What business doesn’t want to find ways to draw more people in? With Google My Business, you can easily go about attracting more people to your local shop. All you have to do is optimise your Google My Business page. All local SEO efforts should include optimising your Google My Business page, as there are lots of great features that can make it easier for you to get the word out about your business. Don’t simply claim your listing and then forget all about it! Below, we’ll talk you through just some of the strategies you can use to optimise this page and get awesome results.
Make Sure Your Google My Business Page Matches
Everything on your GMB page should match other pages across the web. Your name, address, and phone number match exactly on all of your properties. They must match exactly – no changes whatsoever. A small, seemingly simple change could make a huge difference and negatively impact your results. Google will be confused if you do this, and this will limit your reach. Everything needs to be spelled exactly the same, all words included; even abbreviations are a no-go.
These small differences actually make a huge one for local SEO. However, the tricky thing is that your business name, address, and phone number (NAP) could be listed on multiple web properties all over the internet. You might have trouble tracking them all down. This means you may want to pay for a NAP audit from a professional company to make sure you can get everything matching and good to go.
Pick The Most Relevant Category
There are many business categories listed on GMB, so you’ll definitely find your business model in the list. Pick what your business is, not what your business does. There’s a big difference! For example, if you were the restaurant ‘Bella Italia’, you would list as an Italian Restaurant, not ‘pizza and pasta.’
Link To Your Website
Google My Business gives you the option to link to your website, which is great news for marketers. However, your linking strategy must be correct. Make sure you link to your homepage. They do not want to see your ‘about’, or any other page first. You should have an SSL certificate and link to your HTTPS version of the site, not the HTTP version, too.
Enter A Description
You get 750 characters to describe your business, so think about this carefully. Explain to people why they should choose your shop. What is going to help to differentiate you and encourage people to visit? What are your audience looking for? Remember, only the first 250 characters will show up in the knowledge panel in the search results. Use your clickbait in the first 250 characters and include relevant keywords.
Allow Booking Integrations
If you are a service oriented business, like a salon or a garage, you can sign on with one of GMB’s supported scheduling providers. Then, they will automatically add a booking button to your page. Simple!
Have Images And Videos On Your GMB Page
Ideally, you should have several images to promote your business on your GMB page. Add more weekly/monthly to ensure that your page is updated with fresh content on a consistent basis. Videos can be up to 30 seconds long. They can’t exceed 100MB and they must use 720p resolution or higher, so bear this in mind. Even better, if you add more than 2 videos, you’ll get a subtab that mobile users will see. Make sure the images and videos you use really sell your brand for you. Otherwise, they aren’t worth putting on. Something is not better than nothing in this case.
Get Reviews
Positive reviews will help with your search rankings and allow you to bring in new customers. In fact, 85% of people trust reviews as much as a recommendation from somebody they actually know. If you don’t have reviews on your page, you could be missing out on a huge number of conversions. 97% of shoppers say that they read reviews when looking for local businesses, so make sure you include them. Avoid creating fake reviews, as this will do more harm than good. Politely ask people to review you instead. 68% of local business users left a review when they were asked to do so, so this really could make a difference to your GMB page and success overall.
Your Google My Business Page is extremely valuable for your local SEO results, so make sure you prepare it accordingly!
