Making sure your business listing appears correctly online has easily become one of the simplest, yet most often overlooked aspects of your online presence when it comes to growing your brand.
So what exactly do I mean by making sure the listing appears correctly you ask? It’s simple. Wherever your business information shows up online, everything needs to be consistent. When search engines crawl your website and business information, they look for inconsistencies and if your listing has a ton of them, it can have a detrimental effect on your online presence when it comes to ranking for keywords associated with your business.
How to Verify Your Business on Google
Perhaps the most important online business directory you need to pay special attention to when it comes to your business information is how it appears on Google. Many other websites actually pull this data from Google meaning you only have to fight half the battle when correcting inconsistencies with business information online.
If you’re a business owner, Google actually makes the entire process of getting your listing verified easier than ever. Here’s a quick step by step run-down of how to go about not only taking control of your Google business listing, but making sure it’s been officially verified by them.
- Navigate to Google My Business. (If you’re new to Google My Business? Don’t worry–all you need is a Google account. It could be the same one you use for Gmail or Google+.)
- Search for your business using its name and address.
- If you don’t see your business listed in the menu, click No, these are not my businesses or I’ve correctly entered the business. You’ll then be prompted to enter some details for your business. Make sure you enter an accurate, complete street address, and a phone number which reaches your business directly.
- After you complete your business information, click Submit.
From there the entire process is pretty self-explanatory. The great part about Google is they’ve made this entire process as painless as possible for business hours. Even more, once you do have your listing verified, the odds of your listing information ranking higher on search engines drastically increases.
Most business owners won’t take the time to do this simple process for their business and will regret it. The ones who do, on the contrary, will reap the benefits.