Anyone who runs their own business is sure to be aware of the importance of reaching a prominent place in the search results of Google. While there are lots of different ways of doing this, most require a lot of testing as well as a little patience.
Google My Business is a specially created dashboard for managing local listings that will help you improve your local visibility. Read on to learn about Google My Business and how it works.
A wide range of data is provided to help users discover at a single glance how visible their business is.
One of the great things about Google My Business is that it is very easy to use and even novice data manipulators should have no trouble getting to grips with it. Users can easily manage their business listings by adding details such as opening hours, NAP details (name, address and telephone number) and photographs to help entice potential customers to get in touch.
Another great feature is the ability to attract reviews which hopefully will happen naturally. Another tactic for getting feedback is to send satisfied customers a review link which can be found by following these instructions.
Getting Started
In order to get started with Google My Business Services, business owners simply need to create an account and fill in their details. They will then be sent an actual postcard from the Google team to their business address, which can be used as proof of ownership of the business as well as the address. Once the postcard has been received, owners can verify their account and fill in all of the required details.
Once this is done, it will be possible to check how the new listing is performing and receive regular insights regarding the number of views over a specified period. It is also possible to link your Google Analytics account and see this information on the same page.
In order to determine the rankings for various businesses, a number of different factors are taken into consideration. The most important of these factors are relevance, distance and prominence. Relevance is used to determine the suitability of your business with the customer’s search intent.
To perform well in this area, it is best to supply as much information about your business as possible so that your listing is both attractive to the user and of course Google.
The Distance Factor
Distance is also an important factor, as potential customers are likely to be looking for a business that they can travel to easily. Prominence is the final main determining factor and is affected by a number of aspects such as the amount of interest your listing receives, reviews, events that you have created and even local content.
It is essential to try and boost the prominence of your business listing, which can be done by adding quality links to your main site as well as constantly adding different types of content like photos and posts to keep the page fresh and enticing.
People who have already created their Google My Business listing will want to make sure that they optimise it to make their business stand out.
Make sure that you choose the correct business category and complete your profile with your phone number, opening times photos and reviews. It is important to note that all details you add to your listing need to be the same as those that are listed on your website.
Remember to be Accurate
Information that is inaccurate will damage your listing as well as your ranking, so make sure that you check all information carefully before submitting it. Any time that the information on your website changes, make sure that you make the same changes to the information in your GMB listing and pay attention to holiday dates.
The important thing to remember about using Google My Business services for local SEO purposes is that your account should be constantly updated. People who simply create their listing and then forget about it are likely to find that their ranking quickly declines.
However, with a little care and attention, this can be a very valuable SEO tool that can help to dramatically boost businesses of all sizes and types.
If you are looking for local seo services in London we can help! Please get in touch on 0203 637 6310 or use the contact form here.
Article by Danny Smith | Virtualeap