SEO overview

How to Rank on Google

Ranking on Google is not as easy as simply having a business and a website - there are other factors to consider.

The following requirements must be met in order to rank on Google

1. Google My Business Profile Page (GMB) (verify your profile)

2. A link from GMB to your homepage

3. Address/Location listed on GMB matches your website

4. Sitemap submission to webmaster (or ask Google to crawl you)

5. Google Analytics tracking ID Installed

What is Google My Business?

It should come as no surprise that Google loves Google. Recent reports and statistics show that Google is competing agressively to keep the traffic they are tracking (for their AI project) in their perview as long as possible.

What does that mean for you?

That means Google is doing their best to make sure your customer never needs to see your website in order to make a buying decision, or receive the answer to their query.

Google My Business (or GMB) is a SERP add on that categorizes business via profiles on the map to ensure a localized response to a query. The profiles can be developed to include services rendered, service areas, contact information, links to appointment pages, direct communication with clients, and reviews.

Doing a quick search for "Pizza Place near me" will demonstrate the power of a GMB listing.

You will notice the prompt for Google to know your location. If you do not see the prompt, you have already authorized Google to know your location - and they will produce results accordingly. (This Google has to guess)

The search query can be seen in the box in the URL string.

The GMB results will always populate as 3 options - these 3 listing positions will take over 90% of the traffic. For service based businesses - this is a critical factor.

GMB is as important as your website

Because Google holds the market share in searchers - playing by their rules will be very important for both your organic results as well as your map results.

To create a Google My Business page please visit business.google.com

*Google requires the use of a Gmail account. They are free to create, but you will need to ensure you keep track of the account.

Your address must match

When creating your GMB profile, it is not necessary to "publish" your address for all to see. For those who office from home, it is strongly recommended that you do NOT publish your address. (There is no significant benefit to doing so - despite old belief.)

However, the address you place on your GMB needs to match the address on your website, and it needs to be on every page.

Updating your Footer is the fastest and easiest way to do so. See the Editing the website footer article for instructions.

What is Webmaster?

Google strikes again with yet another Google product - meant to help Google warriors navigate the murky waters of best practices and indescribable frustration.

Webmaster is a powerful analytics tool that is designed to provided statistics on clicks, impressions, visibility, errors, mobile readiness, and "scoring" based on particular metrics (which can include speed, consistency, new content, etc.)

As a BookingTimes customer - your sitemap has already been submitted on your behalf, and your site has been registered with Google. For access to the established webmaster account - please email support@bookingtimes.com

What is Google Analytics?

Google Analytics - cough cough - Google Google Google........ is another Google must have product. Analytics provides incredible insights into the traffic you do receive. Information including the behavior of your traffic (which pages they look at, where they convert, if they "bounce", where they came from) is very valuable in making marketing decisions. In addition, injecting the code on your website ensures Google knows you exist.

You can set up tracking goals, phone numbers, ad cookies and more through the integrations section on BookingTimes.

You can set up an Analytics account by visiting analytics.google.com

While there is a new G4 option - we currently recommend you set up a standard UA account followed by a G4 account.