Google is putting a lot of value into Google My Business (GMB) — so it’s one of the first things you need to look at when searching for ways to improve your local SEO ranking.
In his talk, Greg Gifford gave his ultimate optimisation guide for GMB — sharing practical tips on getting GMB right and covering every element.
Overview
Speaker’s name: Greg Gifford
Job role and company: Vice President of Search at DealerOn, Inc
Links to Twitter profile: @GregGifford
Link to LinkedIn profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/greggifford/
Link to the slides:
What was the talk about?
Greg Gifford’s talk on the Idiot Proof Guide to GMB Optimisation came accompanied with a zillion movie references and gave the audience plenty to think about — and action — when it comes to GMB optimisation. He offered some awesome tips and tactics to help businesses spending to much time looking up at competitors who rank higher in local searches.
The way to do this? Google My Business.
Greg mentioned that many people feel clueless about GMB, and his idiot-proof guide helped to remedy this; although there’s no miracle pill for GMB optimisation, there are ways to get your GMB listing to be as visible and awesome as possible.
Optimising your GMB profile should be high up on the list; people don’t need to go to your website anymore, so you should treat your GMB listing as your new homepage. Greg gave the audience a whole host of helpful actionable points for doing this.
He also shared some really specific tips on using Google Posts correctly and the importance of the new Questions & Answers feature — including handy ways to hack it.
Fave quote
People don’t need to come to your website anymore — they can get all the info from GMB. So treat that like your homepage.”
Potential impact on the industry
With Google placing more value on Google My Business, it’s an important tool to use to quickly and impactfully boosting your ranking and get your business noticed.
GMB now has a big impact on UX, as users no longer need to visit a business’s website — utilising and optimising GMB is the best way to ensure success.
Greg’s talk provided some intelligent insights and technical tactics on how optimising GMB can help you to control the conversation and make a better first impression on the user.
Key takeaways
- Optimise your GMB profile:
- use your correct business name (don’t stuff keywords)
- List a local phone number (and it’s okay to use a tracking number too)
- Choose the right categories: the primary category carries more weight
- Upload lots of awesome content to GMB, like photos (ideal image size is 1200×900) and videos
- Use attention-grabbing Google posts to drive pre-site conversions and interactions, and stand out from competitors (easiest are “what’s new” posts because they display the most text)
- Use UTM tracking on your website link (Google Analytics attribution is broken)
- Pay attention to GMB Questions & Answers, as they have replaced on-site FAQs — anyone can answer, and the answer with most upvotes will show as the primary answer
- Use Questions & Answers quick hacks like asking, answering and upvoting your own questions
