To many small businesses, getting to the top of page one on Google search is a mystery, a pipedream. We’re here today to demystify this process.
With Google, there are three main ways to get your business’ listing to rank. Number one: organic search. This is a time consuming process of optimising your website through technical content and off-page authority building techniques, a limiting factor being how competitive the industry is. Number two: Paid Search Visibility. Essentially, this is paid Google ads – you can invest money to be a promoted website, however it can be expensive and unsustainable for a growing business. And finally, number 3: a verified Google My Business listing. Google My Business is a free and effective way to boost your SEO and get your business noticed amongst a sea of other listings, and coincidentally, the subject of this article!
Below I have outlined but a few of the ways that a verified Google My Business listing will significantly boost your visibility within local search.
Building Authority
When you set up your Google My Business listing, you are given the option to fill in a number of fields relevant to your business. This can include your contact number, your opening hours, photographs of your products/store-front, your address… the list goes on. Each of these works to add reputability to your business, and give you a visible, physical presence on the right-side bar on the search page when you’re searched for specifically. It’s almost like getting the little blue tick on Twitter. It shows you mean business.
You can build your authority further by including reviews and Google My Business posts. Reviews speak for themselves as a testament to your business, and posts, which can be anything from blog posts to advertised discounts, are a great way of keeping your listing active, current, and therefore in the eyes of Google, relevant. The more authority your listing has, or the more relevant Google deems it to be, the more your local listing will be boosted and your visibility within local search will be improved.
Local Listings
One of the most significant things a Google My Business listing will do is add you to a Local Listings Pack (granted your listing has a high enough authority). When someone searches for goods or services in a specific area – let’s say for example, a digital marketing agency in Manchester – Google will add snippets of three, relevant, leading Manchester digital marketing businesses to a Local pack, which sits just below the paid ads, but above all the organic results.
The visibility and reach this local listing pack affords you ensures that your business, big or small, increases its impression count considerably, which in turn leads to an increased chance of people clicking through, leading to increased web traffic, which means more chances of lead conversions… so on and so forth.
The Bottom Line
Simply put, by investing just a small amount of time into building a verified Google My Business listing, you will propel your local SEO and boost your overall organic rankings. Keeping your listing detailed and active by adding reviews and regular post updates ensures that your business will come up in local searches, gain recognition and further authority, and then eventually come up in more generalised searches.
Let Us Help You Improve Your Local SEO
Here at Christian Michaels, boosting SEO and growing businesses through savvy marketing is our bread and butter, and Google My Business listings are our knife. As well as offering optimised content and paid Google Ad services to raise your businesses profile, we also provide a fully managed Google My Business listings service. If you’re looking for help getting started, or think your Google My Business listing could do with a little fine tuning, then get in touch today!
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