The Maine SEO Blog

Google Maps is offering a free month trial of Tags. What are tags, you ask? Well, this is what flyte’s Google Maps profile looked like before adding tags:

And here is the profile after:

A tag is essentially a way to promote certain areas of your business. (Get an in-depth look at tags here.) You can choose to promote photos or videos of your business, your website, or coupons:

Then, keep track of your tags activity right in your Google Places dashboard. How many times did users show interest in your tag? How many expansions of the tag were there on the map? How many clicks where there on your tag link?

With a free 30-day trial, why wouldn’t you try tags out?!

Nicki Hicks
Tag, you’re it

For the past week or so, I’ve been writing about how to rank better in local search, specifically in Google Maps.

Here is the entire guide:

1. Submit to Google Local Business Center (Part 1)
2. Submit to Google Local Business Center (Part 2)
3. How to get Local Reviews
4. What to do when you get a negative local review
5. Measuring Local Analytics

Once you’ve completed the 5 steps, you’re not done. [I'm sorry.]

You’ll have to:

• Be on the look out for satisfied customers to review your business.
• Add new images and video.
• Update your local posts.
• Check your Dashboard for (the right) keywords.

Nicki Hicks
Go local

Last time we talked about dealing with negative reviews; today we’re going to finish this five-step series with Google Local Business measurement.

Last June, Google Local Business Center added a Dashboard and Analytics. To get started, log into your Local Business Account and click “View report”.

The Analytics aren’t as powerful as Google Analytics, but you do get some interesting data. Get a complete look at all of the Dashboard components here.

What you get from the Dashboard

Google’s gone social

I just noticed this new section in the Dashboard (perhaps inspired by Buzz?). You can now post a 160-character status update; not unlike Twitter or Facebook.

And posts go live pretty quickly…

Local posts would be a great way to advertise a sale, a blogpost, whatever you’re looking to promote!

Is your profile complete?

Google will let you know if your profile is complete. Do you have pictures and video uploaded? Are all of your categories included? Are your business hours live?

Keywords

Activity, impressions, and driving directions are interesting – and might be more important depending on what industry your company is in. But I think one of the most valuable pieces of information the Dashboard gives are the top search queries. While I wish they would provide the geographic identifier (is it Portland, Maine or Scarborough, Maine the person was searching for?), the keywords will give you a good idea of whether or not people are finding you using the right keywords.

If the search queries are different than what you’re looking to rank for, start by changing your categories around a bit. If that doesn’t help, then there’s a problem with how your web site is optimized.

And that does it! You’ve just done everything you can to rank better at Google Maps.

See the entire guide here.

Nicki Hicks
Measure, measure, measure

Last time we talked about getting local reviews; but what if they’re not always positive?

The fact of the matter is…everyone gets a bad review at one time or another. Something out of the ordinary happened, and something went horribly wrong. It happens to even the best of businesses.

So maybe you have a bad review or two under your belt. How you respond is what counts.

You have two choices.

1. Face it head on. Leave a comment right after the review and humbly apologize for their bad experience, then offer them a free night stay or a free product for their trouble. (And if they take you up on your offer, make it the best experience they’ve ever had.)
2. If you don’t feel comfortable responding publicly, a lot of review sites give you the option to contact the person directly.

One of three things could happen.

1. Worst case scenario, the person won’t respond and won’t remove the review. Think of the benefit though: you just publicly showed potential customers that your business isn’t about to let a bad experience happen.
2. The person might take you up on your offer, and then remove their negative review.
3. Or the best case scenario (and it has happened)? The customer replaces their negative review with a positive one, pointing out that a mistake was made and a bad experience had; but this organization did everything in their power to make it right.

Next time, we’ll talk about how to measure your success using Google Local Business Center.

See the entire guide here.

Nicki Hicks
Sometimes a negative is a positive

Photo by httpoldmaisonblogspotcom

Last time, we finished submitting locations to Google Local Business Center. Once you receive that precious little letter from Google, input the PIN number into your Local Business Center account…and you’re good to go!

Now what?

Some factors have changed in local ranking, some have not. The fact that more positive reviews help you rank better still certainly holds true today. Sure, you could just start writing reviews about your own business, but if we’ve learned anything, it’s Google is smart - so get ‘em from your customers.

How to get reviews

Different industries are going to have different barriers to acquiring local reviews. That said, there are a few different strategies – from the obvious, to a little more out of the box.

Ask

That’s simple enough, right? Think of some of your customers who had a great experience with you and contact them. Ask if they’d be kind enough to give you a review on Google Maps – or even their favorite review site. Hey, you’ll even give them one too!

Make it easy

I’m going to use a hotel as an example here, as this technique wouldn’t work for every organization. Start by setting up a computer specifically for reviews – in a hotel, perhaps at the check-in desk. Bookmark Google Maps, and after the customer checks out, ask if they’d take just a few moments to give you a review.

Or, perhaps your company already sends out monthly postcards or mailers to customers. Why not include a line at the bottom asking them to give you a review – just make sure you include the link!

Likewise, are you running an email campaign? Include a link in the bottom to your Google Maps listing, your Yelp profile, your Yellow Pages listing – whichever you want to improve. (Remember that Google Maps actually pulls reviews from a number of sites, not just their own.)

Post a sign

You’ve probably stepped into a local shop or restaurant and seen the Yelp stickers on the door. If that’s not an incentive to go to Yelp and leave a review – or at least check out what other people said – I don’t know what is.

Give them an incentive

Speaking of incentives, why not give customers a reason to help you out? Whether you offer a percentage or money off your product, free shipping, or free samples; it will be money well spent.

Obviously these tactics aim to get you positive reviews - but next time we’ll talk about what happens if you get an (eek!) bad review.

See the entire guide here.

Nicki Hicks
Local Reviewer

Photo by ropobby