What would you do if you were looking for a health and wellness coach and you lived in the vicinity of Virginia Beach, VA?
Well, you could look in your yellow pages — if you still have them and can find them. But it’s far more likely that you would open a Google browser and type health and wellness coach virginia beach or perhaps health coach virginia beach or maybe even wellness coach virginia beach. Click search and you’ll see:
A little hard to read at that size, but notice that the top listing on the Google Search Results Page (known as a SERP) shows a map followed by a listing for The Coaching Pair along with a link to a Place Page, an address, and a phone number. It also gives the hours and indicates that there are 16 reviews.
Following that are the “generic” SERP results and you’ll also observe that the number 3 listing again mentions The Coaching Pair, but this time it is a link to a special offer for a free wellness analysis by The Coaching Pair. It looks like this:
Now, in the absence of any other information, who would you call first? The answer is probably obvious — The Coaching Pair. This demonstrates the power of Google local search. As a small business owner, you’ll probably be amazed by how much Google charges for such a prominent presence. Well, the surprising answer is zero, nada, zilch, nothing.
It all stems from a program called Place Pages which Google makes available for every small, local business owner. In essence, the Place Page is a free web site from Google for your business. Here’s what the Place Page for The Coaching Pair looks like: (Click the link to access the page on the Internet.)
As you look at The Coaching Pair’s Place Page, you will notice that it has all the elements that someone looking for info about The Coaching Pair would want to know, e.g., hours of operation, method of payment, travel directions, specialties, etc. I’m sure you’ve seen web sites that companies proudly send you to that don’t convey anywhere near that amount of information and for which they may have paid a web designer thousands of dollars to create. Are they on page 1 of Google for their niche?
What we, Internet Marketing Chesapeake, did for The Coaching Pair, we can do for you. Yes, there are books and other resources that tell you how to create your own Place Page (in fact, I am writing one myself), but I ask you, “Do you really have the time to take away from your business to learn all the ins and outs of creating a successful Place Page? Contact us using the link in the menu bar of this post and let’s talk.
2 Responses
Some people wouldn’t even use their computer, they’d use their smart phone instead. more and more people are using their phones to search online.
Getting an optimized listing in Google Places is even more important now that people are making the shift to using their phones to search for what they want.
Lynne Lee Online Coach recently posted..QR Codes – What Are QR Codes And How Do You Use Them
You are absolutely correct, Lynne! This is especially true for businesses that provide in-house services such as restaurants, retail establishments, and the like. When you consider that there are 4X as many cell phones as Internet users, and with the increasing availability of web-capable “smart” phones, the shift is inevitable and clearly coming sooner rather than later.