectors people work in, and what that says about who searches
Sector shapes who needs what. A hospital district, a freight corridor and a university each send a different kind of customer to a different kind of business.
| Sector | People employed | Slice of the workforce |
|---|---|---|
| Health care and social assistance | 358,958 | 13.8 percent |
| Professional, scientific and technical services | 286,892 | 11 percent |
| Education | 247,912 | 9.5 percent |
| Manufacturing | 242,737 | 9.3 percent |
| Retail trade | 240,182 | 9.2 percent |
| Transportation and warehousing | 187,714 | 7.2 percent |
Census ACS 5-year estimates 2018-2022, workers 16 and older by industry.
Sector and search
Four sectors, four kinds of online customer
Health care and social assistance employs 358,958 workers, 13.8 percent of the county's total, and professional, scientific and technical services employs 286,892. Education adds 247,912, manufacturing 242,737 and retail trade 240,182. Transportation and warehousing, which takes in freight and air transportation, employs 187,714, or 7.2 percent. Each group is also a customer base for other businesses, and each searches differently.
A business that sells to clinics and hospitals is found by the person who needs a vendor on a Tuesday afternoon, and that buyer reads the website and checks the profile. A freight, packaging or warehouse supplier is found in search by procurement staff who may be nowhere near the county. A shop or restaurant near a campus lives by its profile and its photos. A professional practice leans on reviews and plain explanations of the service. We write the audit differently for each, because the first three seconds of an online customer's visit are different too.
Audit by business type
What the presence audit checks first, by kind of business
| Kind of business | Checked first | What to look for |
|---|---|---|
| Home service trade | Google Business Profile service area and the phone path | A service area that lists the places the crew actually covers, and a number that rings a person. |
| Professional practice | Provider pages, reviews and intake | One page per practice area or procedure, one per provider and a form that does not ask for more than it needs. |
| Restaurant, salon or shop | Hours, photos, menu or services and directions | Directions that name the nearest station or expressway exit, plus accurate holiday hours. |
| Supplier to hospitals, freight or campuses | Service pages and company information | Pages that name the sectors served and the ways to request a quote. |
| Business with two or more locations | One page and one profile per location | Names written the same way on every listing, and no location page that is a copy of another. |
From audit to fixes
How the audit turns into work
Collect every name the business goes by
List the legal name, the trade name, every address, every suite number and every phone number that has ever been used. In a county with this many municipalities, old addresses cause more trouble than new ones.
Rank the gaps by what a customer sees
Missing phone numbers and wrong hours come first. A confused service area comes next. Everything else waits until the first fixes are in.
Fix the profile and the site together
The profile and the website should say the same thing in the same words. We change both in one pass so they do not drift apart again.
Set up the tracking, then look again in 30 days
A tracked number or form per zone means the next audit uses real calls, not impressions.
Plans
Where online marketing sits in the three Organic Growth plans
Online marketing at GetPhound runs through Organic Growth, month to month with no contract and no setup fee. If you would rather start with zone and service pages, RankGuarantee™ is $495 a month for 25 landing pages. Paid ads management is separate.
Questions
Questions about online marketing and internet marketing for Cook County
What is the monthly price of Cook County online marketing?
Online marketing runs through Organic Growth, which has three steps: Silver at $1,495 a month, Gold at $2,495 with a managed website, and Platinum at $3,495. If you want zone and service pages built first, RankGuarantee™ is $495 a month for 25 landing pages. Paid ads management begins at $895 a month, and the ad budget is yours to set. Nothing is charged to start, and you can leave at the end of any month.
Where does the line fall between online marketing and internet marketing?
Not in practice. Internet marketing is the older name and online marketing is what most owners say today. Both mean the search results, maps, ads, social pages, email and website a customer meets. We use online marketing for the audit and the day to day work.
What does the presence audit include?
The website, the Google Business Profile, the main directories, reviews, social pages and how calls and forms are tracked. We deliver a ranked list of fixes with the reason for each, and you decide which ones to approve. For a business with several locations, we repeat the check for each one, because a clean profile in one village does not fix a confused listing in another.
Why does my business show up under the wrong town?
Because the signals disagree. A mailing city, a township and a village name can each point to a different place, and a search engine has to pick one. Cook County makes this easy to get wrong, since a mailing address is not always the same as the municipality. Matching the business name and address everywhere, and choosing one primary place on the profile, usually settles it once the updated listings are picked up.
Can you help a business with locations in Chicago and the suburbs?
Yes. Each location needs its own page, its own profile and its own tracked number, and the business name and address should be written the same way everywhere. We often separate the reporting as well, because the city and the ring respond differently, and a combined number can hide a weak location behind a strong one. We also check that no location page is a copy of another.
Do I need social media for online marketing here?
You need an accurate profile that shows the business is active: current hours, a few real photos and a recent post. How much more than that you need depends on the business. A restaurant or salon gets more from regular posts than a law office does, and a supplier to hospitals may get almost nothing from them. We decide it during the audit, not before, so you do not pay for activity that does not matter.
How is this different from the digital marketing page?
The digital marketing page sets the order of work for the first 90 days for three kinds of business. This page is about the audit that comes before it: what a customer finds today on your site, your profile and your listings, and which fixes should come first. Most businesses benefit from reading both, and the audit usually decides which of the three sequences fits.
Explore more
Related Services for a Business Here
Start Here
- Search Engine OptimizationSearch names across the city, the suburbs and the airports, which pages to build for each, and how to choose an SEO company.
- Digital MarketingA first 90 days for three kinds of Chicago-area business, tied to the trades and travel patterns of a very large county.
- Online Marketing (you are here)An audit of the name, address, reviews and pages a customer meets before calling, written for a county where addresses and place names collide.
- Search Engine Optimization and Online MarketingWhere search work leads, how paid ads and the website back it up, and the order to cover the suburbs and the city in.
Get Found in Search
- Google Maps and Local SEOBusiness Profile setup for one door, a service area or many locations, written around municipalities, mailing towns and airports.
- AI Search OptimizationHow assistants answer questions about the city, the suburbs and the airports, and what to publish so they can quote your business.
Paid Advertising
- Google Ads ManagementZone-by-zone Google Ads for a county where the account has to cover the city, the ring and the people who arrive by air.
- PPC ManagementPay-per-click in a county with some of the most crowded trades in the country, and how to decide when paid should go first.
- Meta Ads (Facebook and Instagram)Audiences, offers and event timing for Meta Ads in a county of renters, families, new arrivals and festival crowds.
Website and Content
- Lead GenerationWhere inquiries come from when customers live nearby, ride in on Metra or land at an airport, and how to track each source.
- Website DesignA website plan for a business that serves many villages, Chicago sides and transit stops, with fast mobile calling and directions.
- Content MarketingA publishing plan tied to lake-effect snow, sewer-backup storms, festival weeks and the place names Chicagoland actually uses.
Around the County
Get in Touch
Ask for the Presence Audit
Send us your website and the names your business goes by, and we will tell you what a Cook County customer finds first. Call 610-825-4363 or email hello@getphound.com.