It’s important to have a Google My Business account for your business. It’s easy to set up with just a few steps. Once you do, your customers will be able to find and review your company on the map using Google search or Google Maps. You’ll also get notifications when someone reviews or adds photos of your business into their posts.
Google My Business is a free and easy-to-use tool that helps you create and manage your online presence. It’s important for businesses of all sizes, from small local shops to large international corporations. This article will show you how to get started with Google My Business so that your business can start benefiting from it too!
1. What is Google My Business?
Google My Business is a free tool that all Google users have access to. It lets you create and manage your business listing online, making it easier for people to find and engage with your business in maps or search results.
2. What are the benefits of GMB to every business?
It helps you get more customers and make more money because:
- Showing your location on the map.
- Your customers can easily find you—they don’t have to remember a phone number or store address, so they’ll be more likely to do business with you.
- It’s free and it only takes a few minutes to start your account!
3. How to set up your account on Google My Business
Step 1: Find and click the “Start Now” button in your dashboard
Step 2: Complete Adding Your Business Info & Measure the Success of Your Post (optional)
Once you have filled out all the fields, click Next Step. You will be prompted to Complete adding your business info. Click on Start Reviewing the post.
It will also prompt you if you want to measure how much people are looking at your page, and give feedback about it too. It’s optional but I would suggest trying it out at least once so that you can get an idea of how many people are seeing your listing (and looking at your page).
Step 4: Add a business photo
Click Upload a Photo. You can upload one from your computer or directly from Facebook, Google Photos, Dropbox, and Flickr. If you choose to use an image directly from the Internet, make sure that you have permission to use it! A good example is photos of chefs in restaurants. You can choose images from your computer, Google Photos, or other sources.
Step 5: Add a logo
The next step is to add your logo. You can upload one from your computer or directly from Google Drive, Google Photos, Dropbox, and Flickr. If you choose to use an image directly from the Internet, make sure that you have permission to use it! A good example is photos of chefs in restaurants.
Step 6: Add a business description
Write at least 150 characters about your business and what it does. For example, you could say “This is the best one-stop travel shop in Chicago! Come here for anything from airline tickets to all kinds of travel accessories!”
Step 7: Add your business category & details
Choose a category and add some details about your product or service. For example, you could choose “Clothing > Kids’ Clothing” and then write that you only sell clothing for children.
Step 8: Add your business hours
You can now list when your store is open. When you’re done, click Save Changes at the bottom of the page to complete your account.
Your new Google My Business listing will appear on the map. You should also get an email from Google saying that your business is live!
Step 9: Ring up customers and keep them coming back for more
Head to the dashboard home screen and click Manage this page at the top right of your GMB post, then scroll down to “Manage posts.”
There you’ll see a list of all the Google searches for your business. Click any one of them and get some tips on how to manage that search—like what hours people are searching for, or which category they’re looking in. You can also choose to let customers leave reviews there, and add a call-to-action with your link to get people to buy! Click Save Changes when you’re done.
We also strongly recommend that you claim your free, custom Google My Business local listing page. That way you can control all of the information used on that page and make sure it’s always consistent with what’s shown in other places like search results, maps, or ads. It will also give you a place—not just your GMB listing—where customers can find directions from their homes or offices to yours.
4.Tips for managing your account and making it successful
These are the most important things to do if you want people to find your business information online. Remember that because Google is a search engine, having more reviews and engaging in effective SEO will help your local listing appear higher in search results for the places where you are located. If you have any questions about managing your account, please feel free to leave them as comments below!
– Write a compelling description of what it is you sell or who you provide services for . The goal here is to make sure that someone reading this can figure out how they might benefit from working with you – without knowing anything else (just like with an ad). Please note that we don’t allow product-only businesses because those just show up on shopping searches instead of local ones.
– Add an image to represent your business . This makes your listing look more professional and will help people recognize it when they see it in other places (like on a map). Please note that Google only allows images made specifically for this purpose, not those found elsewhere online. Use a picture that’s high enough quality so that people can see your storefront or who they’re going to meet if they visit in person.
– Add relevant text to your images . Just like with your main description, this helps people see if they want to engage with you without having to click through.
– Set hours of operation , including holiday closures if appropriate. If you’re open 24/7 or don’t care about setting specific times, you can skip this step. Just like with search ads, customers need to know when you’re actually available so that they can go there during normal business hours – especially if you offer something that has limited availability (like a restaurant meal). We also recommend updating these hours whenever you change them in order to keep your listing as up-to-date as possible.
– Use location categories that will match the searches that customers are using to find your business . These can include things like product or service category, name of the company, or even keywords for what you’re selling (for example: “buy” and “books” could mean a bookstore). These categories also appear when people look for directions in Google Maps on desktop.
5. Biggest Common mistakes when setting up your account or managing it once you have created one:
- Not setting up your account at all
- Not uploading images of the right size or quality
- Using vague descriptions like “sells stuff” or “specializes in everything”
- Setting hours that aren’t actually available to customers looking for you (for example, if you’re closed on Sundays)
- Selecting categories that don’t match any searches people are using to find your business , like a name only local customers would understand instead of a category related to what they’d be searching for (like restaurants instead of bookstores).
- Writing a description instead of choosing preselected options (in most cases these fields have relevant suggestions already)
- Not updating the hours when they change (so that your listing isn’t outdated)
- Listing phone numbers you don’t actually answer or omitting them entirely because they’re not relevant to the searches people are using
- Not being consistent with these details across all places Google has listings for your business (that means having the same address, images, and descriptions everywhere), which can cause confusion or lower ranking among listings where you do have those details uploaded correctly
- Overemphasizing things like getting a physical address listed in every place possible (it’s more important to make sure it appears as many places as possible – including in web and image search results – than to worry about listing multiple addresses if that causes problems). If a specific location going to result in better results, then spend time optimizing that specific place rather than trying to include every address everywhere.
You can do your part to get listed as a local business on Google My Business by following the steps we’ve outlined here. The more you know about how this service works and what it does for your company, the better position you will be in to make sure that it is working for you. We hope these tips have been helpful!
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