No matter your industry, every business wants to have a leg up on their competition. However, in today’s market, it has become harder and harder to stand apart from your competitors. It can be especially hard for smaller businesses to compete with big brands that dominate the web. One of the best ways to get noticed is to implement Local SEO strategies and a key factor to being successful is to have a Google My Business Account!

What Is It?

Google My Business is a free service provided by Google where you can list key information about your business such as location, company hours, and a description of your services. This information can then be used to appear on Google Search, Maps, and Google+ reaching a larger audience.

Getting Started

Google My Business helps you maintain accurate information, as well as interacting with customers. You can post photos of your business, collect and respond to reviews, and attract new customers.To start attracting customers you’ll have to first set up your Google My Business Account and become verified.

1. To sign up go to  google.com/business and click Start Now at the top right corner of the page

2. You will then sign into your google account or create one to be able to use Google Service

3. Enter the name of your business and click Next. Then enter the Address and click Next. You may then have the option to position a marker on the location of your business on the map. This will help customers find your business easier and hopefully generate more traffic.

4. You can then enter a business category, a phone number, or a website URL.

5. Once you’ve ensured all of your information is correct you will then verify your connection to the business.

Verifying Your Business

After you’ve successfully set up your account, it’s time to get verified. Verification not only protects you from outsiders trying to pose as representatives for your business, but users also consider verified businesses to be twice as reputable. For most business owners you will have to request a verification postcard from google.

1. To send a verification postcard click Mail in the top left corner of the page over the map where your business is pinned.
2. Ensure that all of your business information is accurate and click Send Postcard.
3. After a few weeks, you should have received your postcard at the location provided. Contained in the postcard is a unique verification code that you will enter in Google My Business to confirm that your business is located at that address.
4. Navigate to the Google My Business page and click Verify Now. Then input the code from the postcard.

Your business is then officially verified and you will be able to respond to reviews, edit your business information, and add photos! Check out your listing and start attracting new customers with the help of Google My Business.

Giving Users Access

If you have multiple business owners or you're working with an agency you'll need to set up multiple users.

1. To get started you'll first need to Sign in to your Google My Business.

2. If you have multiple locations, open the location you'd like to manage.

3. You'll then click Users

from the menu.

4. In the top right corner, click the "Invite new users" icon

.

5. Enter the name or email address of the user you'd like to add.
Note: If you're adding an agency to your location, you'll need to add the agency's location group ID here.

6. Select the user’s role by choosing Owner, Manager, or Site manager. Each user type has different capabilities and permissions specific to each one. The full chart below provided by Google shows the full list of user capabilities. When working with an agency such as Red Shark, you'll probably be required to give them "Manager" access. This ensures they can maintain all of your updates and make any needed changes that arise.

7. After you choose a user type you will click Invite. Invitees will then have the option to accept the invitation and immediately become users.

The users page displays all active users, as well as people who have been invited to become users. Again, only an Owner is able to add and delete users. To cancel pending invitations, click X in the row with the invitation you want to remove.

At Red Shark Digital, we can provide your business with a targeted and unique Local SEO campaign to build your brand and attract customers. We can also take results from your Google My Business account and help you build an effective strategy to increase traffic and produce higher rankings. Transform your online presence and start building your business today!

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