Google Places for Business: the Good the Bad and the Ugly
By now, most business owners now realize the importance of being found online. According to research by Constant Contact’s Small Biz Council 78% of small business owners believe NEW customers find them through search engines.
Google’s local listings are an important part of being found online for local businesses and we’ve blogged about this frequently. Unfortunately, Google + listings (formerly known as Google places listings) are MESSY and can be extremely frustrating.
We are going to detail the Good, the Bad and the Ugly of Google + listings to help you overcome obstacles and use this extremely valuable resource.
Local SEO - The Good
1 in 3 searches at Google today are related to local. Ed Parsons of Google recently gave a talk on this very subject and stated that “about 1 in 3 of queries that people just type into a standard Google search bar are about places, they are about finding out information about locations...”.
Google overwhelmingly owns local searches performed here in the U.S. and as we’ve all seen, Google+ listings tend to dominate those search results. Optimizing your business’ listing can give you a DISTINCT advantage over much larger competitors and help drive new customer calls and website visits.
Example:
Dr. Scott Koppel is a local podiatrist and has hired us to improve his online visibility. Optimizing his local business listing has driven significant new traffic to his website and generated many new patients...just this year alone. As you can see, his local business places listing is actually located above and separate from all the others:
Local SEO - The Bad
Google did a poor job when they transitioned their business listings from Google places (maps) to their new social platform-based Google + listings. The terminology changes from Google maps listings to Google places listings to now Google + listings has confused many business owners who are left scratching their heads trying to understand where to find information and just want one simple answer: “HOW CAN I LIST MY BUSINESS HERE IN NORTH FLORIDA???”
Thousands of businesses are trying to deal with a variety of listing problems:
- They can’t get their listings verified
- Their business address is incorrect
- Their valuable customer reviews have vanished
- Their business won’t display in the categories associated with their services
Our agency literally gets calls monthly from businesses here in Gainesville that are trying to fix problems with local listings.
And The Ugly
Perhaps the most frustrating aspect of all of this is the fact that Google, with it’s vast resources has FAILED to provide adequate support for their local business listings. They rushed the transition to Google + business listings and have not, until very recently, even provided any type of phone-based support to help fix the issues. We expect better from Google... you are the industry leader and should help business owners. If Google does this, it’s a win for everyone.
Got questions about your businesses local SEO? Comments on problems you've had? We would love to hear them below!