The American giant Google offers many tools to help companies develop and manage their presence on the Internet. Among others, we find Adwords for SEA, Analytics for traffic, Search Console for general monitoring of sites, Shopping for e-commerce sites and price comparison, and Google My Business for e-reputation and local SEO. These tools form a rich palette that should be known and mastered. We invite you to discover Google My Business in more detail. Features, interest, and use: the point in this article.

What is Google My Business?

The free service Google My Business appeared in 2014. Its goal is to offer users a sort of ultra-complete and qualified directory. Depending on the query and the location of the user, the business listings are displayed in the top right corner of the SERP. They contain the address of the company, its business, opening hours, contact information, but also photos, user reviews, a graph of attendance, a FAQ with the most frequently asked questions, and related searches.

A great opportunity for your local SEO

Before its arrival, companies were working on their local referencing on 4 aspects:

a Google Address page, the purpose of which was to tell Google what information was in Maps and drive organic search results.
a Google + Local page with reviews, photos, videos and information about the company (address, hours, description, services, products...).
Content marketing strategy with content offering information about specific locations.
Adwords ads which offer the possibility to be geolocalized, but which remain relatively expensive.

This local referencing technique became obsolete with the launch of Google My Business. Intended for professionals, this interface opens a new way to communicate and present yourself to the search engine. Google My Business can allow you to improve your positioning on the SERP considerably.

Google judges the establishments according to 3 criteria :

the level of relevance between the business and the user's query
the distance between the business and the location from which the search is made
the popularity of the business, which takes into account whether the business is physically located or not.

An excellent way to build your e-reputation

Through reviews, brands communicate publicly with their customers and build their e-reputation. This exchange space is also an additional way for Internet users to form an opinion about the company through the feedback of other users. By giving consumers a voice, Google is once again pushing brands to take their level of service up a notch. This is part of the reason why more credit is given to businesses with up-to-date information.

When Google My Business first hit the web, changes like these were already a sign that Google was becoming more and more of an answer engine, not just a search engine. Bringing the most relevant result to its users according to their tastes, habits, and location is more relevant than ever. The success, the power, and the development of Google My Business only confirm it.

You have not yet registered your business on Google My Business? 97% of Internet users perform a Google search to find nearby establishments, so it's high time you did!

4 tips for designing an SEO-optimized business listing

Contrary to what you might think, an incredibly high number of businesses have not yet completed their Google My Business listing. What a shame because their local SEO suffers severely. If you are reading this article, you are already ahead of the game. And to keep it, here are 4 tips to apply to exploit the full potential of this tool.

Integrate your services into your business listing

Previously reserved for restaurants and cafes to put their menu online, the '' Add and modify services '' feature is now open to many businesses. And it is devilishly effective since it allows you to indicate your services on your card. So do not hesitate to give a maximum of information to the Internet user so that he knows that it is with you that he must go, and nowhere else.

Add a complete description of your business

Since April 2018, the tool now offers the possibility to design enriched establishment records. This information can now appear in the local knowledge graph or directly on Google Maps. Thus, the user has additional elements to choose from among the various businesses offered: a great opportunity to stand out!

Be careful though, your description must not exceed 750 characters and no URL is allowed.

Rely on the power of attractive photos

Because a picture is worth 1,000 words, the best way to send a realistic and attractive image of your business is to add pictures to your Google My Business. Google reveals that business listings that include photos generate 42% of additional route requests via Maps. Google My Business definitely drives traffic to your site, up to 35% more clicks, compared to businesses that haven't added enough to their profile!

Logo, cover photo and additional visuals give you the opportunity to build a global image of your brand. Thanks to them, your users will get a better idea of who you are and what you offer. Do not hesitate to highlight your way of working, your team or your premises...

The images must respect certain conditions: JPG or PNG format, a weight between 10 Kb and 5 Mb, a resolution of 720 px by 720 px.

Use Google Posts to share your news

The Google Posts feature gives you the opportunity to highlight important information for your audience:

special offers,
sales period,
news,
launch of a new product,
dates and themes of events,
information needed to make a reservation...
Think of Google Posts as Newsflashes: they must be precise and concise to incite action.

To write an effective Google Post, think about the purpose of your post, focus on quality photos, a catchy title (58 characters maximum, your brand name is included by default), and some details (1,500 characters maximum, don't hesitate to abbreviate days and times) and a CTA! Do not consider Google Posts as purely promotional tools, but as more informative: an overly commercial tone is not recommended.

Once you have designed several Posts, don't hesitate to study statistics for each one to identify which messages are working well, and which are not. You have access to 3 pieces of information:

the number of views,
the number of clicks generated,
the percentage of modification on each post.

To easily and quickly manage your business listings, use the Google My Business application! Internet users will be delighted to find updated information when they visit your business and you will reap the benefits.

The importance of referencing Google My Business for local positioning

Local SEO represents a small part of the vast world of SEO, but its potential is no less great! Coming up on the SERP of organic results is a very good thing, but benefiting from local visibility is even better!

Local means targeted, and this strategy allows you to position yourself as close as possible to users' expectations. The figures speak for themselves: after having carried out a local search on a cell phone, one person in two goes to the store within the day. So, let's get started?

An essential SEO weapon for your local positioning

The growing importance given to local positioning goes hand in hand with the increase in searches made on mobile. It is anchored in both a problem of nomadism and immediacy that characterize more and more queries.

On the same model as an article or a page, the SEO optimizations to be done on your My Business page are identical: title, description, text, categories...

If your company is located in the heart of Paris on a generic activity, it will be difficult to position yourself among the first results by relying only on a My Business page, no matter how careful it is. However, if you are located in a village where there is little competition, you can certainly stand out with a nice SEO-optimized listing.

If your establishment has several geographical locations, it is absolutely necessary to create a listing for each location, no matter how close or far away they are. That's what local positioning is all about: getting visibility and exposure to the Internet users closest to you.

Refine your SEO strategy with additional data

Google Posts already provide you with a number of data to take into account to develop the reach of your next publications, but also to better identify the messages that attract and convert the most.

Google Insights gives you valuable information about the behavior of your prospects after viewing your My Business listing. You can access the following data:

the number of views
requests for directions to your business
the number of calls from the listing
number of photo views
visits to your site
how people found you (direct access or discovery)

You can also cross-reference this data with your Google Posts to measure more precisely the effectiveness of your actions over a specific period.

The idea is then to aggregate this data with those collected via other tools for even more advanced analysis. Be careful, however, to handle the results with the necessary precautions when crossing data from different sources...

An important issue for your e-reputation and your communication

Google My Business E-reputation

We can say that today, Google My Business is the most beautiful digital business card that a company can have. But also the most powerful. The majority of purchase intentions start with the search and Google My Business pushes even further the relationship between customer and brands. This trigger is very effective to motivate the customer to go to the store.

Reading positive reviews: there is nothing more motivating for an Internet user looking for THE right company to go to. The reverse is also true.

To better manage your negative reviews, the best strategy is to respond to your users and try to find a solution to their complaints. Don't ignore them! The important thing is to show that you take into account the negative opinions and that you are in search of a permanent improvement to satisfy your customers more and more.

Think of local positioning as a part of your marketing strategy that will help your company gain visibility!

What is your affinity rate with a local positioning strategy?

Still not convinced of the potential of local SEO for your business? Here are some indicators that allow you to evaluate the contribution of a local SEO strategy for your brand:

The geographical area your company is located: The trifecta is a location in a dynamic commercial district, itself located in a city of intermediate size with competitors with little SEO work.
The length of existence of your brand: Google favors the anteriority and tends to favor brands present on the web for more than 3 years compared to the latest arrivals.
web marketing appetence: has your company been doing regular actions for at least 2 quarters and is active on the web
The budget you can devote to this web marketing strategy and to the work of local positioning.

So, do you meet at least one of these criteria? If so, local positioning has real advantages for your brand so let's go!

Google My Business is a very useful solution for your visibility, your traffic, and your traffic in the store. Free, easy to use, and efficient: all reasons are good to use this tool!

With a national search, it is much more difficult to position your site among the first search results on the SERP. But with the geolocalized search, it is much easier to stand out...And to attract customers close to you! Google My Business is the most interesting marketing lever for exclusively local businesses.

As the cornerstone of your local SEO strategy, Google My Business can make a real difference.