MarionVibe.com – WHY???

Rural business directories matter, and that’s why we’re building www.marionvibe.com.

Most of us have a desire to “Shop Local” and support our community businesses; but in small towns and rural counties finding the right local business can be both difficult and frustrating. Why is this? For starters:

• The old go-to source, the printed Yellow Pages in the back of the phone book are long gone.
• Only a small percentage of the available businesses can still be found in brick and mortar buildings in Town Square.
• Radio and television ads are quite often beyond the budget of small businesses.

Without delving too deeply into the complex and ever-changing world of large search engine algorithms such as google; simply stated, they favor national chains and large metropolitan businesses with big ad budgets and a large quantity of web interactions. And often, even when a search engine query produces a list of nearby rural businesses, it’s littered with links to long since closed businesses that go nowhere and lead to frustration. In turn, this frustration leads to the customer resorting to a big-name provider instead of bothering with local businesses.

Free and easy to create Facebook listings can help but fall far short of what’s needed. Facebook favors social engagement (lots of visitors, lots of discussion). If you and/or your business site have this then a Facebook Business Listing can work well; however, it requires a lot of time to cultivate a high level of social engagement and a lot of nurturing to keep it going.

Many businesses still use roadside signs but their effectiveness has been diminished in today’s society because most vehicle passengers are staring down at their phones, while hopefully, at least the driver is paying attention to the road.

In the end, a vast amount of Local Businesses can only be found by search engines that probably hurt more than help, buried facebook sites, word-of-mouth, roadside signs, and fading tribal knowledge. MarionVibe.com seeks to remedy this. We plan to be much more than a simple business directory. We’re not just listing businesses, we’re creating a tool that’s practical and easy to use for residents and visitors to our area. We’re creating a mechanism that transforms “Shop Local” from an enthusiastic slogan to an implementable daily habit by concisely displaying the local businesses to the consumer.

The Guiding Philosophy at MarionVibe.com regarding business listings is, “If the Community Uses It, It Exists, and Deserves to Be Recognized”. We don’t require they have a fancy website, a business listed landline telephone, and certainly not a perfectly designed website with search engine optimization (SEO).  Instead, we include any business that actually serves local residents and we give them equal footing with the big guys. Home businesses, side hustles, cash-only operators, seasonal services, and mobile providers are all welcomed here because in rural life that’s how commerce actually works.

Listing with MarionVibe.com requires only that a business:

• Provide local utility — Does the business actually provide honorable and ethical business goods and service for the residents of Marion County?
• Be Discoverable — Can a resident actually find this business when they need it?
• Be Contactable — Is there a real, working way to reach them?

My friend, Tom Seest, proved this approach works with DunlapDirectory.com in the northern Sequatchie Valley. MarionVibe.com now seeks to bring this same community asset to the Southern Sequatchie Valley region. The goal of MarionVibe.com is to become the obvious and first place Marion County residents turn to when they need goods, services, repairs, food, or anything else local. Whether you’re looking for a home repair pro, a family-owned restaurant, a home-based artisan, or a pet sitter, MarionVibe.com is designed to surface the real local options that you won’t otherwise find online.

We’re still in active development, but the vision is clear: a living, breathing, community-owned knowledge base that strengthens our local economy and preserves the unique character of our community.

Want to Help Shape It? If you own or know a local business that serves Marion County, reach out, tell us about, or even submit a listing for them yourself using the link in the upper right corner on every page of our website. If you’re a business owner, “claim” your listing to make it as detailed as possible and keep it updated.

The old ways of finding local rural businesses is broken. We’re rebuilding it from the ground up — one real, trustworthy, community-rooted business listing at a time.

We’d love to hear your thoughts and input. Drop us a line.