In the past two years, I have heard so many names to refer to Google business listings that I’m not sure if there ever really has been an official name. Each time I finally understand the inner-workings of adding a new business to Google, I seem to get an email alerting me of the changes.
What’s the Latest?
In June, Google launched “Google My Business,” a suite of tools designed to help business owners get their presence on Google. Never fear—this isn’t Google’s effort to completely delete the hard work you have completed. Instead, this is a new dashboard designed to make the legwork a little easier on you. Or at least that’s what all the Google announcements say.
In fact, here’s what the official FAQs say:
If you previously used Google Places for Business or Google+ Pages Dashboard to manage your business information, your account has been automatically upgraded to Google My Business. Google My Business makes it easier than ever to update business information across Google Search, Maps and Google+.
Now your Google Maps, Google Plus, and Google Search listings can be controlled from one dashboard. Let’s say you add a new picture. It updates on each of these listing areas. That photo may now appear in the Google search results, on your Google Plus business page, and in a popup image from your map listing. Now, when you choose to “manage my page,” you’ll see a number of editable sections, like category, business address, and business description. At the bottom of the editing screen you will see the links where you can preview how your listing displays.
Mastering Google My Business
We’ll probably never stop telling you that maintaining your business information on Google is SO important, especially as more and more people rely on the search engine. Take some time to understand the dashboard, and you just might actually like Google’s newest edition.
Now when you login, you’ll see a screen like this:
This dashboard view makes it a little easier to read new reviews, head straight to your analytics, or share a new post directly to your Google+ followers. Let’s hope this sticks around for a while because we kind of like it, and mostly we just don’t like change.
What are your thoughts on Google My Business?
Still not on Google? Get on Google today or contact us to find out how we can help improve your online business presence.
