If you’re a local business and have a Google My Business (GMB) listing, then you’re probably aware of some new features that have been rolled out. One feature, posts, allows you, as a GMB user, to make posts right there on your GMB listing. A Google My Business Posting Service can make these posts for you. Here’s an example of this important feature: When someone searches for your company name, Google shows your posts, as seen below.
Google My Business Posts
I typically try to make a Google My Business posts on a regular basis, which definitely helps with overall visibility in the search results. Making posts on your local Google listing will, in fact, help your business show up more often. Here’s an example of a local business client of mine. I started making regular Google My Business posts for this business around the middle of September. As you can see, the number of times the listing for this business is showing up has dramatically increased.
You can see data like what is shown above right in Google My Business, under “Insights”.
How to Use Google Posts
Making a Google My Business post isn’t that difficult. The hard part is coming up with a topic and an offer. It must been anywhere from 100 to 300 words in length. Adding a photo is not required, but can oftentimes be a good help to get people to click through and see the post.
- Once you log into Google My Business, you can go to the Posts option on the left.
- Upload a photo (highly recommended).
- Once you upload a photo, start writing your post in 100-300 words.
- Keep in mind that the first 100 words or so will be what shows up in your local listing, so you might want to write a headline first. It won’t show up as a headline, but you can use a short sentence at the beginning. Then, you’re limited to 300 words.
- You have an option to add a date to the post and make it an event. If it’s a special or one-day offer, than you’ll want to do that.
- Add a button to the post. This is really good if you want people to visit your website. You can add a button such as “learn more” or: reserve, sign up, buy, or get offer.
- Add a URL to the button. You’ll need to add a full URL/link to a website. I recommend using parameters to track the number of clicks. You can use this tool to track the click-thrus to your website. Otherwise, there’s really no other good way to track how many people are clicking.
- Once you’re ready, click the “preview” button and preview the post.
- Publish the post and it’s instantly on your GMB listing and will show up in the search results.
- Search for your company or business name and look at the search results. I cannot stress this enough, as you’ll want to make sure that it looks good.
- If you have any issues or problems, you can always go edit the post in Google My Business or you can remove it entirely and start fresh with a new post. Posts last 7 days.
It’s not a really difficult task to make a Google My Business post. It’s time consuming. But, what if you have more than one location? What if you have many locations? Yes, it’s still good to make a post on every single location. Even if the post is the same across all of your locations, I still recommend a regular post on every GMB location that you have.
Google Posts Example
While it’s fairly easy to make a Google My Business post, actually finding the time to come up with the idea for the post, write it, and then post it on GMB can be time consuming. And, if you’re a small business, it’s probably not on your top priority list. Even though it should be a priority, as it will bring in new customers, you have other issues to deal with. Here’s a Google Posts example, one I recently posted. It talks about my business, and does bring in new contacts for my business:
That’s where my Google My Business posting service comes into play. I can take care of the posting on Google My Business for you, and make sure that a new, fresh post is made on a regular basis. These posts need to be done manually, and there is no automated way to make Google My Business posts so they’re scheduled. Other services, such as Hootsuite and Buffer allow you to schedule posts in the future so they will be posted. My Google My Business Posting Service is not automated: it’s scheduled, but someone manually will log into your GMB account (or the account of the local business) and make the post.
Google My Business Posting Service
Here’s what I’ll do for you if you sign up for my Google My Business Posting Service. There are two options:
- I’ll write the content with your input ahead of time, and make the posts on an agreed-to regular basis. This can be once a day, once a week. I do recommend one at least every 7 days, as the post expires after 7 days.
- You provide the content for the posts and when you want them posted. I’ll log in and post them for you
In both cases, access will need to be given to the Google My Business account(s). My Google My Business posting service only includes posting–it does NOT include reviewing, changing, updating, or even looking at any other part of the Google My Business listing other than dealing with Google My Business posts. I charge a separate consulting fee for other local SEO type tasks. I provide this service as a 100 percent white-label service for agencies, as well.