In an earlier post I touched on Google’s Local Business Listings in the context of other available online exposure resources for small businesses.  There have been a few recent developments that make me realize that I should dive a bit deeper into this topic.

Google has  had Local Business Listings for a number of years and there are some good really good things about it.  First, what it is: it is essentially a free advertising space on Google.  And every business can have one.  In fact, most businesses may already have one and not know it.  How is that?  Google  aggregates company data from a number of resources and creates  default listings for all the businesses it finds.  As a business owner, you can add a listing if there isn’t already one or “claim” yours if it is already there.

Which brings us to Reason Number 1 to pay attention to the listing for your company – it is there and you may not even know about it.  Which means it might not even contain the right information.  And that can’t be a good thing – you don’t want a potential customer finding your listing but calling a wrong number.  So as soon as you are done reading this post you should go right out and check your listing.  On second thought, you should go right now.  I’ll wait.

Since you have a listing whether you want it or not (and why would you not want free advertising?) let’s talk about Reason Number 2 to check the listing – the better the QUALITY of the listing, the better chance that your listing will show up in the “7-pack” or the list of  local businesses associated with a map.  This placement is different from your regular search placement which is heavily affected by SEO (but the placement of the 7-pack itself CAN affect your overall placement in search results.).   Now Google isn’t likely to share their algorithm but a lot of smart folks (here is one source)  have spent time studying this and, while they don’t agree on the exact order, they do agree that these factors (among others) are likely to affect the placement of your business:

• local address (presumably the RIGHT one)
• good categorization
• location keyword in business description
• videos and pictures
• reviews
• the fact that the listing is “claimed” by the business owner who presumably ensured it is correct and complete

Reason Number 3 to check your local listing is that Google recently (like last week) rolled out a new feature called “near me now” (as opposed to “hear me now” of course) that is available on iPhones and Android devices.  Essentially, if you have one of those devices and go to the main Google screen you can elect, by allowing your device to share your location, to see business that are near that location.  Here is a good article about the “near me now” functionality that includes screen shots and a cutesy video.  Of course, for your business to have a chance of showing up when folks are in your neighborhood looking for exactly the service you provide, it needs to have a good address.

So now you have a nice, complete, correct, good-looking listing.  You can just ignore it now and let it do its thing, right?  WRONG!  Reason Number 4 to pay attention to your listing on a regular basis is that there are bad bad people out there that may hijack your listing.  When they do this they leave your listing intact but do things like change the phone number or the url for the website so THEY get all your hard-earned leads instead of you.  This article talks about how listings get hijacked and unfortunately sometimes getting it fixed with Google can be a pain.  At this point I don’t have any good advice about how to avoid getting hijacked; for now, just be aware and check your listing regularly!  In the meantime, let’s hope Google is listening to the growing uproar and makes it harder to hijack listings soon.  The Local Business Listings are a good thing for small businesses in theory; issues like hijacking can turn a good thing into a bad thing in a hurry.

Here are 4 reasons to pay attention, regularly, to your Google Local Business Listing – have you checked yours today?

Most of the small businesses I talk to, even the tiniest of them, know that when they need legal advice, they need to see their attorney.  Beyond that, they will proactively seek the counsel of their attorney on a regular basis as things change with their business and as they have to make decisions that affect it.

The same goes for their financial needs; most of them have a CPA that they see at least once a year at tax time.  Most accountants would recommend more regular visits at key times in the business cycle to help with future planning.  For example, if you need a new vehicle for your business you should consult with your accountant BEFORE you purchase to make sure the type of vehicle you choose will maximize your tax benefits.

Yet, when it comes to the technology businesses use, they are often left adrift with no help.  Some businesses have a simple website set up by their cousin along with some boxed software they use for billing and accounting.  Others have had consultants build fancy websites and other solution providers in to set up networks and more complicated systems.  In both cases though, these businesses have set no overall technology vision that supports their business plan.  They don’t know if the “pieces” they have fit together, if they are paying too much for overlapping technology, or how much they are wasting on “shelf-ware” they never use.   It is like they are standing way to close to an impressionist painting.  All they see are the dots, not how they combine to create a beautiful flower.

Worse than that though, they don’t have anyone helping them identify opportunities where technology could accelerate their business.   Often there are ways to leverage technology to increase revenue or reduce costs…if businesses only knew what was available.

Today, every kind of business is more and more dependent on technology (like it or not!).  This dependency will only grow.  As a small business owner it makes sense to seek out the advice and counsel of an overall technology advisor.  Someone that can help you see the painting for the dots.  You have a business plan, and maybe marketing plan and a sales plan.  You also need a technology plan that ties these all together.

For an example of what a technology plan is and how it works you can go to http://clearlysimplesolutions.com/what_we_do_tech.php.

It is almost the beginning of 2010 – do you have your technology plan in place?