Hibu vs Beyaoshy for local business marketing

This month Google is switching off the free websites that owners could build inside their Business Profiles. For plenty of small businesses that little site was the only website they had, and the sales calls started before the switch was even thrown: providers offering a proper site, cleaned-up listings, some advertising and a monthly report, all in one package.

Hibu is one of the names owners have brought to us in those conversations, usually with a proposal on the desk and a simple question. Is this a sensible way to buy marketing, or should we be looking at someone else? Both companies can be the right answer, because they are built for different owners.

The three questions that decide it

Before comparing any two providers, it helps to know which kind of buyer you are. Three things decide most of these choices.

• How much of the work you want to see. Some owners want a package that runs in the background and a bill that arrives once a month. Others want to log into the ad account on a Sunday and read what people searched.
• Whether you are buying a presence or buying booked work. A tidy website, consistent listings and an active social feed is one goal. A phone that rings with people ready to schedule is a related goal, and it gets measured differently.
• What you keep if you leave. The website, the domain, the ad account, the tracking numbers and the review history all live somewhere. Knowing where before you sign saves a painful month later.

What Hibu is built for

Hibu sells digital marketing to small local businesses in towns and cities across the country. Its roots are in directory advertising, and it has carried the strengths of that model into digital: a sales team that knows how small business owners buy, packages designed so an owner does not need to learn marketing to purchase one, and a single relationship that covers several channels at once.

The range covers what most local businesses ask for: websites, listings management across directories, search and social advertising, social media posting and tools for reviews and reputation. For an owner who wants one company to take care of the online presence, and who has neither the time nor the interest to manage it, that bundle is genuinely convenient. It also works across a broad range of local categories rather than a few, which suits a business that does not fit a neat niche.

The details that vary are the ones to pin down. What each package includes, who owns the website and domain, what the reports measure and how the agreement ends are all things to get from your representative in writing rather than assume.

What Beyaoshy is built for

We are a smaller, hands-on team that has worked with local businesses since 2015, built around businesses where a booked appointment or a scheduled job is the entire point: home service companies, remodelers, med spas, wellness clinics and restaurants, among others. Other marketing agencies also hire us to deliver the same work under their own name, so the way we run an account has to be clear enough for another firm to present it as its own.

Three habits shape how we run an account. One team handles the local SEO, the Business Profile, the ads, the review requests, the website and the CRM, so nothing falls into the gap between two vendors. Everything we set up is registered to the owner from the first day, from the domain to the ad account to the analytics property. And the monthly report opens with calls and booked appointments, then works back to the clicks that produced them.

Hibu and Beyaoshy side by side

	Hibu	Beyaoshy
Best suited to	Small businesses in many categories that want a bundled online presence	Appointment and job-driven local businesses, plus agencies that white-label our work
What you get	Packages covering websites, listings, advertising, social and reputation, varying by plan	Local SEO, Business Profile, ads, reviews, website and CRM, run together
Who you deal with	A Hibu representative; ask who handles the work day to day	The people doing the work, on calls and by email
Ownership of site, domain and accounts	Ask for it in writing for your package	The owner’s from day one
Reporting	Reports on the package; ask for a sample and what it counts	Calls, form leads and bookings first, traffic second
Ask before signing	What is included, the term, and what you keep if you leave	The same three questions, answered in writing

Pros and cons

Hibu

Pros:

• One relationship and one invoice for several channels, which suits owners with no spare hours.
• A long history of working with very small local businesses.
• Packages are designed so a busy owner can buy without learning the jargon first.
• Social media management is part of its range, which a lot of smaller agencies leave out.

Cons:

• A packaged plan may not bend easily to a seasonal trade or an unusual service area, so ask how much can be adjusted.
• Ownership of the site and accounts is something to confirm for your specific package, so read the paperwork closely.
• Reporting differs by package, so ask whether it can show which calls became paying customers, not only visits and impressions.

Beyaoshy

Pros:

• One team does the work from start to finish, so nothing is passed between vendors.
• Every account is in your name from the start, so leaving never means rebuilding.
• Reports built around calls and bookings rather than traffic alone.
• A focus on businesses that live on booked appointments and scheduled jobs.

Cons:

• We do not have a representative in every town; most of our meetings happen on video calls.
• We are narrower by choice. If you want daily posting on four social networks, we are not the right fit.
• We will ask you to mark which leads became customers, which takes a few minutes every week and is not optional if you want the ads to improve.

Which fits which business

• A new shop about to lose its free profile website this month and wants a site, listings and a social feed handled together. A bundled provider like Hibu is a reasonable fit, provided the domain and the site are confirmed as yours.
• A plumbing company that measures its month in booked jobs. You want call tracking tied to jobs and an ad account you can open yourself. That is where we fit best.
• A dental office whose front desk misses calls over lunch. The marketing matters less than what happens to the calls it produces. Choose whichever provider is willing to look at both.
• An owner who wants no involvement at all. A packaged provider may suit you better than a hands-on team that sends questions. Be honest with yourself about this one.

Before you sign anything this spring

If your profile site is going dark this month, the first job is a real website on a domain registered to you, and every other decision is easier to judge after that. Whoever you choose, ask for the ownership terms, a sample report and the exit terms on paper, and compare the answers side by side.

If you want to see how we would approach it, our page for local business owners explains how we work, and the local SEO and websites pages show what each part involves.