The number of smart phones and tablets is increasing all across the globe for digital marketers and people to search for local and international brand. The Internet technologies bring vital information to our fingertips; so why would anyone want to waste many minutes looking for the vital information in phone books or directories when all they can do is to Google a phone number. Now think of this phenomenon from the perspective of a business firm owner.

When clients are searching for your businesses, what do they expect to find? For example, if someone is looking for your professional help and interested in hiring your team, then the first thing they will need is your contact information such as email or phone number. You must ensure that this type of vital information is never r missing from your websites when consumers or clients are looking to buy from you. But how can this be possible? A robust platform called Google MyBusiness contains all the listings of global businesses containing their information related to contacts, posts, reviews, and much more.

What is Google MyBusiness and what it does for Businesses?

Because more and more customers are depending on the world’s largest search engine Google to acquire the information they desire for their personal and professional needs, Google MyBusiness has evolved into a vital tool for companies to grow in the fierce competition. So now you have slight ideas of what is Google Mybusiness and why is it important for businesses. Let us give you a deeper insight of Google My Business.

Being a starter, you might have never created a Google MyBusiness account in your life. The name Google MyBusiness rings bells in your ears and tells you something about its function. Yes, it allows you to create the listings of your business on Google so when a customer searches for your particular brand or business using Google search, or even enter other search keywords related to your niche, they can get all the information they need to visit your website and make a purchase. Therefore, Google MyBusiness is a great value-creator and a bridge between your company and the potential customers on the World Wide Web.

With Google MyBusiness, you can do myriad things to help customers find the right information they are looking for. For example, Google MyBusiness allows organizations to manage and create a complete listing of their business on Google and allows you to accomplish your goals. The tool can become very handy for promotion your marketing and SEO efforts; you can create a company’s listing to ensure that its appearance is guaranteed to the right customers looking for right solutions. These features and information provide customers freedom to choose a service they desire and quickly contact your team to solve a specific problem they have.

What Google MyBuisness Offers

Google MyBuisness is easy to use and it encourages people to:

• Interact with the other firms an business
• It provides vital information to customers about your existing business such as your working hours, phone number, and other contact information.
• Google MyBusiness helps your potential clients to easily find you and your office location using a fingertip.
• It helps business owners to promote their events and new products online.
• It allows you to add photos and images of your business and new products.

Therefore, Google MyBusiness is an essential tool for promoting your business online and also offers invaluable information to customers searching for right companies. Google MyBusiness tool offers a lot to customers as well as business owners.

Is Google MyBusiness a Free Tool?

Using a free tool online is always a fun and joy when you are on a short marketing budget. Even SEMRush offers you some free trial version before you can tap into its awesome powerful paid features. However, contrary to many well-known software and development tools, Google Mybusiness is free to use for anybody who want a direct and easy contact with their clients. Yes, your company can sign up for Google MyBusiness listing in simple steps and can also manage your listings without paying a penny to Google. Moreover, you can also update your listings free and download the Google MyBusiness mobile application free of cost.

So what about those people who might be approaching your team about expiring subscription of Google MyBusiness and tell you to pay money? Google does not require you to pay any payment for Google MyBusiness, therefore, anyone asking for money is definitely a scam and you must not pay attention to it. Any changes made in the subscriptions will come directly from Google whenever it plans to end its free usage.

Why Google MyBusiness is Vital for Your Business

As we discussed that Google MyBusiness is a vital tool to interact with your desired audience and customers. It also helps customers to gain access to necessary information; if you do not focus on creating a business listing on Google MyBusiness, then there is a chance then you will lose potential customers and sales prospects. You will also miss out on vital exposure on sales and marketing for your business to end up with fewer revenues. There are more compelling reasons for you to know in favor of using Google MyBusiness.

1: Google MyBusiness is Totally Free

As we mentioned before, and it is worth mentioning again that nothing can beat a free resource for your business like Google MyBuisness. For any firm or digital organization, it is extremely important to create a business profile on Google MyBusiness. Unlike other websites, Google does not allow a premium business policy for its users. And there are zero limitations for using Google MuBusiness that allows you to access all the same features and tools that your competitors are using. This is why taking advantage of Google’s relaxed policy is a great advantage for digital and corporate organizations.

2: Google MyBusiness Generate more Leads for your Business

A recent report from WebFx explains that searches related to “companies near me” have increased 500 times in the past couple of years. Clients are always searching for professional businesses and firms to solve their problems in their specific areas or localities; moreover, whether you run a movie theater or a restaurant in Dubai or New York, the local people are always searching for you with specific keywords. Since people use Google often for searching products and services, Google always provide them profiles from MyBusiness, which is why, it is important to establish a business profile on Google MyBusiness these days.

3: Google MyBusiness is also Helpful in Improving your Rankings online

On an extensive website like Google, you need to make sure that your business should not get lost in a long list of search results. When you are most visible on Google, you have a higher chance of getting noticed by people reaching products and services in the industry you operate. Because Google strives to offer you the best information about online products and offline services, it tries to deliver them the most relevant search engine results they can depend on.

This means if you are a SEO company owner or a software company develops mobile apps, then you Google MyBusiness will only appear for someone searching for SEO businesses or mobile application developers. It won’t list your business in the category of Mexican sea food suppliers.

The bottom line is, if you are looking to maximize your search results and ranking, Google MyBuisness can be a great tool to get you more clicks.

However, the tricky part it, you need to maintain and optimize your Google MyBusiness profile and provide the latest information to your customers like location, working hours, and much more.

How to Set Up Google MyBusiness Account

 In addition to being a free tool for organizations, Google MyBusiness is also offering some added features to manage your online presence. GMB listing help increase the ranks of businesses in the local searches, therefore, if you want to take advantage of this tool, then you can do the following to get started with Google MyBusiness.

Complete your Business Profile with all the Information

Google MyBusiness starts with creating a compressive business profile on the platform. The profile should contain most updated and accurate information that will become your first step to optimize your GMB page. You need to ensure that you provide Google all the vital information related to your business; therefore, you Google MyBusiness listings will include the following items:

• Your Business Name
• Business Phone Number
• Business Address
• Website
• Business Category and Description
• Working hours
• Q & A (questions and answers)
• Business and management photos
• Any additional information related to your industry

When you have entered the above information Google has told you to mention, it will be much easier for your potential clients to find and contact your organization for any related transactions.

Post the Relevant Content on the Google Posts

Google MyBusiness provides many features and sections to completely describe your business and boost your online presence. You can fill the content section of your profile that helps you to engage with your prospective clients in an easy way. Your users can find you directly on the Google Map or on the search engine results page SERP. This section is awesome because you can post almost any content related to your digital marketing business including new products, announcements, training courses, articles, blog posts, promotional content, or motivational messages for quarantined people.

Because content is the heart and soul of your SEO process, Google MyBusiness allow you to enhance your online presence based on your content and shows your recent posts to the public. With these features and tools, Google MyBusiness can be a handy tool you need to make sure that your high quality content will always hit the right target on the Internet.

Choose a Relevant or Specific Category

Google requires you to insert as much information as you can; your business category is most important and essential that can allow you to decide which search results your company will show in. from the list of available categories, you will have to select the right category because there is no option to create a new category for your business. However, if you think there is no specific category to successfully list your business, then you can choose a general category for classifying your business.

Accurately describing your category for business is also important. Make sure that the category fits with your business or niche. You should also check the updated category in GMB listings regularly and see the new listing opportunities to represent your business more accurately.

Represent your Business with High-Resolution Photos

Image optimization is an essential part of search engine optimization; however, it is also the most expensive way to get more customers from your Google MyBusiness listings. According to Google, business listings that come without any photos of images get almost 42% less requests for direction to their whereabouts. Another recent Search Engine Journal post states that businesses which upload high quality resolution images on GMB profile get almost 35% more clicks to their websites.

The important thing is that you should use high-quality images to get the attention of your prospective clients. The right images can show you as professionals and help to create a positive image; moreover, it will show the clients what they can expect from team like you. For example, you can add a picture of your official business logo, or sales and marketing team, office premises, or any other photo that can help you showcase your business. A good image can create a 360 degree interactive view of your business on Google MyBusiness.

Moreover, you should pay attention to image specifications as well for Google MyBusiness listings. Make sure that you only follow the recommended image specifications while you upload images to your profile; the images should look great on your GMB profile which should include the following ingredients:

• Upload photos only in JPEG or PNG format
• The images should be between the sizes of 10kb to 5 MB
• Keep the resolution of each image at least up to 720 px in width and length
• The images should be from a high quality source and do not use excessive filters to dampen or alter the images.

Use your Local Contact Numbers in the Profile

A great rule for providing business contact information is to keep the contact number same for all your online listings and websites. That will create a good impression on readers who won’t double your legitimacy based on too many phone numbers provided. It is also vital to use a phone number specifically with a local area code for business purposes that has nothing to do with your personal or private contestations. This way, Google will better detect your business strictly based on your locality.

Make sure that the phone number that you are using on your Google MyBusiness listings is also included in your website or in any landing pages whose link is provided in your GMB profile. Nothing can stop your customers to find you if you follow the exact strategy.

Monitor your Google MyBusiness Q & A Section

Another great feature of Google MyBusiness is the Q & A feature for local searches. This section is helpful because it allows your potential clients to ask you a specific question that relates to their needs and the services you provide. You can answer customer’s queries on Google MyBusiness Q & A section and convince them about solving their problems.

This feature is awesome because it allows you to hear the problems and concerns of clients directly from your Google MyBusiness account and respond to them instantly without wasting time. However, if you fail to monitor this section and do not respond to customer’s questions or needs, it may give them an impression that you do not care about their questions and it can create a negative impression. Therefore, make sure that you immediately respond to customer’s queries and concerns to avoid a negative reputation.

So how can you work efficiently with your Q & A section to avoid misinformation or misconception about your business? Make sure that you or your sales team can monitor your listings and remain proactive in answering customer’s queries. Your sales team should identify the queries that people often ask you on Google MyBusiness.

Collect and Observe Google Reviews

Our final tip can become a vital success factor for boosting your company image through your Google My Business profile. Google reviews are great ways that help your business to get the real updates from customers. These can be highly influential because local businesses which get positive reviews are considered more trustworthy in the eyes of customers. You can get more engagements from clients with positive reviews and it can also influence your search results rankings and click trough rates CTR.

It is not hard to watch or gather Google Reviews which can play a big part in optimizing your business listing. Despite having a great organization and reputation in the local marketplace, potential customers still want to dig deeper before they can make a hiring decision; the reviews section can guide them better about your business and how you have managed previous clients. With that said, watching Google Reviews closely and responding to them is a vital process to optimize your GMB listings.

You can encourage your customers to collect more online reviews for your business listing. Just ask some of your happy customers to give a great review for your business. Responding to reviews can boost your presence on Google MyBusiness and also keep you motivated to eliminate or reduce the negative or discouraging reviews.

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