Are you are looking to maximize your businesses Google Local Listing results? Then just like one of those celebrity cooking chefs you need to know how to spice them up. Why? Because by taking advantage of all that Google offers in their Local Business Center you can only improve your results.
Google is constantly tweaking its local search algorithm just as it continues to improve its natural search algorithm. And we know that Google doesn’t test and add services without a reason — sometimes it is only to see what is going to stick.
But it does appear to me that the more info you feed into their engine the better your local rankings will be. Here are sections of the LBC that you want to be sure to “spice up” to enhance the likely hood of your business getting that coveted first page placement on the all important Google 10-pack (or 3-pack for smaller areas).
Editing Your Listings
These are some suggestions and tips to pay particularly close attention to:
Company/ Organization: Use your most common business name that your customers are most familiar with, not official ones that no one would recognize (i.e. Silver Spring Franchise Group for the local McDonalds). If you can also add a primary keyword phrase that people would be searching for, without being deceptive or spammy, you should do so (i.e. Three Guys to Three Guys Lawn Service).
Street Address: It is amazing how often this can get butchered. Understand that you want your business in its exact location and not an approximate. It is best to not use street abbreviations lie N, S, St., Blvd, etc.) spell them out – North, South, Street or Boulevard. You don’t want you business to appear on the map in a lake or in the middle of a subdivision on the other side of town that has a street name that is similar. Once this is done be sure that your location on the map (on your LBC page) is listed accurately and correctly. If it isn’t your can “Fix incorrect marker location”.
Categories: These are critical to your success, but can also cause tons of pain if they are done incorrectly. We have heard of multiple horror stories of businesses stuffing keywords into these. This will cause a severe Google slap where you will fall completely out of the local search. And it can be torturous to get back up quickly. Just be sure to only use one keyword phrase per category (i.e. Cosmetic Dentist, Thai Restaurant, Auto Detailing, etc.). But you should also be sure to take advantage of all five of the available categories if it is relevant to your business. You do not have to use the suggested category either. In fact, you can test your own category listings – but again they must be relevant to your business.
Photos: This is a fairly recent enhancement and you are allowed to upload up to 10 photos. We like to use all 10 if possible. Be sure to show a front building shot as well as a logo if at all possible.
Videos: You have the ability to add up to five videos and I have not seen this widely utilized up to this point. This is the type of business listing enhancement that can push you up multiple spots just by having it (and your competition not). If your company already has a YouTube video you can very easily add them. If you don’t already have one (or five) I highly recommend cranking up your own and putting it on YouTube.
And for most local businesses your video does not have to be super professional or expensive. You just want to get across what your business is and what you do so that potential customers get a feel for who you are and what you can offer. A quick 2-5 minute interview style video explaining how your service is better than your typical competitor or by describing your unique offer (not just a “we’re better than those guys”) will be sufficient. The real power is in just having the multiple videos.
Web Pages: Google is after all a search engine and it just makes sense that if you have a website site you make sure that you list it on your local business profile. We have come across numerous businesses that do not have their website listed. We have also found in many competitive marketplaces that all of the top listings have websites — coincidence or does Google place added value to this? Either way, if you have a website, make sure you have it listed.
Coupons: Our tests with coupons haven’t been super encouraging … yet. But as is Google’s nature these will either fall by the wayside or they will becomes very powerful (if they start getting better visibility on the Google Map). Right now the visitor has to get very deep into the listing to “uncover” the coupons but that could change.
The Power of Reviews
In many ways local search is a socially driven engine. The more reviews and feedback your customers provide the higher your Google local rankings will go. We know that this is a significant portion of the Google local search algorithm and we have seen the threshold for improving a sites placement be as low as 5-8 in some smaller areas up to 30+ in some of the larger cities. While it is not the primary ranking criteria there is enough anecdotal evidence to show that there is a solid connection.
But this is also not something that you want to spam or inflate. So what is the best way to encourage reviews? Add a link from your homepage to your Google local review listing and encourage current customers to review your company. Again very powerful – lots of bad reviews can kill you in the long run.
Look Beyond Google: Google looks far and wide to gather as much information about your business as possible and reviews are a substantial part of the overall equation. So in addition to Google reviews we have also found substantial weight given to these review sources:
- Angie’s List
- AOL Yellow Pages
- Chef Moz
- Chowhound
- City Search
- Insider Pages
- Judy’s Book
- Restaurantrow.com
- Urbanspoon
- Yahoo! Local
- Yelp
Now most of these are targeted towards restaurants but by looking at other businesses similar to yours in larger cities, you can often find more industry specific review sites that you want to get your business listed on and possibly decide to encourage your customer to review you on those.
Conclusion
Google Local is an amazing marketing tool for local businesses and will continue to evolve how information is served to your potential local clients so you want to take full advantage of it. And the best part is that these listings are yours to craft your message freely.
But you should also realize that in order to take full advantage of this you must commit the necessary time learn how to use the Google Local Business Center, make the necessary changes and then be ready to test, review and re-test. Add these elements to your local search marketing arsenal and you are sure to be in the top ten in no time.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Nice post.
I thought I’d mention, for getting reviews from their customers I tell my clients to send them a link to the review page on Google Local (or add it to the bottom of their email signature). Also for some I’ve added a note on their website asking their customers to give them a review.
I see in your links that you read David Mihm too. cool.
Taiyo – that is a great point. I agree 100% that you can get some great additional leverage by having a spot on your homepage for your customers to add a review. I had a client who wanted to add many of them (with the thought if one or two is great then why not 7 or 8). I recommended that they stick with two (for a restaurant) – Google and Yelp made the most sense for them.
You certainly can’t have too many reviews (especially if they are good at taking care of customers). Somebody had terrible customer service issues probably does not want to promote this!