Are you using Google My Business? If not, why not?
Google My Business – GMB – can perhaps best be thought of as a social media platform for businesses. It is an easy way of enhancing your business’s public identity and presence on Google. And it has the significant added advantage of helping you to appear in local search results for your product or service.
46% of all Google searches are looking for local information. But the way local search now works is not just on organic search results. Local search results include a “local pack”. This consists of a map with three business listings below. This local pack is powered by GMB.
So if you do not have an active GMB listing, you risk losing out big time in local search results.
GMB is currently free, and can be used by virtually any business, whether office or home-based. It has been around since 2014 and we first ran an article about it – Google My Business for SEO – in 2016, introducing its main features.
In this follow up article we will look at:
- The five best features of GMB
- Three important reasons why you should use GMB
- How to get started with GMB in 20 minutes.
The five best features of GMB
There are many different features of GMB but rather than explain everything in detail, we’ve condensed them down into what we think are the five best features:
- Customers can find you and book your services
You need to provide opening times and contact details. Make sure these are correct, as up to 64% of consumers rely on Google My Business to find contact details for local businesses. You do not need to include an address (for example, if you work from home), but all details that you do enter into the GMB dashboard will automatically be updated on Google Search and Maps.
If you have business premises, ensure that you keep your details up to date. Data shows that around 50% of “near me” searches are likely to visit a related store the same day; this percentage increases to 76% for mobile searches.
GMB also has a facility that enables customers to book an appointment with you or to use your services. It has an inbuilt scheduling tool to track and manage these bookings.
- Insights
With a Google My Business listing you get your own personal dashboard. Not only does this enable you to keep your business profile up to date and choose how to display information, but it also provides valuable insights into customer activity. For example, you will be able to see:
- How customers find your business eg the search queries they use
- The demographics of your audience
- The number of views of your profile, photos, and posts
- Engagement and reactions
- Analysis of follow up actions eg website clicks, phone calls, and further queries.
- Reviews
Your GMB dashboard also gives you visibility of customer reviews and the ability to respond to those reviews. This is the area that can make the difference between winning or losing customers. Research indicates that 84% of consumers value online reviews just as highly as personal recommendations from friends; and as many as 91% of consumers depend on online reviews to help them make purchase decisions.
Responding to reviews is really important, as most customers react positively to local businesses that engage with them. Even if there are negative reviews you can reduce the impact of these by responding to them in a helpful and gracious manner. Sometimes mistakes do happen, but the way you are seen to put things right can help to build trust.
The GMB dashboard enables you to track your review ratings over a period of time and identify when action is needed to change or improve things. It can also help you understand how customers feel about your business by analysing popular terms used by customers in your reviews.
- Posts, photos and videos
There are various places in GMB where you can include posts, photos and videos. This provides the perfect opportunity to showcase recent projects, new products or services, special offers, seasonal promotions etc. Sharing such items can significantly increase engagement and boost returning customers.
Photos and videos are an important part of creating a good first impression. According to Google, businesses that have photos on their GMB profile receive 42% more requests for directions and 35% more clicks to their websites. Both quality and quantity are important here: evidence suggests that businesses with over 100 photos in their GMB listing get more clicks than other businesses with less.
- Q&A
Another effective way to engage with customers is through Q&A. GMB provides the facility to do this, and to pin frequently asked questions. So it is well worth researching the kind of questions that potential customers are asking about your business and make sure that you answer them fully. This can also dovetail with the user intent element of your local SEO strategy.
Three important reasons to use GMB
The above features are all reasons in themselves, but for us the three standout reasons are:
- The opportunity to increase listings and results
As we have already seen, without a Google My Business listing, you will not appear on Google Maps or the local pack. You will also be limiting the information that Google uses to populate the knowledge panel, or may not get one at all. Your competitors that do appear in these listings will simply sail ahead of you.
A GMB listing can also boost your organic search results by driving traffic to your website, by confirming your validity in terms of Google’s local search criteria of relevance, distance, and prominence, and by demonstrating social engagement in the form of interaction and reviews.
- The ability to increase content reach
One of the key aims of content marketing is to get that content in front of our intended audience. Google My Business provides the opportunity to do just that. You can publish regular posts on your GMB profile and, as we saw earlier, include photos and videos too.
Some examples of what you could include in your posts are:
- Extracts of blogs on your main website, and links to these
- Details of forthcoming local events
- Photos of new products
- Case studies of recent projects
- Topical or seasonal messages to your customers
- Information about sales or special offers.
You have a golden opportunity to get views on your content as soon as it is published on GMB, without consumers having to search for it. Also bear in mind that a greater proportion of local viewers are already likely to be open to transacting with you, so you can be more direct in your calls to action than you may perhaps be in more evergreen content.
- Ongoing local customer data and insight
Many of the local insights that you can obtain from Google My Business are better than you could get through other platforms. They are provided for you, for free, on an ongoing basis. You can use them effectively to grow and develop your business.
Part of this is the review facility, which enables you to demonstrate the quality of your products or services to potential customers in a tailored way. This is a crucial way to establish trust and drive new business.
How to get started with GMB in 20 minutes
It is quick and easy to get going with Google My Business. You will need a Google account and can then sign into Google My Business with your existing user ID and password.
All you then need to do is to click the “Get on Google” button. You will be taken to Google Maps and can search to see if your business is already listed. If so, you can claim it as your own. If not, you can create a listing for it.
You will then be able to enter information into your GMB listing. Fill out as much information as you can: if possible don’t leave any of the sections blank. The more information the better. As a quick guide, you will need to enter:
- Name
- Address
- Phone number(s)
- Website
- Social media links
- Opening hours
- Practical information eg directions, parking, accessibility
- Business categories
- Details of products / services
- Relevant photos / videos
Once you have your basic profile set up you then need to remember to keep it up to date and also to regularly add in extra value items such as content posts, photos and videos, Q&A. You want to be the eye-catching local business with an active and busy GMB listing that is the envy of your competition.
We hope that this article has helped you learn more about GMB.
To come back to our opening question: are you using Google My Business?
And if not, why not?