In a move that received big cheers from small and medium business owners, last summer Google merged its merchant-facing products for Google Places and Google+ into a single dashboard, named simply Google My Business.
The transition allows small- and medium-sized business owners to manage and update their information across several of the search giant’s properties—Search, Maps and Google+, improving efficiency and productivity.
Evan Carmichael, a social media and leadership expert, notes that Google+ Local and Google Places are must-have resources for any business with a physical location that wants to drive foot traffic.
“[They] became the new Yellow Pages and if you weren’t there, you were losing serious business,” he says. “Entire companies have been built on the back of foot traffic from Google+ Local.”
However, Google+ Local tools were hard to use and understand, so many business owners were frustrated and confused in learning how to use them—especially businesses with multiple locations.
“Google My Business is Google’s attempt to fix the problems of the past,” Carmichael explains. “They want to make it easy to update your information as a business owner across search, maps, and Google+. They want to make it easy to do business with Google and let entrepreneurs focus again on running their companies.”
Google My Business’s other major improvement is a new feature called Insights – an analytics tool. It gives you detailed information about how people are interacting with your content.
“It’s been a standard feature on Facebook for a while so this is really a reactionary move to catch up to the market instead of a visionary new suite of tools,” Carmichael notes. “However, it’s helpful now for business owners who don’t have a physical location as the Insights can help them see what posts are doing well on their Google+ pages and which can be improved.”
Google Maps is a no-brainer for businesses with a physical location. And now it’s easier than ever to sign up and update your information, lowering the bar to entry and making planning for success part of any business’s game plan.
“This platform is great as it eliminates the need for multiple business profiles, making it easier than ever to create and optimize your presence across Google Search, Maps, and Google+, and to manage it via mobile, too,” says Tamara Weintraub, director of content marketing for ReachLocal. “From this one dashboard, you can edit your business info, share updates, respond to reviews, and view your results, all of which can help you get found by more local consumers, no matter how they use Google to search.”
Her tips for using it include:
Claim your business listing to give you more visibility in local search results when consumers search on Google and Google Maps, even on mobile.
Make your profile stand out with images that showcase your business.
Monitor and respond to the reviews you receive from the handy central dashboard.
Track visibility, engagement and audience trends using the measurement tools for insight into how your business is performing.
Google My Business is now running in more than 180 countries with over 20 million businesses using the service. It’s the Yellow Pages of the digital age (only free), and it’s now easier than ever for you to use it to maximize its marketing potential.
planning, efficiency, small business, productivity