Have you ever been out, whether in your hometown or on vacation, looking for a place to eat? Chances are you’ve probably searched on your smartphone to find a place and ended up on a Google Business Profile (GBP) listing. 

If you’re a local business trying to get more traffic, a Google Business Profile is what you need. Having that quick access to your business via GBP will be hugely valuable for you. It’s essentially free marketing for your business!

Stat: As recently as 2020, a whopping 93%–of consumers found a local business through an online search. 

What does this mean for your business? Quite simply, it means that in a world where nearly everyone uses their phone to find businesses in their local area–especially high-traffic businesses like restaurants–it’s crucial to have a GBP (a fully optimized one!) to make your business stand out and easy to find for potential customers.

This is true both for your listing that will show up in general Google search results, as well as Google Maps, which is even more important for local searches.

Stat: Nearly 9 in 10 people use Google Maps to view the location of a business.

Stat: As recently as 2019, there had been a 200+% increase in mobile searches using the terms “near me” and “where to buy” in the previous two years.

This is why having a GBP complete with location, contact details, hours, and reviews where possible will help your business show up high in those search results when people search for a business like yours near them. The higher in those results you are, the more likely you are to get traffic!

If you’re a local business, consider this post as a reminder for you to visit your Google Business Profile listing. Even if you haven’t created a listing, sometimes Google will create a listing based on searches and information it is able to gather from websites or the internet. If that’s the case for you, you will need to claim your listing – which isn’t hard to do. In fact, Google makes it really easy to claim your listing and then you’ll be ready to update, add photos and extra content in no time!