Promote your business locally.
Gone are the days when we used to search for a business in phone books or just looked for stores nearby. People now use internet to look for local shops and offices near their preferred locations.
So when they are searching for a particular business, you need to be there. Every small business must have online presence to attract new customers.
If you are a store owner or provide a service and don’t plan to open online store, you can take advantage of the FREE service provided by Google to promote your business.
Google has made it easy for any small business to have online presence without spending money. If you have not yet listed your business with Google My Business, get registered today.
Suppose you own a fashion store and someone is searching Google for fashion stores in your city and your store doesn’t appear in search results. You will miss out on potential customers.
So, you definitely don’t want to miss this opportunity. If your business is not listed on Google My Business, you are way behind competition.
You also get a FREE website to showcase your products or services with business location map and contact options. Google’s free website builder uses your listing’s information to auto-generate a simple site.
You have the cption to choose from different designs and simply add your own images. You don’t need any coding skills to maintain this website.
The information you provide in your listings is automatically added to your website and may also appear in Google Maps, Search and Google+ to increase the visibility.
It is not compulsory to have or add a website to create listings.
The good thing about free website is that you don’t have to update content in website separately. Whenever you update information (like change in business address) in local listing, this will reflect in your website as well.
It is important to mention that what Google offers is a basic one page site. Google added this feature to help those small businesses who don’t have a website. This is because most small businesses don’t have the technical expertise or time to create and maintain their websites.
Although customization options are limited in this website builder, it serves the purpose to promote your business locally. It is definitely better than not having a website at all.
If you want multi-page website with more functionalities and additional features, you can create free or paid site on Wix, which is an easy drag and drop website building tool for any type and any size of business. It’s premium plans start at Rs. 122 a month only.
If you already have a website, you can connect it to your ‘Google My Business‘ account. so searchers can visit your website.
Steps to promote your business locally using ‘Google My Business’
- Visit google.com/business and login using your existing Google account or create a new one.
- Enter the basic information about your business as required.
- Send request for verification.
Normally, verification is done by requesting a post card with a verification code to be mailed to your listed address. But, some business owners may be given option to verify by phone, text, mail or through the search console.
Watch this video for details:
Also read: How to verify your business
Additionally, you can also promote your business locally by creating ad using Adword Express, making it even easier for potential customers to find your business. You can log into AdWords Express right from the ‘Google My Business ‘ interface to create an ad.
In addition to using ‘Google My Business’, you can make use of Facebook Ads and Justdial to effectively promote your business locally.