Google My Business is one of the most important resources in Google’s comprehensive product range. In today’s blog post, we’ll show you how using Google My Business with only a few small changes will boost your local SEO.
1. Make sure your listing on Google My Business (GMB) is accurate in all areas from Name, Address and Phone Number (also known as NAP) to business hours. Your GMB page should mirror your website page in these areas as well as any place that your business is listed. We use Moz Local to help with our NAP listings and have found it to be helpful. If you are not finding your business in maps or in search, errors on your GMB page could be a reason why
2. Get reviews AND respond to them. Google recently acknowledged that while 5 star reviews are good, they really want to see businesses interacting with their customers. When you are having a strong 5 start rating, please be sure to thank your reviewers for their support and company. When you receive a less than stellar rating, it is helpful information to respond to the customer in a polite, constructive way to inquire about their experience, and how you can enhance your service.
3. Another Google My Business ranking factor is actually 3 factors according to Yoast: Relevance, Distance and Prominence. Relevance has to do with how well search query suits your business. Be very particular about your company listing and this will improve your score on relevance. Distance equates to the user ‘s closeness to your company. In search results, companies that are nearest to the customer appear to show up at the top. Of course, with many things Google related, how this algorithm works is a bit of a mystery but it is a top GMB ranking factor. Finally, lets talk about Prominence. Prominence has more to do with your website than GMB but is still used as a ranking factor. Do you have a lot of quality backlinks on your website? Are you an authority or top business in your area? Do you have awards? These all relate to Prominence and Google My Business uses it highly in local business SEO optimization
4. Google My Company is optimizing your positioning on Google Maps. Any local business would like to be listed in the top 3 results and an automated Google My Business Listing is a perfect way to do this. Sources say that 86% of people look up the location of a business on Google Maps. This is huge for local businesses and one of the best ways to achieves search dominance!
5. Finally, keep your Google My Business account current with recent photos, posts and activity. GMB Is not just.a “set it up and forget” it type of platform. In fact, once you have a GMB account and you haven’t updated for a while, Google will politely remind you by email. You may think of this as just one more thing you have to do but it really is important.
Hopefully these tips and tricks on how Google My Business can improve your local SEO will help improve your search ranking. For more SEO tips, be sure to contact us. We love helping local businesses improve their SEO!