Google “Places” a Must for Local Businesses

Nov 03, 2010•Blog Posts•General Marketing•Online & Digital Media• by admin

Google has introduced its new “Place Search” feature, which lets searchers get a clustered map-based view of search results around a specific location. The new feature makes it easier for users to make comparisons when they’re deciding where to go. With about 70% of search traffic coming from Google, the new Places results page makes it more important than ever for your local business to stake its spot on the Google Places map.

How does it work?

Google displays the new Places pages when it predicts that the user is looking for local information, and those listings include address, phone number, customer reviews, and links to your place page.

Previously, results included just the business name, URL, phone number, and the number of reviews available. Searchers had to click on each business listing to find out how many stars the business received in customer reviews and to see details like address and actual review content.

How do you make sure your business shows up?

To start, if you haven’t already, you need to make sure you claim your Google Places page using the following steps.

1.) Do a search for your business. In many cases, it may already show up with a generic places page that has been created automatically by aggregating web content. If it does, under your business name, you’ll see a “Place Page” link. Click it. (If your business doesn’t have a “Place Page” link, go to Google.com/places and click on “List your business” on the right. You may need to create a Google account if you don’t already have one.)

2.) If Google has created a place page for you, you’ll see information about your business, whether it’s near public transportation, a map of its location, reviews, and more. Toward the top of the page, you’ll see two links: “Edit this place” and “Business owner?” (if you see “Owner-verified listing” instead of “Business Owner, you can skip to step 3). Click on “Business owner?” to Edit, Suspect, or Validate your listing. Click on “Edit this listing” to update information about your business. It’s also a good idea to follow the steps to Validate your listing so you can have more control over the content of your Google Maps listing.

If you don’t have a Google-created Places page yet, you’ll want to click on “Add another business” on the Dashboard page and you will be guided through a series of steps to create a validate a page for your business.

3) Once you’ve located or created your page, you’ll want to optimize it. Google doesn’t reveal the specific details on how it ranks the pages in these search results, but Places pages with good information, numerous reviews, and elements like images or videos are likely to help with those rankings.

Short of reviews? Add a review yourself, encourage your friends and fellow business owners to do the same. Even consider running a promotion encouraging customers to provide feedback online. Not only will the feedback be useful for your location ranking, but it will provide valuable feedback to you about your business, too.

And Google seems to constantly add new ways to enhance your content. Consider adding Google tags, which can highlight coupons, videos, and whatever you consider to be most important about your business. Google Boost Ads are being rolled out for select categories in certain cities, with more to be added in coming weeks and months. Those ads allow you to draw attention to your Google Places listings. Google also offers the ability to post to your place page, so if you’re having a sidewalk sale, a book signing, or even just want to highlight news about your business, you can keep your Google Places page an interesting and useful destination for your potential and current customers.

Your Google Places page can also act as a secondary website, and it offers QR tags if you want to share your Place Page with your customers. And on the right rail of your Places page admin screen, Google even shares helpful hints on getting the most out of your page.

Best of all, the service is free (with the exception of Google Tags and Google Boost ads). Optimize your Places page today and make sure your potential customers can find you.