Google + helps your business website rank on a local level

If your business is one of the bricks and mortar kind, or service based such as a plumber here’s another tool that you should be using. Yes, sorry to say yet another one, though you can set it & forget. Google+ helps your business website rank on a local level.Why is this important? When a potential customer searches on local plumbers, those with a google places listing come up first ( just under paid advertising) and those that have had reviews (real ones) and have been google plused are higher than those who haven’t. So the moral of the story, actively engage in getting customers to review your site and/or google+. The easiest of the two is google+ and here are some set and forget strategies.

Google+ helps your business website rank on a local level

Place +1 Buttons on Every Page of Your Site

This is a no-brainer. Most of us have seen the proliferation of Facebook Like buttons, Tweet This buttons and now the Google +1 button. Place these in a prominent place like your header or near the top of a sidebar. Simply having them on your pages means some people may actually click them. As a small local business it is likely the bulk of your website traffic is local, so most the +1’s you obtain will be locals.

An example is this website I just put together for a friend who is a painting contractor in Kelowna, BC (it was a Christmas gift from his wife and myself ). You’ll see +1 and FB like buttons in the header area just below the phone number. These appear on every page.

Include the +1 Button with a Message in your Contact Form Thank You Pages

If a user lands on a thank you page after submitting a form (or making an ecommerce purchase) you’ve just had a conversion. Yay for conversions! Now that user is a special user, they’ve made an action that makes them more connected to your business. This person is probably more likely to take an extra action to share you on their network. Show them a special message on that thank you page about sharing your link in Google+, Facebook and/or Twitter.

Be sure to set your buttons here to share your home page, not your thank you page. When creating a +1 button use the Advanced options to set that button for a specific page.

The thank you page could also include links to your social media profiles, if your business has them (this painter does not, yet), and ask for a follow on FB or Twitter and an add to Circles on Google +.

Include a Message About Sharing your Link in Thank You Emails

Are you collecting customer emails and sending them a little thank you note after doing business with them? You should, or try to as much as you can (not everyone wants to give you their email addy). These thank you emails are great places to be asking for online reviews with links out to your Google Places listing, Yelp listing and maybe a couple other local review websites. Some of your customers may take action from those emails and go leave you a coveted review.

Besides reviews you should now be placing links to your social media profiles and asking for the share, like, tweet or +1. Some may take action.

Please do read the full article which includes illustrated examples. One of the interesting tips was the influence of the potential customers friends have when searching for a local business. It seems that google thinks if your friends have liked it, you will too. This gives your buisness instant credibilty and trust . Google+ helps your business rank on a local level and gives potential customers more of a reason to pick you over the competition.

Have you had any wins from using google+?

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Update: to read our post on Yelp for local seo click here