You’re convinced of the merits of Google Business Profile (formerly, Google My Business) and are ready to rock it – Excellent! Claiming your listing really is easy, we’ll tell you how.
If you need to know a little more about how a Google Business Profile can benefit your business, check out our last blog post.
How To Get Your Profile
There are two main ways to claim your business profile – you can claim ownership of a business on Google, or you can add your business.
Claiming Ownership
1. Search for your business on Google. If you get a result that matches your business details check to see if it has a link saying “are you the business owner?”
2. If so then the business has not been claimed so click the link to claim it
3. You’ll be asked to verify your business
4. If you don’t see the link appear then navigate to the Google Business Profile website and follow the steps to below in ‘Adding your Business’.
Adding your Business
1. Navigate to the Google Business website
2. If you have a Google account, click ‘Sign In’, otherwise click ‘Manage Now’.
3. Once you have successfully signed in, follow the prompts to add a new business.
4. Your Google Business Profile will not be live until you have verified it. Usually you’ll receive a postcard with a verification code at the postal address you entered. You may get the option to verify via phone.
That’s it! It should be very quick and painless but below are some tips and trick to help you with the process and beyond.
Google Business Profile Tips & Tricks
Don’t make changes to your business name between asking for your verification code and receiving it. Double check your business name, address and category are correct before requesting your verification code.
If you find your business online and you know you didn’t add it – don’t panic!
Google sometimes adds businesses itself with information found online, so just check the details are correct, and update anything you need to when you claim it.
Optimising Your business
To get the most out of your profile it’s important to optimise.
- Always use up to date information with the same format for phone numbers and addresses. Include opening hours and make all your info consistent with your website if you have one.
- Use high quality images that show your business off – this can work wonders in making you more attractive to potential customers.
- Make sure your business description is – descriptive!
- Explain what you do fully and give as much information as possible so people know what services and goods are on offer. Don’t assume it’s self-explanatory – spell it out!
- Ask your customers to leave reviews and add posts with great images to your profile on a regular basis. This helps your business look dynamic and fresh, and great reviews are worth their weight in gold when it comes to attracting more customers to you.
Once you’ve finished your profile and optimisations you can use the ‘insights’ function to see how your profile is performing. This will give you vital info to help you make your listing as effective as possible.
Learn more about how you can boost your website in google with Local SEO.
