Google My Business Process Overview (The 7 Steps)

Your Google My Business needs a process if you want to optimise its potential

This Google My Business process overview video and article will answer the following questions that you have recently raised with me:

• Do you need to make sure you’ve added Google My Business correctly in the first place?
• Are you just needing reassurance that you’re not missing a trick with GMB?
• Do you believe you’ve done everything but Google My Business just isn’t giving you any enquiries or traffic?

“View Google My Business as if you were the customer”

Zanet Design

Lets dive straight in with my most detailed Google My Business process ever

Google My Business Process Overview Video

Setting up Google My Business can be a little overwhelming at first. Just follow the instructions, answer honestly and think like a customer and you are then starting off the right way. Now watch this video and within half an hour of watching this, you will be confident to know exactly what to do. If you then want more support videos and learn how to really push your listing up another level head over to the Zanet YouTube Channel

1 Register or claim your business

For the full breakdown head over to How to claim your Google My Business.

Registering Your Business on Google My Business can be done in several ways. So you need to go to Google Search engine or Google Maps to see if its already been registered. If so its no big deal, just claim it.

If you cant locate on maps or the search engine then head over to https://www.google.com/business/ and then add your business there.

One of my best pieces of advice to start you off with is this: “Think As a customer“
Now let’s assume you’re registered. You now want to know How To Set up an Account that can be optimised for traffic.

This is where your choice of business category and keeping consistent business information is so important. See this video on nap if you need more information on this NAP consistency
Not sure what category to choose? Then take a look at your competitors. If you need more than one category, as long as its relevant to your business then use more than one if necessary.

To jump directly to Step 1 in the video then just follow this link 2:38

2 understand its value

Google My Business (GMB) is absolutely free (though this could change) Have you checked to see there are at least 3 or 4 ways for a potential customer to contact you from your listing or knowledge panel?

Call, email, SMS, book appointments on calendar, get directions, these are all available if you want to set them up and I have videos that cover each one if you get stuck. Also, delve into your insights and you will be able to see if these are working correctly for your business.

You’re looking for a good communication link between the customers and your business.
GMB Insight should be used regularly to understand what clients are doing.

To jump directly to Step 2 where you can understand Google My Business’ value click on 6:24

3 locate your keywords

A couple of tools i find really useful are:

Ubersuggest from Neil Patel
Surfer SEO which is a free chrome extension to give keyword ideas and their value
Understanding a keyword value is really important if you are not just wanting traffic, but the traffic is ready to purchase.

So what do you do with all these keyword phrases that you have discovered. You need them in your business listing. Add them in a natural way so Google can understand what you are referring too in your business. Add them to your business description. Consider replying to customers with a keyword included in the reply. Add some FAQs that cover some of the keywords

If you want some additional ideas, head over to this article called “How To Add Keywords To Google My Business” and then come back when you have done.

To jump directly to Step 3 about GMB keywords click on 9:43

4 Eye Catching Offers / Events

It’s important to know the difference between Events, Products, Covid updates and New Offers on Google My Business. Once you understand there differences, you may need to devise some eye catching titles or headlines. Think in terms of your national newspapers. They know how to catch your interest.

I find Fat Joe’s free title generator a great place for inspiration. This gives eye catching titles, based on the keywords you enter, Then add this to your titles on a blog or product or just add it to the top of a description of a post. You will be amazed at how this encourages more traffic. In effect it increases the CTR (Click Thru Rate) which helps the Google Algorithm see you as more worthy of higher ranking. This has a snowball effect.

Fat Joes Title Generator: https://fatjoe.com/blog-title-generator/.

Additionally you will need to keep managing Information as more updates are released by Google. Keep looking at your listing from a customers perspective. Take control of what you want customers to see. Improved logo images and clearer products will be important.

To jump directly to Step 4 which looks at various methods for extra traffic go to 16:37

5 respond to insights

Revisit GMB Insights to understand where traffic is coming from. Check and adjust. combined with Analytics and Google Search console you will get a clear understanding of where you are having success. Normally in a month you can start to see the impact of changes. This is not a rule, but an average from my understanding.

Jump to step 5 in the video to show what to look for in GMB insights 21:28

6 Improve your Business Rank

Improving your business rank is like running a marathon. It needs to be built up over time. You need to train yourself with small runs first and gradually as the muscle builds and the stamina increases you are then going to see the improved results for the bigger challenges.

So to Improve your Business Rank on GMB, you need to work.

• Add regular posts.
• Keep adding images and ask customers to do the same when they leave a review.
• Keep all your citations updated and consistent.
• Find out what NAP is in the article in point 3 above.
• Request reviews on Facebook as this has a big impact on Google.
• Always promptly answer reviews with keywords.

Head over to step 6 where I look at Improving your business rank with some of those methods, see 23:37

7 Add images

In my video example I show you how a photo review in a restaurant hit almost 3.5 million views. Now that’s a lot of views in a year. It shows the importance images play in bringing fresh traffic through Google My Business.

Of course many now view business using images on there mobile, so its never been so important to get this right.

However, Images can also authenticate the area you are based in, as Google can recognise the longitude and latitude of a photos.

If you want to know how to create images for GMB with a geo tag then this tool is really useful https://tool.geoimgr.com/

But you may want to consider adding a brand logo and text to the photo too as Google is very intelligent at understanding these things on an image.

Step 7 covers the importance of adding images with the 3.5 million Jetty image example see 25:03

Zanet Design Ltd is based in the Bournemouth, Poole and Christchurch area. So feel free to contact me if you are a local. But I have many loyal clients in many other areas an don’t just limit myself to local web design work. So if doing the above is beyond you and you need help, then book a consultation with me and I will do my best to give you the best advice tailored for your business.