How can Google Maps SEO benefit your business?

Google Maps is a web mapping platform. In addition to navigation, address storage, search and other functions, Google Map is a powerful online marketing tool.

Why Google Maps marketing is so important?

As people use the mobile Internet more frequent, Google Maps marketing is becoming more relevant to various industries.

• According to statistics, 80% of Internet users have smartphones. And more than half of users use Google search function on mobile devices to look for local businesses, services, products or information.
• Google Maps offers users prominent powerful search capability on mobile devices for seeking local solutions. Therefore, various companies can get incredible advertising exposure through Google Maps marketing.
• Google Search continues to focus on products and services that local users seeking in their area. Besides marketing, Google Maps also displays brand, general business information, such as business hours, physical location, customer reviews, and driving directions.

Local SEO Services for Google Maps

Optimization for Google Maps marketing has quickly become an important part of local SEO. Being able to appear at the top of Google Maps listings, including local 3-pack and Google Maps search results, is valuable for any business that markets to local consumers.  Local maps SEO can drive high-quality local traffic for all types of businesses. As a result, Google Maps optimization has become one of the most useful and effective ways to invest in local SEO marketing.

Gaining your marketing value from Google Maps

Google Search Engine Results pages always display the lists of local maps depending on users’ location and keyword search. For example, if a user searches ‘digital marketing Auckland’, then Google will display some geographically relevant results with local maps. Even though the user is in Melbourne, Google still will show results that are relevant to where they are being searched because the user takes a geo-modifier in the keyword query.

The factors behind Google Maps SEO rankings

Google Local Maps SEO or optimizing businesses to appear in the local 3-Pack, containing so many unique variables compared to traditional organic SEO. Some of the factors include:

• Whether or not the Google My Business page of your company is verified with the business.
• The number and accuracy of ‘citations’ (or mentions of your business name, address, and phone number on other web listings, such as Yelp, Facebook, Yellowpages, LinkedIn, etc.).
• Average number and ratings of reviews on your Google My Business local page
• Company location, distance from the city centre or target location
• The number of views and optimization of your Google My Business page
• The domain authority of the website of your company
• How does your company’s website mention the ‘citation’, and does the ‘citation’ correctly link to the Google My Business page?

Local Maps SEO service: An inside observation

If you would like to execute SEO strategy properly, you first need to make sure that your business is listed on each major search engine (eg: Google My Business, Bing Local, or Yahoo!). Sometimes, you might already have your Google My Business page and not even know it. Thus, you should conduct a whole review of your business’ web properties before you adopt Google Maps marketing.  A significant aspect of Google Maps optimization is to claim and verify ownership of its Google My Business page. The main steps include:

• Completing all information, such as business hours, address, and contact details
• Tagging the Google My Business page for being properly categorized by Google
• Adding relevant videos and images of your business
• Adopt a review generation strategy to gain more 5-star ratings on Google My Business and other websites like Yelp and Bing Local
• Checking the local business’ citations and optimize all citations for accuracy and consistency.

This article summarizes some of the primary ranking factors that influence local maps SEO. An effective Google Maps marketing and SEO strategy can help your company position in the local 3-pack, growing their business, and outperform your local competitors. If you are seeking an effective Google Maps marketing plan, you can contact Webzilla today by sending us a message! We will have our best digital marketing specialists to help you!