Having ownership of your Google business listing opens up a whole new world of control when it comes to how your business shows up to potential customers. For starters it allows you to:
Add and update business info such as hours, website, products & services, and more.
Tell customers about your business, your parking situation and handicap accessibility
Respond to reviews and customer questions.
Of course, that’s not all, but it should be enough to encourage you to claim your business immediately. Once you get started, you’ll find that you fall into one of two categories. Either your business already exists on Google and you need to claim ownership to manage it or you need to start from scratch and add your business to google. Neither way is difficult and there is no cost, so no more excuses. To find out which route you’ll be taking, you first need to search for your business on google maps.
On your computer, open Google Maps.
In the search bar, enter your business name.
At this point, if your business name pops up, double check the address and click Claim this business > Manage now.
If your business name does NOT pop up, you’ll need to add your business. You can do this in one of three ways.
Enter your business address in the search bar and click ‘add your business’
Right click anywhere on the map and then click, ‘add your business’
In the top left, click menu > Add your business
You’ll need to provide some basic information about your business such as the name, type of business, contact information but nothing too complicated.
Both steps lead you to the verification process. Here, you’ll need to prove that you do in fact own/manage the business. This might seem like a real pain to have to do but think of it like this - if a competitor or some ill intentioned person were trying to claim your beloved business, you’d be grateful for this verification process. So, it’s a necessary step and it’s simple.
Your choices for verification methods are:
Postcard - If you select this option, it’s pretty simple. The next step here is simply to wait. After about a week (in my experience it does not take much longer), a postcard from Google will arrive at your business address. There will be instructions on what to do from there. Basically, you go to your Google business listing and enter the verification code on the postcard. And that’s it - you’re now a verified business! Woo!
Phone Call - If you choose the phone call, you need to make sure to request the call when you are physically at the location and are able to answer the phone. During the call, an automated voice recording will give you a confirmation code that you’ll need to enter on your computer in real time. It’s important to note that if you have an answering system that picks up and directs calls to different departments before a caller gets a live person, you need to turn that off or have it disabled for this. The automated call goes directly to the listed number and cannot dial extensions or leave the code on a voicemail.
And, that's it! See how easy that was? Now comes the fun & rewarding part. Having ownership of your business listing allows you to do the following, and more:
Add and update business information such as hours, website, products & services, and more.
Manage how your business shows up on Google
Respond to reviews and customer questions.
We’ll get into the many ways that you’ll benefit from Google Business in future blog posts. For now, if you have any questions - let me know! stacey@virtualstacey.com or 203-694-0817
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