Research says that about 97% of consumers use the Internet to research products and services in their local area and according to the world’s number one search engine, which is Google, almost 73% of all Internet activities is based around local content.

These statistics are great news for local business owners who wish to grow their business by attracting more targeted local leads and customers. And one more thing is that Google has made it easier for local business to include their business in Google Local Business Listing which can be use with or without a website.

Putting your business in Google local business listing is fast and easy task to do.  Here are the few things that you need to do in order to get your business listed.

First, you will need a Google Account to be used in signing in to Google Places. If you don’t have an account yet, create one. If you already have an account, you can also use that but it smarter and advisable to create a separate account for your business.

After signing in, just follow what the page asked you to do in order to verify If your business is already listed or not. If your business is not yet listed, you may now proceed to next step of filling out information about your business.

When filling out the form, make sure to provide precise and accurate information about your business. You can include as much information as you wanted like your business hours, the method of payments, your business physical address, and how customers may contact you. If you have a website you can include it as well. Adding some photos and videos related to your business will also do positive effects.

After you have fill out the information, you can now submit your listing. And as a final step you will need to verify your Google Local Business Listing. You can do it either by phone or by mail. Usually phone verification is better than mail because it is faster. After you have received you verification PIN number, just type it in the verification code box and you’re done verifying that you are the owner of the business.

Submitting your business to Google local business listing is really fast and easy but another thing that business owners aims is to put their listing on the top of the search results. You will need to work a bit more on it by optimizing your business listing. Remember that you are not alone in the business thus competitors are always around. As business owner of course you would want to have some edge over them. You can consider these things to get better rankings on local business listing.

Google allows you to create coupons or special offers for people who visits your Google places business listing. You can take advantage on it and use it to attract more customers and this is also a great token of appreciation for your customers.  It can also create traffic to your listing which is a good thing.

Another thing that you can do and is highly recommended is to create more business listing aside from your Google local business listing. There are lots of site where you can submit your business for a local listing, some are free and some are paid. Just make sure that all the information that you will put in your other listings are matched with the information that you provide for Google.  All these listings that you will create will help you rank better in Google local business listing.

Getting more positive reviews and high rating will also help to boost your rank in Google places listing. It will also create trust and credibility for people who will see your listing and it also have a positive impact on Google’s eyes. You can ask your customers to write a review about your business and their experiences with your business. Satisfied and happy customers will surely do the favor for you. You can also ask them politely through mail. Just remember, don’t try to cheat Google by doing a self review, this will affect your business badly on Google’s eyes when they find out. Remember that Google have its way of finding out which reviews are genuine and which are fake.

Google local business listing is indeed one of the most helpful and effective tool for businesses to get free exposure and attract more local leads and customers. If you are a business owner, you should act now and don’t let your business be left behind. Have your business listed to Google Local Business Listing now and enjoy all the benefits that it may bring you for free.

Related posts:

1. How to avoid mail verification by post of Google Places Place Pages
2. Google Places shifts Place Page verification focus to physical address

However, I recently came across something quite interesting – another google angle on changing search results – Google has integrated its shopping results combined with organic results – pretty much like its Google Places results.

As an example – if you are in the US (if not, make sure you are on Google.com) and do a search for “doral tires”. You will see shopping results merged along with organic results, where Google is trying to promote its shopping business through search results.

This appears to be a highly significant move from Google as part of its larger plan to merge several aspects of its own offerings into the organic results. Google Adwords is no longer its only monetization method and Google has now started to get creative with its search results.

Perhaps this series of google moves is going to trigger another wave of google search engine optimization (seo) techniques like it had done with Google Places, however this time for products and not for local businesses. Perhaps a simple search for tires would result in several brands of tires that are available nearest to the IP location? Who knows.

Are you looking for local SEO services for your business? We can help grow your business exposure online

Have any of you noticed other mergers of Google ventures within organic results? Do you consider this Google search spam? Do you see more SEO opportunity due to these moves by Google? Do share your thoughts.

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So what is the difference between Google Maps Cash 10 box finder and Google Places Pack Finder?

From the introductions I have now found about the 10 box finder on the internet and from watching a video somewhere, the basic functions of both the softwares are exactly the same – the only problem with the 10 box finder is that it does not work any more (based on users that I have heard feedback from).

10 box finder does not recognize the new Google Places results format

Google Maps Cash 10 box finder was based on the previous superseded Google Maps (10 box / 10 pack) model and the software has apparently not been updated by the developers to reflect the changes made by google when google introduced Google Places (please do correct me if I am wrong). Google Places Pack Finder has been built specifically for Google Places results that are displayed on the first page of google.

Google Maps Cash 10 box finder software is not free

The 10 box finder was accompanied by a course called Google Maps Cash and was therefore not free. You can get Google Places Pack Finder for free from the link below …

Enjoy and do leave us with your feedback on what you think about the Google Places Pack Finder and share the details if you have any more information about the 10 box finder.

Related posts:

1. Google Places Pack Finder software now available

I have previously written a blog post about place page verification titled Google Places shifts Place Page verification focus to physical address … Well, there is definitely still some truth in that, however, there are a few twists to it that you should know about.

VERIFICATION OPTIONS FOR EXISTING PLACE PAGES – THINGS YOU MUST NOT DO IF YOU WANT TO AVOID SNAIL MAIL

When I recently claimed a place page for one of my clients and attempted to be a little smart by adding a mobile number so that I can get an sms verification, google decided not to show the mobile number as an sms option, even though I had entered it in the mobile field before pressing the submit button. My client wasnt in his office since it was beyond his working hours, so I thought why not just replace the phone number with the mobile number and put the phone number in a different field. Wow!! What an idea.

When I clicked submit, there was no phone verification available, let alone sms. THERE WAS ONLY SNAIL MAIL … I started pulling my hair – Oh No!! .. But then I thought, why not swap it back to how it originally was and try again. So I did – and Guess what – I was stuck with SNAIL MAIL place page verification – and it took 3 weeks to receive the post – very painful indeed! So, here are the rules …

Never change sensitive information of an existing place page when you are claiming it … This info includes the following

- Business Name

- Contact Numbers (You can add new ones, but leave the original one as-was / as-is )

- Business Address (You don’t want to mess with this at all)

Now, you may argue that some of these things may have genuinely changed for a business, my friend, in this case you are stuck with the snail mail, so, oh well!!

Why is this information critical and should not be changed?

Google has taken all the google places data based on its partnership with major business information database companies like the Yellow Pages, etc … The database of Yellow Pages and the likes are highly authoritative, because they mostly contain proper information that has been individually verified by business owners themselves. So, if you introduce a change, it has to be for a good reason, and google then wants to verify that the change is genuine. Google, it appears, therefore wants to verify it via snail mail coz that is the most authentic way of verification, coz everyone has mobile phone numbers that can be fraudulently used to claim place pages of other businesses.

What about new place pages?

For every new place page that I have done, I have had to deal with snail mail, except one. Don’t know if there is a specific method or rule Google applies in this case, however, in a nutshell, it seems most new businesses will be receiving snail mail.

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Related posts:

1. Google Places shifts Place Page verification focus to physical address

http://www.localseoaustralia.com/google-local-places-pack-finder/

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