Google Business Profile is an exceptional free tool for any business owner, but especially important for small businesses everywhere. Whether you run a coffee shop in a small town, a dentist in a major metropolitan city, a non-profit organization anywhere, an artist, an HVAC expert, or just about anything else, Google Business Profile (GBP - formerly known as Google My Business), can be a huge help with local search results.
There are many benefits of a Google Business Profile. Therefore, optimizing your GBP listing is extremely important. Here, we will touch on the basics, but really highlight 3 areas that can prove to be extremely helpful to increase search traffic, but many times, are often overlooked, or used minimally at best.
Before jumping in to the 3 easy and often overlooked ways to optimize your business' Google Business Profile, here's a super quick overview of the basics.
The Basics of Setting up your Google Business Profile
Just like building a house, there are certain steps that need to be completed first before moving on to the next steps. For example, you can’t add a roof without building walls. You can’t add walls without pouring a foundation. You can’t pour a foundation without proper to place the foundation on, etc.
Same is true with your business’ Google Business Profile. Let’s say your business is hosting a community event that you would like to promote, or you have an incredible promotion on several of your products or services. Your GBP listing is a fantastic platform to help spread the word, however, if you haven’t completed a few necessary steps beforehand, promoting a sale or event on GBP might be like adding a roof to a house that has no walls.
GBP Setup Basics:
Claim your business
Enter in your business information
Business Name
Address
Phone number
Business Hours
Type of Business
Online Retail/E-Commerce
Local Store
Service Related Business
Primary Business Category
Examples:
Bakery
Dentist
Clothing Store
Plumber
Restaurant
Auto Repair Shop
Verify Your Listing (usually done with a post card)
Again, these are just some of the basic steps to get started with Google Business Profile and we will cover these in depth in a subsequent blog.
My Business Has Already Claimed and Verified Our Google Business Profile:
For those who have taken the steps to claim and verify their local business on Google Business Profile (GPB), let’s take a quick look at ways to increase optimization.
Don’t worry, we promise this isn’t rocket science or even too time consuming, yet often times, businesses overlook these “optimization gems” when completing and/or updating their small business’ Google Business Profile info.
Further Optimize Your Business’ Google Business Profile with these 3 Easy Steps:
Every proper step you take within your Google Business Profile, from entering in your business’ correct address and phone number, to your open/operating hours to gathering online reviews to a primary business category and more is helpful and beneficial in regards to optimization. And since a lot of these items are required (address for instance) every business out there has completed these steps.
What about some of the optional features of Google Business Profile, though? Sure, a lot of savvy small (and large) business owners alike take advantage of these features. But, many do not. This is where your opportunity to take your Google Business Profile to the next level awaits.
GBP Optimization Tip # 1 - ADDITIONAL BUSINESS CATEGORIES:
When initially setting up your small business Google Business Profile, you will be prompted to select a primary category. This is exactly as it sounds - what is the primary category of your business. But, did you know - Google offers Additional Categories? In fact, you can add up to 9 additional categories for your business.
For example, let’s say there is a local auto repair shop in a town that sets up their primary business category as “Auto Repair Shop” from the available options in Google. This will work out great for people searching along the lines of Auto Repairs, Car Repairs, and similar searches.
Like most businesses, this fictitious auto repair shop probably offers additional products or services in addition to the basics. Maybe they sell and service tires at their repair facility, have an excellent car detailing service, specialize in quick lube oil changes, and offer basic auto body and dent removal services.
By adding these individual, unique services/products as additional categories, when consumers search for items such as, “Car detailing near me” or “dent removal” or “tires for sale” (or similar) the auto repair shop now has an opportunity to rank and appear as a relevant search result.
A similar example could be true for a restaurant. In this example, let’s say the restaurant is locally famous for their burgers. They have an extensive burger menu from the basics, to the unique to the extreme.
However, this same famous burger restaurant also offers a nice selection of Vegan and/or Vegetarian menu options as they want to make sure their delicious food is available for a variety of dietary needs and/or preferences. The problem, other than having the vegan/vegetarian options listed on their menus, the restaurant doesn’t reference these anywhere online.
Now, a new resident to town, maybe a tourist, or even a local is searching for Vegetarian restaurants or restaurants with vegetarian options. The chances of this burger restaurant appearing in the search results or in Google Maps for this search are slim to none, despite their numerous offerings.
To help combat this, the restaurant could easily add additional categories to their Google Business Profile highlighting the fact that they serve/offer Vegan and Vegetarian dishes.
GBP Optimization Tip # 2 - UPDATES:
The Updates section of Google Business Profile is a fantastic way to easily promote anything from sales and promotions, events, or even just general updates like “What’s New” (maybe the burger restaurant in the above example added a new “Burger of the Month” to the menu, or even a blog post or video.
Please note, unless it is an event with specific start and end dates, anything added in the update section of GBP only lasts for 7 days. But, this is a great way to get in the practice of logging in to your business’ Google Business Profile regularly. Once a week or so, log in and add in new updates. Perhaps last week your business had a sale on “A, B, C and D” and this week, you're running a special on “X, Y and Z.”
The updates portion of GBP can really help your business stand out for the competitors and the sky is almost the limit to the possibilities here. The updates section is like prime real estate. Just like a real estate developer wouldn’t leave an abandoned lot in the heart of a bustling town or residential area, a business owner shouldn’t leave the updates section empty in their Google Business Profile.
GBP Optimization Tip # 3 - PRODUCTS:
Whether your business is strictly online or you have a physical location that sells both in-person and online, featuring your products directly on your GBP is another way to increase optimization (as well as promote the products you offer).
You can choose just a few of your products (we would recommend at least 3 or 4), a couple dozen items, or all of them. The products section is another piece of prime real estate that shouldn’t be left blank.
Imagine owning a bakery with so many decadent options. You take pride in each and every baked good and have wonderful photos of your desserts. It would be a shame not to showcase them. Additionally, maybe the person searching for bakeries is looking to buy a dozen cupcakes. On your GBP you have not only your cupcakes highlighted, but also your signature gourmet cookies. Perhaps, initially, all the searcher wanted was a dozen cupcakes, but now saw that you also offer these amazing cookies and decide to purchase a dozen of those as well.
Highlighting some (or all) of your products is a great way to help optimize your GBP as well as, let customers find your items easily and quickly.
For each product listed, you can choose links on your site to direct to once an item is clicked on. Maybe it is the individual product page for that specific product. Maybe if a customer clicks on “Wild Blueberry Pie” in the above image, the link takes the customer to the pie page that lists all the pies (including that delicious looking blueberry pie).
Creating the Best Google Business Profile:
No doubt, there are numerous ways to fully optimize your Google Business Profile for your business in order to create a strong, highly searchable GBP listing for your business. These are simply 3 easy ways to help along the way that not all business owners know about, know how to do, or have time to do.
At Soma Marketing, we are small business owners ourselves and understand the challenges small business owners face with seemingly endless to-do lists. Whether you're a GBP novice or an experienced user struggling to find time for updates, we offer tailored solutions from setups all the way to ongoing management. Contact us for a complimentary consultation and let us help you refine your GBP strategy for optimal results.
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