Google believes what many dead, wise people have said â that with great power comes great responsibility, and thatâs why they strongly encourage business owners to âclaimâ their business on Google Maps.
Today, Google is the first stop for most folks looking to spend money in eateries, shops, and other businesses. After all, âGoogleâ isnât just a noun, itâs a verb, too.
Itâs so much easier to Google business hours or addresses than it is to phone. If that information is incorrect, itâs not uncommon for would-be money-spenders to blame the shop, not Google. The search giant knows this. Wanting to save businesses from such wrath, theyâve made âbusiness claimsâ possible.
So, have you started the process to claim your business on Google? If not, do it today.
An unclaimed business is an opportunity for nefarious sorts to claim it for themselves. Before you shrug this off, consider the potential consequences.
What if someone claimed your business, then entered a âcorrectionâ for the business phone number? Maybe itâs some pranking teen, but what if itâs a competing business? What if they enter their number in place of yours, and your would-be inquiries reach them, not you? How much might that cost you?
What if they changed your business hours? How easily could customers go somewhere that âisâ open instead?
A hair salon in Toronto had their business was sabotaged by someone who changed their Google listing to say they sold falafel instead of styling hair. Luckily for them, the so-called âInternet Policeâ rode in to the rescue, putting an end to phone calls for falafel orders and confused walk-ins.
Who are the Internet Police? Theyâre power users Google has dubbed as âLocal Guides,â volunteers whose mission is to improve search success for local businesses. There are over 33 million Local Guides around the world, in over 240 communities, constantly trying to improve information in Google listings to aid both customers and business owners.
In fact, Iâm a Local Guide myself, as a home-free nomad moving from city to city. Recently, in Istanbul, I raced to reach a shop before closing â listed as 7 p.m. on Google Maps. With only 13 minutes to walk nearly a kilometre after a long day on cobblestones, I debated blowing it off, but you know how travel is â our well-intentioned plans often fall apart.
I made it! I said how glad I was to beat the shopâs closing, but the staffer replied that they were open till 8:30, not 7:00. Putting on my Internet Police cap, I showed them Googleâs listed hours. He was shocked, said they were open seven days weekly, not the listed six days, and from 8:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m., not 9 to 7. Added up, theyâre open for 24 more hours per week than Google had listed. I fixed it in less than two minutes, with tourist peak season just beginning. Phew!
In 10 minutes, including the Google fix, I spent $28 in the shop. Itâs just a block from one of the worldâs busiest tourist sites. Letâs imagine they make $75 in sales per hour â a conservative off-season estimate, ridiculously low for peak season. Thatâs potentially $1,800 a week in lost sales, in a country where the average person earns $600 a month.
How many times have customers deferred a visit because they thought the place was closed? As a specialty shop selling the last of Turkeyâs village-loomed towels, itâs a destination shop, with a world-wide reputation among collectors of such products.
Itâs impossible to know the dollar value of correcting shop information on Google, but, as a business owner, isnât it critical to you that every dollar out there with your name on it make its way to you?
And this is just my experience, only a week ago, as a tourist with some one-location shop. I run into wrong listings frequently.
The danger with incorrect listings
Even claimed companies have mistakes in their Google info. With changing seasons and the day-to-day chaos of running a retail location, itâs easy to overlook something like updating Google. Imagine a corporate giant like Starbucks somehow having wrong hours at locations throughout the country, if not the world, because managers donât realize the stakes.
Starbucks says 60 million customers visit their nearly 18,000 stores weekly. Thatâs a daily average of 476 customers filing into every shop. Suppose they spend $5 each, for a store daily total of $2,380.
Now, letâs say, instead of the usual 13 hours the average Starbucks is open, Google has them listed for 12. Thatâs a potential loss of $183 in an hour. Over a year, that single wrong hour a day stands the potential of costing $66,000 in lost income for a single location. Globally, thatâd be $1.2 million, or the combined income for around 49,500 baristas.
But, as my example showed, being wrong by just one hour a day may be a dramatic understatement. In the case of the Turkish towel store, being âclosedâ 24 hours a week could cripple that company by a conservative $93,000 in a year, if people Google to see if that shop is open.
Accurate Google search results are fundamental in helping you as a business owner, no matter how you feel about Google. If youâre not using that free tool to its best advantage by claiming your business and regularly ensuring its information is accurate for your store hours, your offerings, and your map location, then youâre possibly losing money.
Worse, you could be frustrating people who had already decided to spend money with you and who change their mind.
According to Richard Trus, one of the worldâs top Local Guides, sabotaged businesses report as much as a 20% hit on their income. With stats showing that four out of five searches on Google Maps leads to a purchase or visit, thereâs no room for error.
With so much going on for businesses, itâs easy to understand that wrong information may be overlooked for a week, a month, or even longer. If a competitor sabotages your information, how soon would you to realize it? How much of a financial toll could âclosedâ listings, a wrong address or phone number, or even wrong business services take on your bottom line?
How to get started
ICUC understands that your online identity is everything today. Whether itâs a small business with a few locations or a national giant with dozens of stores, the threat of online sabotage through wrongly âcorrectedâ location information is an ever-present danger.
Thatâs why ICUC prioritizes monitoring your online listings to ensure hours, locations, and services are accurate on Google and beyond. In fact, when onboarding new clients, business listings anywhere and everywhere are their first priority, because if that ainât right⌠thatâs just wrong.
With ICUC on your side, youâll be able to rest knowing youâre in control of your online identity. Whether itâs locations, operations, or whatâs said about you, youâll know, and like all those wise, dead folks said, knowing really is half the battle.