Google has officially flagged an update to occur on Tuesday, July 28. The update is aimed at tidying up Google My Business listings – commonly referred to as ‘Google maps’.
Google Trusted Photographer and Better Clicks business owner Dave Whiteside alerted Geelong businesses to significant details about the Google My Business update which was originally flagged for August. Please read the message Dave received, his advice, and consider what steps you will take to ensure your business stays on the map!
Dear photographers,
In the past few months, you may have seen some changes in the look of Google+ pages that have been associated with Google My Business (GMB) accounts. These changes, including how we treat business pages without owners, are part of Google’s ongoing effort to simplify people’s experience with our tools. We are constantly working to provide only valuable and rich content to our users. On July 28th, Google will begin shutting down those GMB–associated Google+ pages that have not been associated with user accounts and are also not verified.
In light of this information, we are encouraging you to CLAIM, VERIFY and MANAGE your Google My Business listings over the weekend!
Wait, what’s a ‘Google My Business’ listing again?
Think of it as being one profile with two parts:
- Your Google+ business page, which is essentially the social media part – you can post photos, text and links from your page, similar to Facebook – but famously less successful as a social tool.
- Your Google map listing, which appears in Google’s search results. The information that appears in your business map listing also appears on your Google+ page. These details are edited under the ‘My Business’ tab of your page.
Your Google My Business listing and connected Google+ page are essential for your visibility in Google’s search results. You should login and keep them up-to-date on a regular basis.
How do I know if my Google My Business listing is unclaimed?
If you do a search for your business in Google, even just your business name and location for this purpose, and see if a map pops in on the right of the search results list. If there is no map, you most likely do not have a Google My Business listing at all. If there is a map, you can tell it is unclaimed if it has this message in small-sized writing underneath the map – “Are you the business owner?” This message is actually a link, if you are the business owner you can click on the message and then follow the steps to claim your listing.
It’s not all bad…
In some ways this update is a good thing. When Google first started rolling out Google My Business listings it created listings on behalf of businesses based on old Yellow Pages data. The problem with this was businesses didn’t know they had an existing listing created by Google and many set up new listings. Duplicate and out-of-date listings have been a nightmare for business owners as they have had to merge, claim or try to remove duplicate listings. It’s been messy and complex and there’s still a ton of unclaimed, unverified listings showing up in Google. The Google My Business clean out will hopefully rectify this so that only the claimed, verified and active listings will show. Claimed, verified and active listings are more likely to show up-to-date business information as they are more likely to be managed correctly.
We’d like to finish on a note from Dave, Geelong’s local Google expert:
Make sure you claim your listing, verify it and regularly respond to Google’s suggested updates and notifications or risk the loss or disconnection of your prime asset on Google.