Did you know that, besides being a directory listing on the web for your business, your Google Business Profile can help your business gain more customers and sales? With all the features that Google Business Profile provides, your profile goes beyond just being a Yellow Pages-style listing. It can help you pinpoint your target customer base and figure out how to best reach and serve them.

But first, What is Google Business Profile?

Google Business Profile is a free listing service for local businesses (meaning you need to have an office or operate your business in a certain service area). That means that your business can show up in Google Maps where millions of users are searching for businesses for their needs without you spending a dime on ads! This leaves more money in your budget to use if you want to run ads in the future. Even better, it’s super easy to use and optimize!

Already have your Google Business Profile set-up? Great! Let’s check out a few ways how to grow your Google Business Profile audience!

1. Complete Your Google Business Profile Listing

Google Business Profile offers many great features to help your business, but it only works if you do your part in setting up your profile. Fortunately, this is easy to do!

According to Google itself, potential customers are nearly 3 times more likely to view your business as trustworthy (and therefore worthy of their money) if your profile is completely filled out.

Google guides you through the simple steps but it’s important that you take the time to fill everything out completely. In particular, be sure to list all the services you offer as to help broaden your appearance in search results. This will ensure that your profile brings is targeting the correct customer demographic for your “services” keywords.

Further, if your profile is complete, that means customers will be 70% more likely to check out your business in person, and 50% more likely to consider making a purchase. So, in other words: don’t skip this!

2. Ask for Reviews to Increase Your Social Proof

One of the most important features of Google Business Profile is the ability for customers to leave reviews, along with photos and video. The more reviews you get, the more credibility your business will have and the higher the likelihood it will show up in Google Map results for potential customers to find. It’s always a good idea to ask customers (especially happy ones) to leave a review after they’ve made a purchase or used your service.

“Word of Mouth” is such an important marketing channel that still plays a huge role in lead generation today!

Requesting reviews is only half of it as you should respond to them too! According to Google, customers are almost twice as likely to trust a business that responds to reviews from their customers (both positive and negative).

3. Utilize Data and Analytics Features to Make Better Marketing Decisions

Probably the coolest feature of Google Business Profile – and what really sets it apart from old phone book-style records – is the amount of data about your customers that’s at your fingertips. The information this provides is almost unlimited, from how customers find your business, to what days of the week they search, to how they contact you, and much more! This information will prove incredibly valuable for advertising and positioning your business online, so you can better market to your customers.

4. Bring in Traffic, both In-person and Online, with Photos and Website URL

With your website url included on your profile, viewers can quickly access your website. If users are searching for a store or office location, Google Business Profile will provide searchers the address or help notify viewers of businesses nearby and then provide them with driving directions from their location.

Don’t forget to add business photos as they give such a great inside peek to prospective customers about the type of work you do, quality of food you cook, appearance of the office, type of merchandise you carry, and so much more.

The Bottom Line –

Google wants to be the best search engine in the world, and in order to do that, they need to provide searchers with the information that they think they are looking for. If there are two nearly identical businesses in a town, do you think Google is going to promote the listing that is half filled out? Or, do you think Google is going to prioritize the Google Business Profile that is completely filled out, contains reviews and photos, and is up-to-date with hours?

Yes, the active Google Business Profile will get the priority and therefore more views!

Perhaps most importantly, all of these features help inform prospective customers and bring traffic to your business, which is really your goal at the end of the day! Using your free, no-hassle, fully-optimized profile, you will become more informed about your ideal customer and their behaviors, and the best ways to reach them so you can target your messaging and, in turn, grow your customer audience.