If your business has been around for a while, especially if you have a physical storefront, you are probably already in Google Search. However, there is a pretty good chance that your business doesn’t show up well in Google Maps or Google+ unless you’ve taken the time to claim and optimize your listing. Google started its mobile initiative by eliminating one of its iOS apps a few years ago and pushing iPhone users directly to Maps.
Google My Business is Google’s listing platform for companies. Setting up a Google My Business profile for your company is free and will help your company show up in Google search engine results, local search results and Google Maps results. In fact, Google “near me” searches have increased by two times over the past year and 72% of consumers who did a local search visited a store within five miles. You can set your hours, contact info, photos, virtual tours, and even manage customer reviews. Google My Business allows you to control the way your business shows up on Google.
For Android smartphone users, Google integrates all of these features into its Google search app so getting this task done will help you reach:
- Those smartphone owners who are looking for a business within 5 miles of their location.
- 80% of people who use a smartphone to research businesses and services.
- The 48% of mobile who start their mobile search from a search engine.
With Google My Business, you can monitor and control how your business appears on the world’s largest search engine. On your personal dashboard inside your Google My Business account you can learn about your customers and how they’re getting to your business. You can see the number of clicks on your business phone number, driving direction requests, and website visits you receive. You can also access your reviews on the dashboard. Reviews boost social conversation, creates user-generated content, and it is believed that Google favors highly rated sites. Look at reviews as advertisements. Reviewers are buyers of your product or services; the language they use is similar to the one your target audience will use. So consider positive customer reviews as crucial for your SEO, if not directly, then because people are more likely to click on a site that has lots of positive reviews, which will improve your click-through-rate (a known component of SEO).
Getting started with Google My Business is free, easy to use, and makes your business easily accessible to all Internet users. Take advantage of it!
Steps to complete this task
Let’s make sure you are in Google maps, a heavily used search tool for mobile users. Go to www.google.com/mybusiness and click start. Type in your business name, if you show up make sure all your information is correct.
Fill out your contact information (phone number, hours, address) on your Google Dashboard. If you don’t have a storefront, if you’re a home-based business or a service-area business, you can list your details to appear on Google with or without an address. You can edit your business details at anytime and it automatically updates on Google search and Google maps.
When selecting an industry or category, Google may not have your specific industry. Choose the one as close to the keyword you want to rank for as possible.
Add pictures, videos, or even a virtual tour. Businesses that add photos to their listings receive 42% more requests for driving directions on Google Maps and 35% more website clicks than businesses that don’t.
Get on Google Maps and search the keywords you want your user to search for to see if your business appears. Use those keywords in your business description. For example, if you are a criminal attorney list your title as (Your name, Criminal Attorney).
Google will send you a post card (usually within 10 business days) or call you with your verification code. Once completed, log into your Google+ account to enter your verification code. As soon as you are verified you should start popping up in map results and shortly thereafter see an increase in traffic!
Take a minute to watch the detailed video at the bottom of this task to make sure you’re doing everything right and also to get some additional pointers.
Related Tasks:
- Don’t lose mobile traffic to technology, master your mobile website.
- Get more mobile traffic by promoting your website on social media.
- Find people on the go by getting into Google my business.
- Coming in 2017, Google’s Mobile First Index.
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