Here's how to make Google Maps your friend! ???

More and more people use Google or Google Maps to search for the nearest restaurant, café or hotel. It is more important than ever to rank high in the results. But how do you ensure you end up on the first page?

For years we have been working with Obenan, a company that provides digital marketing solutions that, among others, ensure optimal online findability. A crucial part of business in 2023, according to a study by Google Insights.

In their research, Google Insights reported a 900 per cent increase over the past two years for searches with "near me." Searches with "open" + "now" and "near me" increased by 200 per cent. These numbers show how important local SEO is to businesses with physical locations. These five tips will help you get started!1.

1. Maintain your location data

If you want to boost your online visibility, it is essential to maintain your location data consistently across all online platforms and navigation services. Discrepancies, such as misspellings, abbreviations, missing room numbers or wrong phone numbers, can cause problems. If Google cannot determine which information about your business is correct, your business may not show up in search results at all. In addition, make sure to remove any duplicate listings you come across.

2. Create unique and local content

This is all about being as close to your guests as possible and communicating with them from that position. In the end, SEO is all about providing a positive content experience across all devices and platforms. Always focus on adding unique quality content tailored to individual locations. Quality content benefits your guests. Create blogs, posts and stories about nearby attractions or "things to do." Talk about the products you work with or the designer who designed your interiors. Give an inside look at your business so (potential) guests can build a connection with your brand.

3. Links are still of importance

Getting links on local blogs, websites and listings is just as significant for improving your visibility as creating content yourself. Consumers want products and services related to your brand, so you need to be visible. You can manage this through PR. By inviting influencers for reviews, or partnering with bloggers and vloggers. By specifying newsworthy events within your company (there is always news!) and slinging this into the world through press releases or (small) events. Offer yourself or your boss as an interview candidate for trade media to discuss your areas of expertise. This creates external links, which are incredibly important for a strong local search engine presence.

4. Optimize Google My Business listings

If you are not using and optimizing your Google My Business profile, you are missing an opportunity to make your products and services visible where it matters most. When optimizing, fill in all possible information, including photos, menu items, descriptions and service lines. It is absolutely essential to fill everything in properly and keep information up-to-date.

5. Track rankings and build local landing pages

Always make sure you offer local landing pages that provide an excellent user and page experience. Consider responsiveness, load times, the latest schema code base, calls to action and design elements. All of these can help your business rank on all sites and convert searches into physical visits.Maybe this all sounds like abracadabra to you, but your local SEO approach is more relevant than ever. It's worth setting aside time and diving right in. After all, in the end, you'll be able to see all your effort reflected in the number of guests. And that's what it's all about: a full house.

Good luck!