No one will ever tell you about this. But now that you read this, a bright light should be shining in your head.
People always ask, "What do I have to do to be seen online?" This is your basic foundation.
Imagine if you had a phone book. That thick book of paper full of phone numbers. Now imagine that half of the information of those people, businesses and phone numbers were invalid and no longer available. Half of that phone book would be crap and you wouldn't use it.
Google is the same way. It is filled with invalid information. So what does Google do so that you won't stop using it? They set certain parameters to gauge if a business is valid and then they ensure that the businesses that meet those parameters, are highlighted first. Page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.... those pages are generally pretty good and you will choose a business from one of those pages. Not page 6, not page 10 or 100.
How does Google do it? There are a number of websites that Google uses and they look for your business name, address and phone number. Otherwise knows as your NAP. If any of these are not accurate on the websites they use to gauge you, they rank you lower and put you on later pages. This process of updating and correcting your NAP is known as "LISTINGS."
Some of the sites that they use are Google My Business, Yelp, Trip Advisor, BBB, Facebook, Bing, Yahoo, Maps, voice searches and many more. Generally you want to make sure around 50 of them are correct. Overall there is a couple of hundred of these sites.
Equally as important is making sure your working hours are updated on all of them, your business description, etc... Hours changing for Labor Day? You should update that. It would take you forever to make a change on all these sites just for business hours. But there is a simple way.
Imagine you did some advertising. You are a contractor. Someone saw your ads but they forgot your name. So they google contractor and the city they saw you in. What do they find? Not you, your listings are jacked up and you are on page 6. But they find other contractors there with glowing reviews. Guess what happens next? You guessed it, they no longer remember to hire you. You literally paid for advertising that is driving traffic to others. Congrats. Talk to 10StarReviews.com on this site and they will tell you how to integrate listings and take advantage of building your reviews.
There is a system to do it all for you and at an affordable price. We provide that system and we are Veteran owned. Business coaches, marketing gurus, all of the good idea fairies who advise you, aren't guiding you to do the one thing you absolutely must do or how to do it. Fix your listings. Contact us for more.