Over the recent months of the COVID pandemic, digitalization has influenced many of the choices we make, and favored, e.g. online services or home deliveries. Numerous businesses have changed their ways of communication and promotions.
Communication has become more digital or digitalized, partly modifying some of the customers’ habits with the focus on their user experience.
In this article, I am going to analyze Google My Business, a free and easy-to-use, powerful tool for the acquisition and management of new customers for laundries and businesses in general.
What is Google My Business?
Google My Business account represents a digital profile of a business. Apart from a “local file” containing all the data, it has replaced the old “telephone directory”. As a matter of fact, it allows to easily contact customers online through Google and Google Maps search engines. A well created profile and strategic key words will be able to attract customers at the distance of a click.
What should we publish in the profile?
It is crucial to verify and edit some basic marketing aspects in the Google My Business profile, such as: the GPS coordinates of the business, opening hours, closing days, telephone numbers, e-mail addresses, a website address, but most of all, the photo of the profile that constitutes the first business card for customers to see. The best choice here is to publish a photo of the headquarters and the company logo for an easier recognition.
Verify the account
Once all the information is entered into the listing, the account needs to be verified by the owner of the business or by its representative through a verification code that is sent by Google by an e-mail or by phone. The verification allows Google to confirm the legitimate owner of the business who is authorized to edit the profile. The verification determines the ownership of the account and its owner obtains a full control over it including the possibility
of updating the information, answering the customers directly, interacting with customers and dealing with the reviews.
The Ominchannel marketing strategies with GMB
Google My Business profile offers a possibility to publish photos of products or services, present special offers, highlight the points of strength that distinguish the company and offer customers all the good reasons to choose your business. Customers can book services directly from the company’s profile and visualize the catalogue which simplifies and improves the interaction with the business. What is more, the integration with Google Merchant functions allows to connect a website or an e-commerce platform directly to Google, free of charge.
Statistics and Interaction
After having verified the account, it is possible to access the statistics of the web page through the control panel in order to check the number of times the page was visualized, the number of phone calls carried out through the account, the requests for road indications and other information. Moreover, it is possible to share the offer with the followers directly in recognition of their loyalty, therefore induce them to come back. Statistics shows how to optimize customers’ involvement in order to obtain better results, and how to increase it by interacting with them through customers files.
A free Web site
For those who do not have much of an experience, and for all the newcomers, it is possible to have a free, quickly configurable, professional Web site through Google Site. It is created automatically using the information entered in the profile of the business activity, and it is updated automatically every time the profile is modified. A professional web site increases sales. Almost 70% of the consumers agrees on the fact that the probabilities of purchasing from a business that possesses a web site are higher than purchasing from a business lacking it.
When to start?
The first thing to do is to digit the name of the business activity on Google search to check whether a listing already exists otherwise it is necessary to create it from the start. At times, a business can already have an existing account as it might have been created by Google automatically editing wrong photos or data. At this point, it is enough to claim it by verifying the data and obtaining its ownership. In some cases, listings might have been duplicated. It is then enough to signal to Google a wrong listing with a request to remove it.
Having acquired a full control over your account, it is necessary to strategically manage the key words, business categories, location names and other strategic marketing aspects in order to correctly meet the three most important variables used by Google when it shows the research results: relevance, distance and importance.
Have a good digitalization. •
by
Alessandro Martemucci,
Marketing Consultant
Officinae Marketing Management
Detergo Magazine – JULY.AUGUST 2020
