When I first set up my Google My Business listing about three or four years ago, I was already a latecomer to the scene. I literally set it up, did the bare minimum and didn’t touch it again for a good while.
About a year later, whilst I was cleaning out my inbox and getting rid of tonnes of unread emails, I came across an old email from my Google My Business listing. It said that the 30-odd photos I’d uploaded to my listing had been viewed over 600 times in one month.
‘600 times in one month,’ I thought to myself. Now that’s not bad, considering all I did was upload some photos to a free listing. Once.
Although this email had been sitting in my inbox for months, this was the first time I’d even seen it, because like most emails of this kind, they tend to go unopened.
But wow, I’m so glad that I stopped to read this email before binning it, because it basically made me realize that I’d been missing out on a trick with my Google My Business listing.
If my photos had had over 600 views, how many views had my website got via the listing? And how many views could my website get if I made a bit more effort?
After a quick search of my GMB listing emails, I realized that Google had been regularly sending me updates about my listing and showing me what features were working well. OOPS! I’ve got to admit, I felt like a bit of an idiot for not paying more attention.
Especially because I teach other celebrants to be super aware of how the marketing tools that they use work for them, and here I was ignoring this one!
So this for me was a big wake up call to the power of the Google My Business listing. And from that day, I started to pay more attention and to use the listing to its full potential.
I now invest my time wisely in my GMB listing and I make sure to use all of its amazing features to their full potential. I even created a video on how to set up a listing for my Celebrants Collective members.
Just last month in March, this was what was happening with my listing.
The 71 photos on there had been viewed 1521 times in total.
I had three wedding enquiries directly through the listing message feature.
40 people clicked on my wedding website directly from the listing.
1 person called me directly from the listing about their 2021 wedding.
And between January, February and March, there were 1002 viewings of my listing via the Google search engine.
In this last quarter, I also saw a 25% rise in direct enquiries to my website and lots of my couples left reviews on my listing too.
The upshot of all of this is that after spending a minimum amount of time each month on my Google My Business listing, I’ve seen amazing results. Huge amounts of engagement on my listing, direct listing enquiries and a good push of traffic to my website.
Now, I’m not someone who likes to spend lots of time on social media, or marketing in general, even though I understand its benefits perfectly. If I’m honest, there are other things in my business that I’d rather be doing.
So I’m pretty pleased with the relatively little effort that I’ve put into my listing, compared to the returns that I’ve gained.
If you’ve been under-utilising your GMB listing, then here’s a little call to action for you to put some energy into it, (if you want to!) and if you haven’t yet.
I’ve put together this e-book, ‘How to maximize your Google My Business listing,’ to share with you how I use my listing and take you through the listing features step by step. I explain what all the different features are and how to use it in the best way possible for your Celebrant business.
The guide is usually priced at 9.99E but whilst the lockdown continues, if you use this code LOVE50, you can access it for half the price. And that goes for all the other e-books in the Celebrant Resource Shop, too.
For more info and to buy my ‘How to maximize your Google My Business listing,’ click here.
And CC members, don’t forget you can access this e-book for free in our Resource Room.
Here’s to making that listing work its butt off for you!
