Understanding How Google My Business Works

Performing well in local search results is essential to growing your business. That’s why Google My Business is vital to local companies. Local result pages on search engines trigger by the search query. Geographic proximity is weighted heavily in local SEO, which makes ranking for services in your local market area much more comfortable and far less time-consuming than ranking in hyper-competitive nationwide result pages. By optimizing your local rankings, you can engage with customers close to you, who need and can use your services.

Google My Business helps to optimize your local rankings and has a significant impact on your business's online visibility. Search engines want to help customers find the businesses and services they are looking for. It’s in Google's interest to help you improve your local search rankings. Opening a My Business account is free. It’s a must for any business looking to enhance their presence online.

How to Appear on Local Search Result Pages

To appear in local search results, you must first register in Google My Business. Be sure to should keep your business hours accurate. For example, nothing can kill a 24-hour emergency service business faster than having their business hours listed as 9 AM to 5 PM. You will also need to submit photos to My Business page that engage with your customers. Most importantly, you must respond to reviews daily. Another crucial ranking factor for local search results is to have positive reviews. Encourage your customers to leave feedback about your service and company by creating a link that leads them directly to your My Business page.

What are the ranking factors in local search result pages?

Google ranks businesses using algorithms, which are mathematical equations that take in a variety of factors to score each business for search queries. There are three main factors: Distance, Prominence, and Relevance. Google may decide a business that happens to be further away provides a better service than a nearby business, and therefore they will rank it higher in results. Improving your Relevance and Prominence in the eyes of Google's local search algorithms can give you the edge over the competition and a boost in business.

Optimizing Your Local SEO

Exactly how Google ranks pages is kept confidential. However, there are clues about what works. Let’s review three important areas that are under Google review. Relevance is mainly determined by what we consider to be traditional SEO best practices. Google uses AL, which is: Algorithm and Machine Learning to score relevance. For example, if many users land on your pages, and stay there, using a single search query, Google begins to rank you higher for that query and its relevant synonyms.

Prominence refers to how well a business is known. In other words, the size of your reputation matters. Google ranks your business prominence by assessing key performance metrics from across the Internet. These metrics can include how many external websites provide links - known as backlinks to your website. You need to have good quality reviews and be mentioned by known and trusted sources, such as a local online paper or blog.

What you may notice is that both prominence and relevance are extremely difficult to manufacture artificially. Attempting to outwit complex algorithms- known as black-hat SEO is extremely risky and dangerous for your business presence online, even if done effectively for the short-term, could result in penalties, catastrophic drops in your search rankings or in some cases a permanent ban. 

There is no way to request or pay for better rankings from Google. The flipside is that local businesses fight for rankings on an even playing field. The question becomes… how well can you do this?

Contact Harben Marketing to Optimize Your Local SEO and Land Your Business in the Lucrative Local Search Boxes

Harben Marketing is a digital marketing agency with a focus on a data-based SEO approach that provides lasting organic search results for local businesses. 

Adhering to Google's guidelines ensures improvements to your local ranking results are legitimate and valid. By staying on the cutting edge of our industry, we can offer tangible results that improve your business both on and offline. Contact us today for a detailed review of your Google My Business and a game-changing plan to put you ahead of your competition.