Have you recently been told by one of your customers that they couldn't find you online? Maybe you were surprised to hear that because you've had a website for a while as well as a Facebook page. So why wouldn't a potential customer be able to find you?
We recently heard from a client who was pretty disappointed to find this out about her local business as well:
Lisa <lisa@fakecompany.com>
Can't find our company on the internet
Hi,
We just had a customer come into our store who said that they were happy to drive by our store because they didn't see our business listed online. Is there any reason why we wouldn't be showing up on the internet anywhere? Of course, we want to make sure that our customers can find us.
Thanks, Lisa
It can be pretty disappointing to find out that a customer can't find you online. After all, you've gone through all the work and paid money for a website, and you've been posting on social media at least fairly regularly for months.
Is all that hard work being wasted?
There are different variables that need to be considered here. Do we know where the customer was looking for your business? We might assume Google search, but we don't know for sure.
The point is that we want to make sure our business is appearing for all of the different possible ways that someone may be looking for us - or a business like ours.
This is referred to as local SEO or search engine optimization and this really starts by having a Google Business page for your business.
A Google Business page is similar to a social media page, in that you can enter information about your business such as your address, phone number, description, images and more.
However, a Google Business page is even better because it will often be displayed in Google search - for both general searches and map searches.
This is especially important for local businesses who customers may be trying to search for by entering phrases such as "near me" or where that might be assumed by Google.
- pizza delivery (same as "pizza delivery near me")
- florists
- plumbers
- daycare
To return quality results to the individual performing the search, Google relies on its database of businesses. This could include your business even without having a Google Business page - for example, if you have a website with comprehensive local business schema included and index.
But the best way to get your business included in these search results is to create a Business page.
That's the most important factor to local SEO, but a few other things to consider are:
- Other business directories such as Angie's List that are relevant to your business where your potential customers may be performing searches
- Search engine optimization including content creation
- Get online reviews from your happy customers (you can do this in your Google Business as well)
- Local link building - making sure your website is listed in your chamber of commerce, etc.
By getting started with the Google Business and a few of the other suggestions above, you'll be sure that your customers are not only finding you but hopefully finding you before finding your competitors!