One primary goal of building a digital marketing strategy is to help build brand awareness. To do this, you must take advantage of all viable online platforms to help you draw the attention of your ideal target audience. While it’s true that you want to spend your time and resources on posting to and building your presence on platforms that are most relevant to your audience, some options are universally beneficial to brands, such as Google My Business. Before exploiting the necessary steps for Google My Business set up and optimization, it’s essential to understand what the platform is and why you need it. What is Google My Business?![]() Google My Business is a free tool designed to help organizations and businesses manage their online presence across the search engine. This tool, when optimized correctly, allows businesses to take full advantage of their off-page and local SEO (search engine optimization). This is crucial to building brand awareness. The tool works like an online business listing, similar to the likes of an old phone book, which listed businesses, their location, hours, contact information, etc. What makes Google My Business more beneficial is that it allows users to link their information between other helpful tools, such as Google Search and Google Maps. Not only does it allow you to list your organization or business online, but it will enable you to monitor essential insights, such as who’s interacting with your listing and where they are interacting from. It also allows you the opportunity to interact with your audience. One feature of Google My Business is the ability for consumers to leave reviews on your business. This allows you to address questions, comments, and concerns in real-time, as well as allowing you to thank happy customers for their time and their business. Do I Need to Have a Google My Business Account?If Google My Business is just another online profile, you may be scratching your head wondering if it’s really worth the time and effort required to set it up and maintain it. The answer is simple – yes! Google My Business is so much more than another online business listing page. Still not convinced? Here are just a few reasons why you need to claim your brand/organization’s Google My Business listing as soon as possible: Makes Your Brand DiscoverableWhile larger brands or those that belong to part of a chain may have an easier time building their audience and brand awareness, small businesses tend to struggle a little more. They don’t often have the necessary resources to invest in various marketing channels to help boost their initial discoverability. A Google My Business listing is a must-have for small businesses not only because it’s a free tool, but it can help you boost visibility and brand awareness significantly. With approximately 68% of all online experiences starting with an inquiry on search engines, it’s vital to take the necessary steps to optimize your listing. Once you’ve implemented SEO tips and best practices into the creation of your listing, it becomes more discoverable for those looking for specific information. Even better, if you have a physical location, optimizing your listing with your location makes it even more discoverable for those searching for “topic + Near Me,” which is crucial given that the number of “near me” searches has increased by approximately 500% over the past few years. Boosts Your Audience’s Trust in Your BrandNot only is your Google My Business a great way to boost your local search appearances, but it also helps you start building trust between your brand and your targeted audience. Marketing professionals understand how vital trust is to their audience, especially when it comes to encouraging them to make the move from audience member to a paying customer. Research shows that 70% of consumers are more inclined to visit a business or organization that has a Google My Business listing, and those with a complete listing (has a description, photos, contact information, etc.) are twice as likely to earn the trust of consumers. Encourages Engagement and Builds Better Relationships Between You and Your ConsumersWith the budding trust-building between you and your audience, you’ll start to see that the relationships you are building will be that much stronger. Since your Google My Business listing allows your audience to leave comments, ask questions, etc., it encourages open communication between you and your audience. When you take the opportunity to acknowledge your consumers and address their comments, questions, and reviews, it helps to boost your credibility and shows your audience that you genuinely care about what they have to say and their experience with your business. Setting Up Your Google My Business Profile in 6 Steps![]() Of course, those are only a handful of reasons why it’s imperative that you move forward with your Google My Business set up. However, those are some rather convincing reasons – right? The next step in the process is taking the time to set up your Google My Business account. Not quite sure where to begin? Here are six steps to help guide you through the initial set up process: 1. Sign into Your Google AccountTo get started with building your business profile, you’ll want to head over to Google and sign in to your desired Google account. Ideally, this will be a dedicated account for your business – not a personal account. If all your small business has is your personal account for the moment, you’ll want to keep in mind that consumers will respond better to businesses that have a dedicated, branded email address. Not only does it make your email more easily recognizable to your audience, but it makes you look more legitimate as well. So, while a small business may not have a branded email address just yet, you want to remember that it’s a vital next move when building your brand awareness and brand credibility. 2. Head on Over to the Google My Business PageOnce you’ve logged into the correct Google account that you want to associate with your business listing, you’ll want to head over to Google My Business. Once there, if you’ve already signed in, then you’ll be prompted to move along to the next step. If you haven’t logged in, you’ll be required to do so or sign up for a Google Account. 3. Create a New ListingOnce on the page, you’ll be asked to “find your business” or “add your business to Google.” If you’re creating a brand new listing, you’ll simply click on “add your business to Google.” Once you’ve clicked on the link, it will bring you to a new prompt that will walk you through the necessary steps to build your listing. 4. Input All Relevant Business InformationWhen prompted, you’ll want to enter your Business’s name. Make sure you aren’t working on autopilot here and ensure that you enter it correctly. You don’t want to misspell your own business name, right? The next prompt will then ask you to input your business address. If you don’t have a physical location yet, it may be wise to enter your business’s P.O. box information here to help you boost your local SEO and help with discovery. When entering your address, you’ll need to include:
You’ll then be asked whether or not you deliver goods/services to your customers. If you do, then you’ll want to make sure you check this box. If checked, you’ll be asked a few follow-up questions, such as do you deliver in person and what distance you’re willing to deliver products/services. You’ll also be asked if you want to hide your address. If you don’t have a physical address or P.O. box, then you can check this box to hide any personally identifying information. However, if you want your listing to be searchable for terms such as “near me,” then you’ll want to leave this box unchecked. The next question will then be to choose your business category and then write up a business description to help Google determine what kind of consumers you’re looking to target. Once that information is in, you’ll be asked to add a business telephone line and a link to your website. 5. Verify Your Business Listing![]() With all your business’s information input, you can move on to the final step of the initial Google My Business setup process – verifying your business. You’ll be presented with several different verification options, and you simply have to pick the option that best suits your preference:
Should you choose to verify later or simply need an alternative method of verification, you can choose from any of the following methods:
6. Regularly Update Information as NeededOnce you’ve verified your business, the initial Google My Business setup is complete. However, you don’t want to neglect to update the information on your listing as changes occur. For instance, if your hours change or you update your contact information, you’ll want to make sure you update that information on your page as soon as possible. Remember, your Google My Business page is likely one of the first touchpoints your customers have with your brand – so make sure the information presented to them is as accurate as possible. Proper Google My Business OptimizationNow, once your initial Google My Business setup is complete, you’ll want to make sure you’ve taken all the necessary steps to properly optimize your listing to ensure you are reaching the right audience at the right time. Here are a few essential steps to help you with proper Google My Business Optimization:
Get Your Business Branding Done Right with EWR DigitalEstablishing your Google My Business profile is only one small step in building your branding. To ensure that your branding works for you, you need to establish a branding strategy, and the talented team at EWR Digital can help you do just that. Curious how we can help you build your Business branding strategy? Then contact us today to get started! Via https://www.ewrdigital.com/blog/your-guide-to-google-my-business-from-set-up-to-optimization
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Content creators and marketers walk on eggshells when it comes to search engines and their ever-changing rules and regulations. One of the most talked-about guidelines is Google E-A-T, which is designed to help search engines discover, rank, and prioritize content that they deemed relevant and helpful for those searching for specific inquiries. As part of their recent Medic update, Google made it known that they would be prioritizing content that was authoritative, trustworthy and written by someone who demonstrated expertise on the topic. That means that brands who weren’t adhering to the Google E-A-T standards could find themselves in a pickle. What is Google E-A-T? Your Quick Recap![]() The guidelines that make up Google E-A-T have been around since 2014. These guidelines were introduced as part of their Search Quality Rater Guidelines, which outlined what Google’s employees should look for when it came to ranking websites, pages, and other content. The goal of these guidelines was to help provide those using the search engine to find solutions to their problems or pain point with ease. To do that, Google expected content creators to create and share content that could easily be identified as authoritative and written by someone who had some level of expertise on the topic. However, they had to build a level of trust between the brand and its audience. That is where the acronym E-A-T came into play:
While the Google E-A-T guidelines had been around for quite some time, they began trending in 2018 when the Google Medic update was released, and those who fell under YMYL (Your Money or Your Life) websites began noticing swift declines in their overall traffic. Why? Because they weren’t creating the authoritative, trustworthy content by someone with experience/expertise in the niche. Instead, they had been focusing on generic, lightly optimized content in hopes of drawing attention to their brand. As the update began weeding out the weak content, more and more brands started looking for answers as to how they could improve their content and, in turn, increase their website traffic – hence, the increase in searches for Google E-A-T. Google E-A-T Part 1 Recap – Expertise As Google continues to update its content quality guidelines, it is crucial to take the time to understand what exactly is being prioritized. For Google E-A-T, you want to first dive into what they are looking for when they say “expertise.” Content awarded the level of expertise is content of the utmost highest quality but is content that is 100% relevant to your readers and their needs and showcases your ability to research a topic and share that information with your audience. Google E-A-T Part 2 Recap – AuthoritativenessAccording to Google E-A-T, the next piece of the puzzle when it comes to ranking content is identifying and ranking content for overall authoritativeness. Authoritative content is unique to your audience’s needs, and that is written by someone who has established their expertise in the niche/topic. This is content that readers can rely on for accurate information, leaving them with answers to their questions – not more questions. Google E-A-T Part 3: TrustworthinessUnderstanding what Google means by expertise and authoritativeness is the tip of the iceberg. The final piece of the puzzle is trustworthiness. It is essential to understand that trustworthiness accounts for accurate information and the quality of your website. What Exactly is Trustworthiness?In a traditional sense of the word, content marketers understand that trustworthy content is backed by sufficient research, written with the reader in mind, and helps them address a problem or present them with a pain point solution. ![]() However, when presenting solutions, you should be doing so in an honest, non-promotional manner. Remember, there is a time and place for promotions, and when building your brand reputation, you want to focus on educating your audience, not outright selling to them. Research shows that approximately 70% of consumers prefer to learn about a brand through their educational content as opposed to their purely promotional content. How Does Google Define Trustworthiness?According to Google’s Search Quality Evaluation Guidelines, the search engine giant defines trustworthiness by not only the content being shared but also by the trustworthiness of the creator of the content – also referred to as the main content (MC) creator – and the trustworthiness of the website as a whole. That means that Google takes into consideration:
While that may seem like quite a lot of checkboxes that need to be attended to, the good news is that if you’ve been practicing proper search engine optimization (SEO) and content marketing best practices, then you are already on the right track. You understand the importance of high-quality links, topic research, and creating high-quality content that directly addresses the most common questions and concerns that your audience is seeking information on. What Impact Does Trustworthiness Have on Your Website?Your website’s trustworthiness plays a vital role in not only how many visitors you get but in the number of new potential leads and conversions. How? It helps with building brand awareness, as well as brand credibility. Content marketing guru Neil Patel said it best – “If you are unknown, you are unsafe.” That simply means that if people come across your website and do not recognize you, they have no reason to trust you, your solutions, or anything you have to say. If you don’t focus on building your credibility through the content you create and/curate and share, the lower your domain authority score. Your domain authority score is a ranking that shows consumers how successful a site is compared to similar sites in their niche/industry. Another tactic your audience may use to determine just how successful your website is is its overall Alexa ranking. This score tells your audience how popular a site is – and the lower the ranking, the more popular it is and likely more authoritative and trustworthy. For example, if your site has an Alexa ranking of 150,000 and your competitor has 175,000 – your site will be seen as the more successful because it has been vetted by search engines and your ideal audience and proven to be authoritative, trustworthy, and relevant to their needs. The higher your domain authority score and the lower your Alexa ranking, the better your chances of attracting more website traffic. With more traffic comes more significant chances of building your audience and converting them to potential paying customers. What Impact Does Trustworthiness Have on Your Audience?![]() The best way to approach trustworthiness is to keep in mind that people coming across your website are looking for any reason to leave. If you’re an unknown brand or your domain authority is low, those who come across your brand assume that you have little to offer them. If you want to give them a reason to pay attention, focus your time and resources on creating expert, authoritative content. This is how the Google E-A-T system works. When followed, these guidelines ensure that you generate only the best content to help you build brand awareness, create trustworthy content and earn the trust of those in your audience. The more trustworthy your relationships are, the more likely they are to make the conversion from lead to a customer, and the more likely they are to recommend you to others. How to Create Trustworthy Content Your Audience Will DevourRecent studies show that trustworthy, authentic content plays an even bigger role in the consumer decision-making processes than ever before – with 90% of consumers saying that authenticity is important to them when choosing which brands they will do business with. This is why it’s crucial to build brand visibility online. The content you create and share online will help your audience determine just how authentic you are, and if they find your content and solutions worthwhile, it will help build those vital, trustworthy relationships you’re looking for. Not quite sure how to begin creating trustworthy content that will come off as authentic and educational? Here are a few tips to get you started: 1. Understand Who Your Audience IsUnderstanding your audience is vital in each step of the Google E-A-T guidelines. However, when it comes to building trustworthiness, taking the time to genuinely get to know your audience and their needs is more critical than ever before. If you don’t know who your audience is and what they are searching for on the internet, your digital marketing efforts will be for naught. To help you identify what type of content your audience will devour, you want to take the time to create audience personas that outline who would benefit from your brand and the solutions you have to offer. From there, work backward, identify the topics that would interest them the most, and start researching keywords, phrases, and topics that would draw their attention. 2. Conduct Research into Their Wants and Needs – Not Your OwnCreating content for the sake of creating content will do nothing to build your authoritative voice, and it will not help you a bit in earning the trust of your ideal audience. Why – because chances are, you are not creating content that is relevant to their wants and needs. If your niche is supposed to be digital marketing and you are doing an extensive piece on the benefits of newspaper advertisements, you aren’t creating content beneficial for those in the digital marketing niche. In this situation, research is your best friend. You can conduct a variety of different types of research to help you determine what would suit your audience’s needs, including:
Each type of research can provide you with insights that you may not have had access to before. 3. Utilize Your Research to Create Shareworthy ContentWith your research ready, you can start creating shareworthy content. Remember, if you’re trying to build your credibility to boost your trustworthiness, you want to focus your attention on educational content. A few excellent examples of content worth creating include:
![]() This type of content allows you to directly address your audience’s needs while being as transparent as possible. 4. Maintain Regular Communication with Your Audience Across PlatformsFinally, when building your trustworthiness amongst your audience, you want to go far beyond creating content for your website. Take that relationship beyond your website and encourage interactions and engagement on other platforms as well. An excellent way to do this is by sharing your content on your social media platforms. Doing so will allow you to start conversations with the audiences you build elsewhere and encourage them to visit your website for more great information, solutions, etc. On top of that, social media provides you with channels to further foster those vital audience relationships. Maintaining an active presence by addressing comments, questions, and concerns on your social media profiles shows your audience they can rely on you pretty much anytime. EWR Digital Helps You Build Trusting Relationships with Your AudienceTo ensure your content marketing strategy’s success, it’s vital to understand each piece of the Google E-A-T acronym. Building trust between you and your audience is crucial in the success of your business, and by adhering to these guidelines, you’ll be surprised at just how simple it can be to not only build these relationships but maintain them for the long run. If you’re wondering how EWR Digital can help your brand build create trustworthy content, and boost your relationship with your audience, then contact us today for more information! Via https://www.ewrdigital.com/blog/all-about-google-e-a-t-part-3-trustworthiness Link building is not simply a buzzword used to sell optimization services, or drive blog traffic. It is a viable, must-have SEO strategy in 2021. And link building will continue to be important for years to come.
Why? Good question. A question that Google’s PageRank algorithm can only answer in detail. For those of us not working side-by-side with John Mueller at Google, simplistic answers will have to do. The following serves up answers surrounding link building SEO in 2021. From why link building is important to critical link building SEO nuggets of knowledge you need to know, let’s dive right in. |
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