If you’re serious about taking full advantage of your small business marketing, at that point it’s a great opportunity to look at the Google My Business highlight as a major aspect of your online engagement strategy. The device was launched in 2014 to gather together all of the previous directory offerings, for example, Google Local, Google Places and Google+, into just one Google My Business platform. This makes it more manageable for small business marketing, meaning that you no longer need to deal with numerous client accounts crosswise over different platforms.

What is Google My Business?

By spending the necessary time and energy into getting your business recorded in quality local directories, you can support your SEO results and separate yourself from the challenge. One of the most imperative directories listing that each organisation ought to organise is Google My Business listing.

Google My Business (GMB) is a completely free tool offered by Google that enables business owners to deal with their online business listing and presence over the search engine’s digital estate. List your business on Google, and you get a public presence and identity on the world’s most popular search engines, with data that would then be able to show up in Google Maps, Google Search and Google+.

How does it display in Google results?

The feature can offer real advantages for businesses and brands who need local exposure specifically. The Local Search results offered by Google will show nearby listed businesses alongside the important data that clients esteem –, for example, address, opening times, business category and reviews – with a link to the business site itself. Search yourself and you will see that reviews of the listed business are shown on the right-hand side of Google’s search results. This gives potential clients an immediate insight into the reputation of your business.

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By listing your business, you will further find that your business is returned in relevant searches, as Google integrates its My Business database with its Knowledge Graph, Search and Maps functionalities.

How do I add a new business or claim an existing listing?

The procedure is simple and user-friendly. Sign in to your Google account. Once signed in, type in the name of your business and its location. If it comes up in the results, search for the “Own this business?” link at the bottom of the listing and confirm that you are approved to claim it. If your business isn’t returned in the results, click the ‘none of these match’ option and select ‘add your business’.

Google will at that point verify that you are the user of the business by sending a hard-copy postcard to the postal location that you provided. It will take up to a fortnight to arrive and will contain next step instruction. You can use the intervening time to start populating your new business account profile, however. Add your business details to the fields appeared on the business profile page – with data, for example, contact details, website URL, opening times and photographs to show your premises, brand or a hero product image.

To assist you to manage your client reviews, connect your accounts, for example, Google Analytics, YouTube and Google+. Find these by clicking on the squares framework in the top right-hand corner of your account page. Once this is done you can read your client reviews and respond to them. This is fundamental to manage any issues or negative feedback.

If your business doesn’t work out of a physical location, at that point choose to make a brand page. At the point when you visit http://business.google.com, you can tap the ‘not a nearby business?’ connect that shows on the right-hand corner of the page, then select ‘brand’ in the ‘choose business type’ drop-down. Again, follow the prompts and enter your URL to access your profile page which will be ready for editing.

How would I optimise my advert?

To get the full advantage of your business listing, enter full details and forget about nothing. Ensure everything is exact and recall the local Google searches will prioritise applicable searches and detailed. Include significant keywords and search terms and ensure the business opening times are up to date. Add photographs to build exposure and communicate with client reviews to show that you esteem the feedback.

Ready to build your Google My Business listing? Take a few moments now to get started and get the rewards of local search for your small business marketing strategy!

For more information, get in touch with the Kuroit team today.