Google is the world’s most popular search engine, with a market share of around 83%, and is used by more than two billion people each month. That’s why having an optimized Google Business Profile is so important to improve your online digital presence. A Google Business Profile allows you to create a page that will appear when someone searches for your business or related businesses on Google. This helps increase your business’s awareness and gives customers more information about what you do, who you are, and where you’re located.
It’s easy to set up and maintain a Google Business Profile: all you need is an internet connection and some basic information about your business—like its name, address, phone number, hours of operation, website address, etc.—and then you’ll be off and running!
Here are some more details about Google Business Profile and how it can help boost your online presence.
Benefits of Having a Google Business Profile
Google Business Profile is a crucial component of your online digital presence. It allows you to gain more visibility and improve your brand’s reputation. You can add reviews from customers who have used your services or products in addition to creating a profile for your business that showcases your company. These reviews appear on the profile and aid in developing trust with potential clients.
Having a Google Business Profile helps people find you when they are looking in Google Search results or Maps for businesses like yours. The main benefits of having a Google My Business account include the following:
Easily Share Important Information About Your Business
When users search for your businesses related to yours on Google, your Google Business Profile is the first thing they see due to the Google Local Pack. The Google Local Pack is a collection of three local business listings that appear in response to searches for products or services offered by local businesses. Unlike organic search results derived from Google’s website index, listings in Local Packs are derived from the Google Business Profile directory and appear on the first page of the search results.
So all the relevant and up-to-date information like store timings, complete address, product images, links to your website, and any other information which you feel is necessary should be added. This ensures customers can quickly access all the information they might need without going elsewhere.
Builds Trust
Google Business Profile includes a Google reviews and questions section where customers can ask questions and leave reviews. When the customers see positive reviews and your appropriate answers to their inquiries, it automatically builds trust and credibility. Moreover, these reviews serve as free and reliable ads for your products or services. In addition to positive reviews, your ability to handle negative ones professionally, giving value to customer opinions, helps build trust with your customers.
Customer reviews have immense power in boosting your online presence as the feedback comes directly from the customers, and 88% of consumers trust online reviews just like they would personal recommendations. Since people love reading reviews, search engines use them to rank search results, thus improving your local SEO too.
Improves Local SEO and Visibility
One of the main reasons why Google Business Profile can boost your local SEO is that it is integrated with Google Maps. Search queries are becoming more geographically specific, and Google’s algorithms take user intent into account. For example, if you search for dentists near you on Google, a list of dentists based on your current location will appear at the top of the search results. Businesses with Google Business Profiles have a clear advantage over businesses without one when it comes to attracting new customers.
Gain Insights to Improve
The Google Business Profile comes with features that can give you useful information about your online audience, like views, engagement, clicks, and audience data, that can assist you in better understanding your customers and gaining valuable insights. It gives information about how consumers find your business and how people search—specifically, what keywords they input to find your listing. It can also show you the number of clicks to your website. Such quantifiable data is highly helpful in making data-driven decisions and sound strategies.
Increases Brand Engagement
A significant benefit of having a Google My Business listing is that it increases online engagement with your brand. Furthermore, much of that engagement occurs on Google’s search engine. When you reply to customer reviews, add photos and videos to showcase your services to customers, answer questions about your business through a Q&A or even chat directly with your customers, it will boost customer engagement drastically.
How to Optimize and Manage Your Google Business Profile
A well-managed Google Business Profile can help your business stand out from the crowd, especially when many other businesses are vying for attention on the directory. A few things to keep in mind include the following:
- Completing your profile with all the relevant information will increase the number of actions customers take when they find your profile and also help you rank better. Make sure your business name and address are consistent across all mentions on your website and across the web. Google’s algorithm considers these inconsistencies when determining your credibility.
- Choose a category to get found in discovery searches. This is particularly important for businesses whose name doesn’t indicate their service. When you select a category, Google makes category-specific features available to you, making your profile more appealing and effective. Restaurants, for example, can include a menu or a reservation button. These details may persuade customers to choose you over competitors.
- Uploading high-quality photos regularly to your profile will boost your ranking. Additionally, businesses with photos are more likely to receive requests for driving directions and clicks through to their websites than businesses without photos.
- You can create posts about announcements, offers, events, and products in Google Business Profile, just like on social media.
- Set up a messaging feature in your profile to communicate with customers directly. With larger amounts of possible customers using their smartphones for searches, messaging provides a simple and effective way to communicate.
Google Business Profile is essential for every business looking to attract new customers and mark its presence digitally. The Business App by Assist90 LLC provides an easy and effective platform to create, optimize and manage your Google Business Profile. You can also use the tracking and reporting metrics feature in the app to know exactly how your profile is performing.
Schedule a meeting today to organize and boost your business’s online presence.
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