How To Optimise Your Google MyBusiness Profile

If you own a business, creating an optimised Google MyBusiness (GMB) profile is one of the first tasks that you should consider completing as part of your digital marketing efforts. It offers you the ability to increase your visibility in local searches and provide customers with key information about your business such as your website address and phone number.

Google MyBusiness is considered as Google’s version of an online directory, which is arguably the most important directory that you want your business to have a presence in.

When you have searched for a business’s opening hours, phone number or address, it is highly likely that Google MyBusiness has provided this information to you. This means that it is likely to be the first touchpoint where a customer will engage with your business, so ensuring that you have adequate and accurate information in your profile can make the difference in securing hard-won enquiries and traffic to your website.

Info

The info tab of GMB is where you can add the core information about your business that will appear in Google Search and Google Maps. This typically includes your business name, service categories, phone number, website address and a company description, although the options available in this tab will vary depending on your business type.

Business Category

We recommend that you carefully consider which service categories you choose for your business as this has a significant influence over the search results that you appear in. You can choose a primary category, which should accurately represent your core business area. For example, if you are an estate agent that provides sales and lettings services, the most appropriate category would be ‘real estate agents’ and your additional categories may be ‘real estate agency’ and ‘real estate rental agency’.

If you had selected ‘real estate rental agency’ as your primary category you may find that you are not as visible for customers who are looking for an estate agent to sell their home. This highlights the importance of selecting the correct primary category.

Business Description

The next most important category for optimisation in this section is the business description. This field is an opportunity to highlight the USPs of your business while also featuring a selection of strategically important keywords that you are looking for rank for. A good description will include a combination of these with a clear call-to-action at the end of the description.

Services Section

Following on from the description is the services section. Here you can add services categories and individual service items. Each service item consists of an item name, item price and item description. In the case of the name and description, the same principles that were discussed for the description apply. The decision as to whether you should include item prices depends on your business and if your services have clearly defined prices that do not vary.

Photos

While photos do not directly improve the optimisation of your GMB profile, they do make a noticeable difference to the visual appeal of your profile and that alone may determine whether a prospective customer will click on your profile.

At a minimum, you should ensure that you have uploaded a logo and cover photo. Your cover photo is the preferred photo for your search and maps presence. It should clearly show what your business does and it can include text.

There are also opportunities to add interior photos and a video of your business. The interior photos are particularly important for businesses with a retail presence or an office that customers visit. These photos can showcase the personality of your business and allow customers to explore your business before they visit.

Posts

GMB Posts provide a platform for you to share your business’s latest updates and content with people who are searching for your business. Your posts will appear directly under the information sections of your profile.

It is recommended that you use GMB posts to share your business’s offers, blog posts, important announcements, events and products. You should view this space as an opportunity to reach customers who are already interested in your business.

Sharing a relevant offer, blog post or an event that you are hosting will encourage a prospective customer to engage with you and complete an action that is valuable to your business.

We Can Help You Optimise Your Google MyBusiness Profile

If you are looking for a professional SEO specialist to optimise your business’s Google MyBusiness profile look no further than VIP IT. We offer our clients a complete SEO management service that takes care of every aspect of your SEO efforts, from blogging and technical optimisation to keyword research and Google MyBusiness optimisation.

Take the next step today and request a free SEO report. Once we have prepared your SEO report we will contact you to discuss your business’s report results and SEO requirements.