Google Places for your business

Check out our Google Places Guide for Free Google Advertising.

Do you want to increase your website’s exposure? Do want more traffic, leads and customers?

Do you want to achieve all this for free?

Read on…

Free Google advertising is not only possible, but easy to do and Google actually want you to take advantage of this. Google wants to increase the value of its applications – Google Local and Google Maps; in order to achieve this they want some information on your business.

A few stats…

In the UK alone Google accounts for over 90% of searches** so getting your company on Google business listings is a great way of gaining exposure to potential customers in your local area. It is a simple process that can have a big impact on your business.

**Information provided by Hitwise (Dec 2008-April 2009)

What Google says…

“All Google search results are based primarily on relevance, and Google business listings are no different. Google Maps ranks business listings based on their relevance to the search terms entered, along with geographic distance (where indicated) and other factors. Sometimes our search technology decides that a business that’s further away from your location is more likely to have what you’re looking for than a business that’s closer.

Google Maps and the Local Business Center are a free service, so there’s no way to request or pay for a better ranking. We also can’t provide additional details about our ranking algorithm. We do our best to keep the details of the algorithm confidential in order to make the ranking system as fair as possible for everyone.”

How to get that free Google advertising

All you need is…

A description of your business
Your business contact information
Your company logo or business image

All you need to do is…

Go to www.google.com/local and search for your business just to verify that it is not yet listed.
Go back to www.google.com/local and click on ‘Put your business on Google Maps’
Follow the simple steps provided by Google. As part of the process you will need to verify your business either by phone or mail
Check back in a few weeks with Google to see your listing. You can edit or update your business listing at any time in the same way.

Be sure to optimise your business listing

In the company details section you have the ability to add 200 characters. You should include some keywords that your customers might use when searching for your business. It is important that this section reflects the search terms you would like to be found for. Google uses this section to assess how relevant your website is in relation to the search term used. You should also enter a few categories (underneath the description) that relate to your business.

Congratulations!

Your business will now benefit from the additional exposure given to you by Google business listings.