When you craft a digital ad campaign, your goal is to see positive, business-growing results after the launch date, right? Well, what if one part of your digital marketing efforts was actually hurting the overall campaign you worked so hard to develop?
Maintaining a strong, cohesive presence online for your business across all your digital marketing channels is vital to your success. One of the most important methods to achieving that is through your business listings management. When all your business info across all platforms is accurate, relevant, informative, and engaging, you are far more likely to attract audiences, earn new business, and even see repeat business from those who have used you before.
What Are Business Listings?
Business listings are the online directories and profiles a company uses to reach audiences and tell users, “This is who we are and what we do.” Each profile displays vital company information a user needs to gather in order to understand the business and research it further.
Business Listing Information
Your business listing information may vary from platform to platform, but the details most will ask for when creating your profile include:
- Business name
- Business address
- Business phone number
- Hours of operation
- Business category
- Website URL
- Company bio/About info
- Product and service info
- Accepted forms of payment
- Photos and videos
Some business listing platforms allow you to display a wide range of information, while others may limit you to only a few relevant details. But all will require you, at minimum, to display your NAP – name, address, and phone number. Many profiles also provide your audience the opportunity to engage with your profile by leaving reviews, asking questions, and answering questions that other users have left. You can also link to other profiles, like your social media pages from some profiles, creating an interconnected network of listing profiles to boost your presence and credibility.
Business Listing Profiles
There are hundreds of platforms your company or organization can use, some general and some industry-specific, to reach the right audiences. Some of the most commonly used business listing platforms and directories you can create a profile on include:
- Google Business Profile*
- Apple Maps
- Avvo (specifically for lawyers and law firms)
- Bing Places
- Foursquare
- Healthgrades (specifically for medical professionals and healthcare practices)
- Instagram for Business
- Superpages
- Tripadvisor
- Yahoo
- Yelp for Business
- Zoominfo
And this list only scratches the surface of what platforms are available and worth using for your company.
Google Business Profile, Specifically
You may notice that Google Business Profile (GBP) is first on the list, bolded, and starred. That’s no accident. It’s #1 and highlighted because Google remains to be the search engine kingpin. The vast majority of internet users turn to Google to research businesses, products, and services. Having a Google Business Profile helps ensure your business appears in relevant searches that many users are conducting to find the solutions your company offers.
With a GBP, your company’s profile will show up to the right of the first search results page when your business name is searched. Your company will appear on the map in a relevant search. Your company could appear in the local pack if it’s optimized enough to outperform your local competitors.
If you could only have one business listing profile, let it be your Google Business Profile. (Thankfully, that’s not the case, though—you can and should have as many profiles as you want to reach your audience and establish your name across multiple relevant platforms.)
How Can My Business Listings Hurt My Digital Advertising?
There are a few ways your business listings can undermine your digital marketing strategies without you even knowing it.
Inconsistent Info Can Lower Your Ranking on Search Engines
Your business listings management matters to your ranking on search engines like Google. The local algorithm that Google uses cross-checks the information on all the profiles a business has on various platforms and directories. If it catches inconsistencies from one profile to the other, it will push your company further down on the results pages and place competitors with consistent information ahead of you.
Why does it do this? Well, to the algorithm, information that contradicts itself says one of three things: “This company is spammy,” “This company is dishonest,” or “This company is not thorough,” all of which are unattractive to users. Search engines want to be seen by users as reliable sources for quality results and information. None want to present a company that comes off as dishonest or poorly managed. Instead, to optimize user satisfaction, they are going to show businesses that seem more credible and trustworthy. In addition to other ranking metrics, it will use the quality of the business listings to determine where in the order of search results a particular company should appear.
Even if you’re producing compelling Google or Microsoft ads, geofencing ads, social media ads, email marketing campaigns, and other types of digital advertising, your business listings could be undermining all your digital marketing efforts if they are not up to date or well-managed.
Inaccurate Information Can Turn Users Away, No Matter How Solid Your Ad Strategies Are
Have you ever discovered a local company from a Google search, gathered its location information, and visited its store in person only to find the doors shut and the lights off because the business relocated across town a few months ago? Chances are, you developed a bit of distaste for the company because it misled you from the beginning.
Displaying outdated, inaccurate information on your listing profiles can lead to major frustration and even distrust among your audiences finding you in Google searches. If you create a sense of dishonesty or unreliability with your listings information, users are more likely to assume your overall business practices are just as dishonest or unreliable. And no one wants to engage with a business they can’t be sure they can trust. Even if your other marketing strategies promote your commitment to high-quality service and products, your actions of providing inaccurate and unreliable information will always speak louder than the words you produce through your marketing efforts.
Are your business listings in need of optimization or better management? Talk to the digital pros at M&R Marketing to start boosting your digital ad strategies and satisfying audiences. 478-621-4491.
At M&R, our digital strategists have the know-how to enhance your listings across many platforms and manage each one to ensure your company is always serving audiences the right information.
Call 478-621-4491 or contact one of our business development managers today to get started with better business listings management today.
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