Over the years, Google My Business has quickly become an essential tool for gaining visibility on the web and making yourself known to the general public. But why is it so important to use it? And what should you include ?
5 essential elements to optimise your Google My Business listing
Your business information
The most important point when creating a Google My Business page is to include your business information. This is the main objective of this tool. For example, by entering your name, address, telephone number and business area. When someone searches for a business in your sector in your geographical area, your Google My Business page will come up in the search results. Quite an interesting way to gain new customers !
To complete this business information and maximise your chances of being found, but above all to be relevant to the requests of Internet users, Google allows you to add categories to your page to specify the nature of your activity and your offers.
For example, a pizzeria could add the words "Takeaway pizza" and "Pizza delivery" to its listing if it so wishes 🍕
Finally, if you are equipped with online appointment scheduling, you can integrate it into your listing to allow your customers to make an appointment at any time of the day, bypassing your opening hours!
Indicate your exceptional hours
If you already have a Google My Business listing, then chances are your hours are already listed, but have you thought about listing your special hours ? This GMB feature applies to public holidays in our calendar, but you can and should use it if you're taking time off work or in case of a lockdown.
In the case of public holidays, Google will show your hours in orange with a statement such as: "Easter Monday, these hours are subject to change", whether your hours change or not. On the other hand, if your hours are filled in, you will see a green indication of the hours for that day.
The impact of this feature for your business is not to be neglected:
👉 by filling in your exceptional hours when necessary you indicate to Google that your listing is updated regularly so you automatically have more chance to move up in the search results.
👉 in terms of customer experience the benefit is not negligible. You can thus ensure that Internet users who wish to visit you do not find a closed door.
⚠️⚠️ In the current health situation, if your business is closed, remember to indicate this on your Google My Business page, thanks to the "Temporarily Closed" banner set up by Google. ⚠️⚠️
Pictures of your activity
Pictures are a plus, but not a negligible one. In fact, companies that have pictures on Google My Business receive 42% more commercial requests than those that do not. Here's a simple example: You're looking for a restaurant near you, so you type "restaurant" followed by your location in Google. All Google My Business pages will appear in the first results. All you have to do is make your choice. To do this, like most consumers, you'll have a look at the customer reviews, as well as at the pictures in order to visualize the places and why not their creations.
To read: Top 10 reasons to adopt online scheduling
Write posts to promote your offers
Thanks to Google Posts, you can now share your content like on social networks (articles, special offers...) directly on Google My Business. This will allow you to improve your referencing, while allowing your customers to directly access the content you wish to distribute to them.
Your customers' reviews
By responding to customer reviews you can increase your conversion rate by
up to 80% !
Customer reviews play an important role in the final decision of consumers. It is therefore important to include them on your Google My Business page, so that you have the best chance of attracting as many customers as possible. Taking the time to respond to reviews has two key benefits for your business:
👉 by responding to your customers' reviews, Google will consider that you are active and you will therefore be better referenced
👉 secondly, responding to your customers' reviews will allow you to strengthen your customer relationship. Whether the reviews are very positive or a little less so, it is essential to take the time to respond to the feedback you receive: in the first case you will have a better chance of building loyalty, in the second case, you will have a better chance of improving your customer relationship.
Are you short of customer reviews?
With an appointment scheduling solution such as Agendize you can invite your customers to leave their feedback in the form of a review on your Google listing !
You don't have an online appointment scheduling solution yet? Request a demo now by clicking on the button below :
