Why is a Google My Business listing an important part of a garage door marketing strategy? It’s a tool that is free to register that can help your business attract garage door customers in your local market that have an immediate need for your services.
It doesn’t matter what type of business you operate – your leads, prospects and customers are all online. And what do they use to find information online, including local businesses?
Google.
This is where almost every search query begins online. Therefore the search engine giant is the source of valuable referral traffic – local customers in your area that are looking to hire a garage door company.
Anyone can create a Google My Business listing – that is the easy part. The trick is to get it to show up in the search results for local-intent terms related to the services the business offers. Website traffic is great, but only if it’s highly targeted and ready to hire your business. This is why the expertise of a garage door marketing agency is recommended.
Your garage door company website is important, but your Google My Business listing has the potential to act as a bridge to that website. The top of the local search results are dominated by local results and Google Maps, both of which pull their data from GMB listings.
So, even if your main website is ranking high, Google My Business listings can occupy the real estate above the regular organic results, making them more valuable ranking positions.
In addition to helping you rank on top of the local search results, a GMB listing gives your business credibility and trust plays a big role in whether or not a local consumer engages with a service provider.
Ok, so now you know the importance of a Google My Business listing, so let’s dive into five tips to help you leverage it to attract new garage door customers.
1. Encourage Past Customers to Leave Garage Door Google Reviews
Your Google My Business listing has a very influential section – garage door Google reviews. When a previous customer leaves a review they do so via your GMB profile. Visitors are able to see how many total reviews your business has, the average star review, as well as the detailed feedback each person leaves.
A consumer is going to trust feedback and reviews left by your previous garage door customers more than they are going to trust information stated by your business. Any company can proclaim that they provide the best service – but it’s more effective when it comes from someone with first-hand experience with your business.
Accumulating as many garage door Google reviews as possible is important, and the best time to ask is right after the garage door job is completed. Your business and the experience is still fresh in their mind. A satisfied customer is going to be more likely to honor your request if you ask immediately after the job is finished.
We implement different automated “ask” techniques as well as follow up sequences to help you convert as many past customers into raving garage door Google reviews, helping convert new customers as well as contribute to the on-going search engine optimization effort.
2. Post Updates, Offers and News
One of the newest Google My Business features allows you to post updates, offers and news directly on your listing. These posts show up in a feed format, similar to a Facebook news feed. Posting updates on a regular basis keeps your listing fresh and active.
It also gives you an opportunity to lure in more prospects by posting special offers and highlighting previous jobs and happy customers. It’s an effective feature to include in your garage door local marketing campaign.
Consumers are visual – an image of a brand new garage door installation along with a special offer can push a visitor to call your business or click-through to your website to inquire about their specific garage door needs.
Posts also occupy some prime real estate on Google. They can be shown next to your company in the Knowledge Panel and they can also be displayed within the Maps results. You need to take advantage of every opportunity to command more attention on Google.
3. Add Attributes & Special Features
Reaching the top of Google Search and Google Maps requires a professional garage door search engine optimization strategy. Oftentimes the smallest adjustments and changes can result in the biggest gains, visibility-wise.
When you set up your GMB listing you are able to select a category for your business. Did you know that there are now more than 3,000 available categories to select from? You are allowed to pick up to ten for your listing, so it’s important that you know which ones are best for you.
There are additional features that Google My Business profiles have access to, depending on the categories selected. For example, service businesses can create a menu that lists the available services they offer, as well as an option to book those services directly from the GMB page.
Service-based businesses also have the ability to add a product catalog. Attributes are another option that is available, and while they are mainly for businesses with a physical storefront, it’s something that many garage door companies with a showroom take advantage of.
Things like available WiFi, wheelchair accessibility and the payment types accepted are examples of attributes that you would want to enable.
Remember, we want to give Google as much information and data about your business as possible. With so much garage door search engine optimization competition, all fighting for that prime real estate, we want to go above and beyond when it comes to optimizing your Google My Business listing.
4. Complete Your Entire Business Profile
We just finished explaining why it’s so important to provide Google with as much data as possible. Part of a successful garage door SEO effort is ensuring that your business is matched to as many relevant Google searches as possible.
This won’t happen unless you provide complete and accurate information, tailored to the terms, phrases and keywords that your ideal garage door customers use when seeking what you offer. This isn’t speculation – Google itself says:
“Local results favor the most relevant results for each search, and businesses with complete and accurate information are easier to match with the right searches.”
Google can be a hotbed for ready-to-buy customers, but you have to provide the information and data points to them, via your Google My Business listing, to help them match your business to local relevant searches.
Essentially you have to help them help you. When the garage door SEO is executed correctly it can lead to organic exponential growth across all data points – GMB impressions, website traffic, phone calls, leads and customers.
Our team of garage door SEO experts knows how to create business profiles that thrive in Google Search and on Google Maps.
5. Include Images of Your Business & Completed Projects
Visuals need to be part of your garage door company marketing, even on Google My Business. Pictures of your business, from the office and workshop, to the showroom and employees – it helps connect faces and a physical business to your listing.
Even though the majority of business is conducted online these days, smiling faces and pictures of your business can do wonders for establishing a connection with your potential customers. Images help you show potential customers what your business is about.
You can highlight your work to show your skills and specialties, and you can show your staff to highlight a friendly family atmosphere. Consumers connect with people – not faceless brand names.
The majority of businesses will just upload their company logo as the GMB profile image and then again for the cover photo. More personal photos perform better. You can create a nice profile logo that features your logo, but the cover photo should be of your staff at your location – this type of image helps to establish a connection immediately.
Then, in the photos section of your listing make sure to upload professional quality images that highlight your expertise and skill set. The cost of professional photos is well worth the small investment. Final Thoughts
It should now be very clear as to how important your Google My Business listing is and how an optimized profile plays a huge role in your garage door marketing campaign. In fact, your GMB listing can be responsible for the majority of your website traffic.
Since your Google My Business listing acts as the gateway between your business and an endless supply of garage door leads and customers, don’t you want to ensure that your listing is optimized for maximum exposure?
We would be more than happy to provide you with a free consultation, complete with an audit of your Google My Business listing and an overall online audit of your business. Then, we can discuss the opportunities we identify that can help your business thrive on Google – both on the Maps and in Search.
We look forward to making your business our next garage door marketing success story.
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