Before getting to the heart of the matter concerning advertising on Google Maps, you should know that in order to be visible on Maps, you must first register your establishment on Google My Business.
Google My Business? It is a tool made available to you free of charge by Google and its objective is to highlight and benefit from a presence on Google for businesses and other organizations. It is a useful tool for Internet users, especially when searching in writing or on Maps.
Thanks to GMB, you have an information sheet (opening days, hours, address, website, phone number, customer reviews …) on your company and directly to potential customers. It helps everyone to find you quickly and improves your online visibility.
Through GMB, you as a company have access to indicators about the consultation of your website and your company by Internet users, but also access to tools to improve your visibility on the Internet. GMB is a key tool.
Advertising on Google Maps: a discrete but effective advertisement
Google has been running ads on Google Maps for some time now. These are advertisements that appear discreetly, during searches by Internet users, through an ad described by means of a purple-colored pointer or a pointer containing the company’s logo. This pointer allows to indicate that a promotion campaign is in progress. This means that the point of sale concerned has paid through the Google Ads auction system to have a prominent place in the results of places on Google Maps.
When you do a search on Google Maps for example, for a sports shoe store nearby, it is possible to find points of sale in the middle of a promotion campaign. You will therefore see it through the sponsored pointer.
The point moreover: It is not necessary to have a room, a store or a website to benefit from the referencing on Google Maps. It is even more interesting to have a website but it is already possible to be referenced without these elements.
The interests of advertising on Google Maps
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Advertise on an additional interface to increase visibility
Google Maps is the first local search platform. Appearing in the first search results is therefore an excellent lever to generate “drive-to-store”. Indeed, when Internet users are looking for a place to go, they may be more likely to go to the outlets appearing first than to the last ones. This also increases visibility for local customers.
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Accentuate the "drive-to-store" by taking advantage of the boom in mobile internet consultations
This allows you to facilitate the “drive-to-store”, i.e. the action aimed at moving a targeted prospect to a point of sale, with the ultimate goal of getting him to make a purchase.
This strategy allows you to have a greater impact on customers who move close to your establishment, especially with the rise of cell phones and the Internet.
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Generating leads
It also allows you to generate phone calls or prospect messages through the contact forms of your nearest location.
We advise you to help your customers get to know your company better through proximity ads, which redirect them to a page specific to your establishment, containing useful information such as opening hours, addresses, notices and photos.
You should know that more than a third of mobile searches are local searches and Google Maps searches have doubled in a few years.
Using a 360° communication agency for Google Maps advertising
The objective of these Google Maps ads is also to be able to target a specific audience that is more likely to be interested in your brand.
Our Google Ads expert consultant can set up Adwords campaigns for your company in order to reach an audience more in line with your activity thanks to a relevant targeting.
Our expert can accompany you in your strategy of paid referencing but we are also at your disposal if you wish to optimize the natural referencing of your website on Google.
Optimize your company listing on Google My Business
In order to best optimize your business listing on Google My Business, there are different criteria to consider. To make it really effective, it is important to observe these different points:
- Your GMB listing must be consistent in its information: the information must be verified, confirmed and correlated with that of your website in particular.
- It is important to ensure that the authority of your website is maximized. The authority of your website corresponds to the trust that Google, in particular, places in you. In order to improve it, the links of your website must be of quality but also be present in quantity. This authority really influences the visibility of your GMB listing.
- On your GMB page, customer reviews can be deposited reviews. They can indeed be positive or negative. What counts for your GMB page is your average score, your responses to the reviews submitted, their quantity and the dates on which the reviews were submitted.
- Key words: for the referencing of your company on Maps and My business, words play a key role. It is crucial to place the most relevant words.
- The local pack: these are the results appearing when searching on Google. For example, if an Internet user searches for an Italian restaurant in Lausanne, he or she will get results for different Italian restaurants in this sector and the best referenced will be the most optimal listings.
