Put your business on the map to draw in more customers. Follow these top 10 recommendations to improve your exposure on Google Maps.

You need a professional to repair a sudden flat tire, or you're searching for a restaurant in an unfamiliar region.

How do you search?

You are not alone if you say Google Maps.

Many use Google Maps to find nearby companies and make wiser purchasing selections.

So how can local companies get more visibility in the marketplace when customers increasingly want to buy goods and services locally?

The following ten actions can help you rank well, increase traffic, and attract more clients using Google Maps.

1. Create and Finish Your Google Business Profile

Claiming and optimizing your Google Business Profile is the first and most crucial step in being visible in Google Maps (GBP; previously, Google My Business or GMB).

Do a Google or Google Maps search for your company name to get started, and if you haven't already, confirm your listing.

You may now update a listing after creating it and signing into your Google account, even from the search results themselves.

Being a Google property, GBP serves as a fundamental signal to Google indicating your company's existence; the data shown here is thus presumed to be accurate and current.

More on the significance of this information will be discussed shortly. Google will compare these specifics with those it discovers on your website and in other local directories and resources.

2. Share Links To Content (Including Photos)

You've only completed a portion of your task after you've claimed your GBP listing.

It's crucial to submit frequent changes to your GBP page since Google awards active companies with increased placement in Google Maps.

Special deals, hosted events, links to pertinent blog entries, and general company updates are all examples of updates that may and should be made.

Use images in your posts wherever you can since they are more likely to increase reader engagement in terms of shares or clicks.

Links to your website's essential product or service pages are preferably included in your postings.

3. Make Your Website More Visible in Local Organic Search

If you want to rank well on Google Maps, ensure your online presence, including your website and external content, is optimized for your local audience.

As these are the three main building blocks around which a presence is created, you may start by conducting a local SEO audit to see where you need to concentrate your efforts from a keyword, content, and linking viewpoint.

Your website must be correctly designed for Google to be able to crawl and index your material with ease. Therefore, the content on your site must be filled with pertinent, regionally relevant, intent-driven keywords and logical internal and external connections to the solutions your audience is looking for.

Websites that Google rewards direct users to answers in the fewest clicks.

Regardless of the device, websites must load swiftly and provide smooth navigation. This is crucial locally since more and more people start their searches on their phones.

4. Employ a Local Business Strategy

Google and other search engines favor uniformity when it comes to information architecture, particularly when it comes to business facts. This preference has resulted in the creation of a schema.

To make their material simpler for Google to crawl and index, companies may use Local Schema.

The local business schema covers many of the same company information in a Google Business Profile, which Google will automatically cross-reference.

Your company is more likely to appear prominently on Google Maps the simpler it is for Google to verify your location.

5. Integrate a Google Map Into Your Contact Page.

Although it's not mentioned explicitly, it's reasonable to infer that Google prefers this style and that having a Google Map on your website will affect your rank in Google Maps.

In this instance, Google can also guarantee a consistent user experience for its searches, which should also be the goal of any company aiming to delight its clients.

6. Mind Your Reviews and Mine

Any company may establish a GBP listing, make sure its essential company information is current, and upload relevant local content.

On the other hand, customer reviews play a crucial role in deciding if and where a local company appears on Google Maps.

Google pays special attention to how many reviews your company receives and how responsive it is to those reviews, whether they are favorable or not.

Any company wants to reduce the number of bad reviews it gets, and any bad reviews should be quickly addressed.

This might be a valuable technique to demonstrate your company's dedication to client service.

Although there are other online review platforms, such as Facebook, Yelp, and other niche review portals, reviews on GBP profiles will be given greater weight regarding Google Map results.

Soon after you've successfully provided a product or service, while a hopefully good experience is still fresh in their consumers' minds, think about proactively asking them for evaluations.

Once certain online or offline client activities have been accomplished (such as an appointment finished or an invoice paid), services are available to automate review requests (through email or text) and review management across numerous sources via a single dashboard.

Automating the process may save time for busy local companies while ensuring a steady stream of favorable evaluations.

7. Update Your Nap With Local Listings and Citations

On your GBP, website, and the internet, your Business Name, Address, and Phone Number, or NAP, are the three most essential pieces of navigational information.

Your NAP has to be precise and consistent across all of these sources to be effective for Google and your audience.

Citations are another name for these mentions of your company that appears on other websites.

You may start by simply Googling for your company name and noting all the locations where your company data can be accessible to identify and confirm that your NAP is up to date.

To update this crucial contact information, check each occurrence and get in touch with each directory or website owner as required.

There are automatic local listings services that you can use to find and update your NAP, as well as other crucial company details like your website URL, services, or even pertinent photographs from a single spot. These services are both free and paid.

8. Increase Local Backlinks

Backlinks, occasionally referred to as inbound links, are simply a continuation of our NAP strategy in which you look for appropriate, local third-party websites to link to your primary website pages.

Backlinks may support your company from a local and product/service standpoint.

If category choices are available, you should ensure that any listings you keep with links in local directories are in the appropriate categories.

For Google to follow and acknowledge the source of the connection to your content, these links to your website should ideally be "follow" links.

You should also explore possibilities to obtain connections from other non-paid sources, such as a relevant partner, industry, or service organization sites since most directories know the significance of "follow" links and consequently charge for membership.

9. Get Involved in Your Community

In the same way that Google rewards GBP activities, it also takes into account how involved a company is in its local community as a way to develop its presence and influence there.

Businesses that are observed participating in neighborhood service organizations (such as Chambers of Commerce, charities, or sports leagues), sponsoring neighborhood events, or collaborating with other well-known neighborhood businesses are naturally thought to be a thriving part of the neighborhood.

Publishing and/or promoting linked content, such as event announcements, partner pages related to these partner organizations, and, of course, physically engaging, can all be forms of engagement. It can also include the possibility of being mentioned or linked in local news articles or other publications.

10. Pay Attention To The Long Tail And The SERPs

If you want to improve any area of your local online presence, you should keep track of your progress by checking your position in Google Maps and the standard search engine results pages (SERPs) for the keywords you wish to appear for.

You may use various rank tracking apps, many of which let you explicitly filter out Map ranks, or you can do your manual Google searches (ideally in Incognito Mode and while not signed into a Google account).

Make sure to take into account and use local identifiers and qualifying phrases like "near me," "best," and "cheap" when choosing which keywords to use, for example, "auto body shops near me," "best auto body shop in Barrie," or "affordable auto body work."

These three, four, and five-word phrases are regarded as long tails, which means they might not have a lot of local search volume. However, these volumes can add up, and any local business would be wise to concentrate on topical groups of related keywords rather than pursuing more competitive phrases.

Short tail top rankings will eventually come if you've successfully built up your company's local authority over time.

Place Your Company On Google Maps

Put your neighborhood business on the map now that you have your laundry list.

It's not all that different from how it's always been in the real world to establish your authority and competence online, but it may take time, as any genuine connection should.

Google awards companies that consistently provide excellent customer service respond quickly to inquiries from consumers, supply high-quality goods and services, participate actively in their neighborhood, and get positive feedback from their clients.

Get out there and start your company if this describes it.

‍