Elevate Your Online Presence with a Google Business Profile

Unlock the secrets of local SEO dominance as Marilyn Jenkins, a digital marketing virtuoso, joins us to share her expertise on leveraging Google Business profiles to boost your online presence.

Imagine the edge you'll have when Marilyn divulges how to transform your local SEO rankings and attract floods of traffic to your website.

She comes equipped with actionable advice that's easy on the wallet but rich in results—think weekly engagement with your Google Business profile, finesse in posting updates, and the wizardry of managing reviews to magnify visibility and lead generation.

Join Kaylee and Marilyn and you'll discover how to elevate your business’s reputation and presence, transforming customers into your most valuable advocates.

Want to get in contact with Marilyn? You can reach out to her on LinkedIn or her website, MaximizeyourGBP.com.

Want to reach out and hear more about Digital Journey? You can email us at info@digital-journey.net or check out our website, www.digital-journey.net.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

What's up guys? This is Kaylee Johnson here with Digital Journey. If you're a person that's wanting to learn social media, maybe that's just for you personally, maybe it's for your business this is the right place for you. What's up guys? Today we have Marilyn Jenkins joining us. I'm super excited to talk to you. Thank you for coming on.

Speaker 2: 0:20

Thank you. It's an honor to be here. I really enjoy your show and I'm just happy to be here.

Speaker 1: 0:24

Yeah, I'm so pumped. So Fairlyn Jenkins is a digital marketing veteran with 16 years of experience. She's the founder of MJ Media Group LLC and Law Marketing Zone. Her expertise lies in leveraging paid advertising and SEO, particularly for optimizing Google business profiles, to propel business growth. So SEO is something that is on everyone's mind. It's constantly questions I hear about what is SEO, what is even Google business, what is all of that? So I'm excited to dive into that with you. But first, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got to where you are today? What was your journey like, Can you tell?

Speaker 2: 1:04

us a little bit about yourself and how you got to where you are today. What was your journey like? Yeah, so I've done almost all aspects of digital marketing, working for myself, and I've been doing consulting since about 2004, 2006. And literally through doing my own ads, my own SEO. Back in the day, when it wasn't, when there wasn't a Google business profile to work with, I had clients come to me and refer me clients to to do their ads, and so it kind of just spiraled into an agency. And recently, over the last six years, I've been working mostly with attorneys and some home services companies. So we do my, our my agency focuses on like an omnipresence for our clients, so we help them with SEO, social planning and paid ads so that they can get their network out in the local area as much as possible.

Speaker 1: 1:54

SEO is so valuable. I don't think a lot of people realize that Some of our listeners are a little new to the digital world world, so can you explain what SEO is for them?

Speaker 2: 2:04

Well, it used to be this, this far reaching kind of thing to explain, um, and it's with google business profile. It's made it a lot easier, um, so basically, it's when I go to google to search for something, which we all go to google to search for stuff, um, if you've got what I want and you've done your right keywords, h1 tags and all those technical jargon things, your website will come up. The key or the problem right now is, if you look at a regular Google search, the top three searches are paid ads. The second three is the map and then you finally get down below the fold to those organic reaches. So if all you're doing is SEO for your website, you're missing that map pack. So that's what I focus on and that's why I focus SEO on. And it's easier to understand, because if someone's looking for a restaurant near me or a business near me, you want to show up in that map pack.

Speaker 1: 3:00

Absolutely.

Speaker 2: 3:01

So that's why now, with Google Business Profile, which used to be google my business, it's so much more understandable of why do I want to do this. As a small business to be found locally, and you know anything as important as your hours of operation, all of those different things that you can put on, it's so important I know, when I go on and look at a business and find their google business profile and they don't have the times they're open, they don't have the phone number.

Speaker 1: 3:26

I'm just like, how legit actually are you? You know?

Speaker 2: 3:30

it's like this.

Speaker 1: 3:31

This doesn't take much time to upload and if you're not willing to do it, like what? What's going on here?

Speaker 2: 3:36

well, I think there's a huge number of people that still think your Google business profile is just a place to store reviews. They don't think about anything else because a lot of the times it has your basic information not updated.

Speaker 1: 3:51

I know it, wow, yeah, so what are some ways that people can improve their local SEO rankings so that their businesses can appear higher in search results?

Speaker 2: 4:01

I think you have to think of your Google business profile as its own little website, dare I say, but not website, because you can have. The important part is having some engagement every week, right? So if it takes 10 minutes a week to say, answer a question, reply to a review, add a photo, add a video, and especially if you offer a product or a service, you need to have those listed in the products or services section. So, and even you can add articles. So think about if you've got a blog. You can put those articles on your Google business profile. Now tag team that with running ads, and Google sees that you're engaged, so they'll give your ads more weight you're engaged, so they'll give your ads more weight.

Speaker 1: 4:47

So it's kind of like social media and the aspect of if you're staying active, they're gonna push your post or your, your information more exactly okay, okay and it's free right, I know. I remember when I was starting my business and I heard about, I was like oh wait, I don't have to. This is one thing I don't have to pay for. All the time it's like this is good, why not?

Speaker 2: 5:03

don't have to pay for all the time. It's like this is good, why not? It's a definite big bonus that people should, small businesses or local businesses should do.

Speaker 1: 5:10

Yes, no, I definitely agree. So how can using Google Business actually drive traffic to websites and help generate leads? Because I think a lot of people just see it as okay. This is where people can find information about me and they don't realize.

Speaker 2: 5:32

Wait, this can actually get me clients that, or people that will buy my product. Well, exactly, I mean there's. There's two buttons on it, one is directions and one is your website. Um, you can even have your phone number. Your phone number is automatically clicked to call. So think of everybody on the mobile that's walking around your town looking for something. So you've got your website on there, you've got your address on there, and behind it, in the management portal, is insights. You can see what people are actually clicking on your Google business profile and how they're finding you. But it's important to have all that information up to date. I had a friend that was trying to figure out why his sales were going down in a pet food store. He goes you know, nothing's happening on Tuesday. I don't understand what the problem is. Well, someone on his team updated their hours of operation. It shows that they were closed on Tuesday. Oh no, so they went in, updated it and literally within two weeks their Tuesdays were back to normal sales. So it's just that simple of how it can help.

Speaker 1: 6:26

Wow, I mean that's that's crazy that they saw results that all quickly too. It's like, oh, wow, you know you need to make sure this is updated. I work a lot with realtors and sometimes I'll check out their stuff and they're like open all the time and they're like I don't understand why I'm getting calls at midnight about this and I'm like, maybe because you say that's okay, it's a good place to help set boundaries and to give a little bit more of a roadmap into how you can reach out to people. We all know that social media can be overwhelming. You think it takes so much time. You look at all these amazing creators who are doing insane viral posts and think how can I ever measure up to them? The good thing is you don't have to.

Speaker 1: 7:09

Your point for being on social media is probably to earn money. You want to increase your sales. You want to gain more clients so that you can have more free time to pour into your clients, to pour into your family. Digital Journey can help you with that. We have a group coaching program targeted specifically for people who are overwhelmed with social media. It's really not as complicated as you think. We can teach you how to spend 15 minutes or less a day on social media so that you can gain more clients and you can up your sales. So if you want to learn more, you can go to digital-journeynet and we'd love to help you out. Now back to the episode. That's one of the main reasons I go on and look at it, for people is like where are their hours? What is you know their reviews, that kind of thing, cause that can be harder to find on a person's website. Sometimes, a lot of times, they don't include that, especially holiday time.

Speaker 2: 8:05

It's an instant update, right? So if you've got special hours for any particular period of time that's holidays whether it's you know the summertime hours or you know back to school, whatever it happens to be. If your holiday hours are different, jump in there and update it and then you know, put a reminder in your calendar to put them back to normal.

Speaker 1: 8:25

That's very true. Otherwise, you'll have people show up there and okay, it's closed.

Speaker 2: 8:30

And then they think bad of you. They may not say anything, but they're like I'm not coming back here, you know so it's a reputation as well, and a lot of people don't realize that it's that you should reply to every review, whether they're good or bad. You know, that shows your professionalism, that shows that you care for people's opinions, whether it's good or bad. Just reply professionally and future people that read your reviews will then see that you are responsive and you care about your customer's experience.

Speaker 1: 8:59

That's so good and like. That's. One thing we focus on a lot at Digital Journey is authenticity and you know being yourself and not just caring about the client because you want their money or you want to sell them your product, but instead showing you know we care about people as a whole, and I think responding to reviews can be a really great way to kind of nail that in and show that you're genuine and care about a person after they've even bought your product, not just when you're trying to get something from them.

Speaker 2: 9:24

True.

Speaker 1: 9:25

So what? What platforms are most important for local searches?

Speaker 2: 9:31

Obviously, the Google business profile and any, if you have any, facebook groups that relate to your neighborhood. One of my clients has a group on Facebook that focuses on her in real estate, her territory. She started this during COVID and it's just a way she invited businesses in to refer each other and it's grown over the course of these past years to where people are new. People that move to the area go hey, I'm looking for someone for lawn care or we need some painting done. That group's the first place they go.

Speaker 1: 10:06

That's awesome. I live in a smaller town and we have, I think, like 10 of those groups on Facebook because it's a smaller town. But I know that that's where my friends a lot of times go if they're trying to say who's going to be the best realtor, who can do my plumbing, who can do you know? And all of that's getting publicity for the people out there who you know. Hey, more people can hear about me by doing this and since they're asking from a lot of people, it might not sound as pushy, you know, recommending yourself versus just hey, everyone, look what I do. You know it's like hey, I can help you specifically.

Speaker 2: 10:40

Yeah, I mean, and when they become communities like that, it's not just a whole bunch of sales messages and most of them are monitored enough. So it's not, you know, inundating with messages, but it's really good content, really good conversations, even simple things like festivals going on. You know what's going on this weekend. You know you can find out about that Charities to support, but I found a lot of it is a lot of local businesses. People just have needs and they're going to go to places that they know to ask that question.

Speaker 1: 11:10

Right, exactly, and that's when referrals can be amazing, you know.

Speaker 2: 11:15

Exactly.

Speaker 1: 11:16

That makes sense. Why you refer? Why you respond to them? You know, to reinforce even. Oh man, if I leave them a referral, my name is going to be on there and they're going to respond to me. You know, everyone has a little bit of their ego that they want stroked, and sometimes even having their name on there leaving a review can make people excited.

Speaker 2: 11:34

Exactly A dopamine hit.

Speaker 1: 11:36

Yes, so how can, how can you get more reviews for your business? Are you? Do you normally ask someone right away? What's your strategy for that?

Speaker 2: 11:46

Asking right away when a customer so say you have a one-off business or maybe just a retail store. I mean it doesn't matter if it's a multiple purchase or whatever. Every time you you finish a purchase. It should be something that is automated if possible, so that at the end of a transaction they automatically get an email with a link directly to your Google reviews link not to Google, but to the thing that pops up so it's ready to type in. Make it easy for people, because people are not going to go and look for you again. So we want to make it easy and for my clients and I suggest my consulting clients always set up an automated email that, as soon as you can, just hit a button and that email goes out and they get an email to leave you a review.

Speaker 1: 12:30

That's great and that cuts down on the work for you while still getting some of those benefits. I'm a big fan of reviews. For me, that's how I a lot of times judge if a product is actually legitimate or not. If you go on somewhere, they have two people that have left reviews and it's like five stars. It's like okay, are these just their mom and dad? Is this just their best friend and their coworker? So having more reviews is good and I even I was talking to someone the other day and he was saying you know, even having a bad review is OK, because if you see a business, that's always all five stars, it's like OK, are they legitimate? Are they paying people to leave reviews?

Speaker 1: 13:10

You know he was like step into that, you know, uncomfortable zone of. Sometimes people are going to leave a bad review and that's okay. Don't feel discouraged about that.

Speaker 2: 13:19

And respond to it. Again, you know, whenever, when you it's kind of like reading reviews on Amazon, right If you see a really bad review, any bad review on Google, you look and you read all the others and you get that one bad one. That person may just be having a really bad day, you know, but if you, as a business owner, respond to it politely and professionally and even if it's not a valid review, you can't get that taken off, but you can respond like I'm sorry, kaylee, I'm not showing that you ever did business with us. I mean, you know, just be professional about it and when people see how you respond to real and positive reviews and how you respond to negative reviews, that's your character. That comes through and people do business with people they like.

Speaker 1: 14:03

Yes, exactly, especially in the day you know now of so much AI and automation, you know it can feel like we're losing that personal human touch.

Speaker 2: 14:12

Yes.

Speaker 1: 14:13

It's like you know, I'm just a number. It's like you know, I'm just a number. But if you're willing to show that you care and you know, take on that individual time with you know, replying to a review might take a minute, but that could still make a big difference.

Speaker 2: 14:26

You're telling Google I'm involved. But now I do want to caveat when it comes to getting reviews. If you or any of your listeners have not been doing requesting for reviews, don't request 20 in a day. I've had people want to do that. If you request 20 in a day and say 20 of them review, google will gatekeep those. So what you want to do is make it a normal part of your business. If Google sees that you get a review every day, that's normal. But if you get 20 in one day and you haven't had any in two months, they're going to gate keep all of those. So you want to slowly, you know, get them.

Speaker 2: 15:02

And the other thing too is, say, professional services companies maybe they are just getting started, they have maybe one or two reviews. You kind of need to get 10 to really break into the map pack in most small towns and then, of course, get that raised up as fast as you can. But the other thing you can do if you don't have direct customers or you're new, what you can do is you can ask your service providers or professional friends to actually give you a character review. You know it's not a mentee in terms of service that they have to have done business with you or been your customer. So it's it's called a character review and we suggest people that don't have that many reviews or that many past customers get some people to review. Maybe you remember the chamber of commerce, uh, your bni group. You know the people that you're networking with, people that know the type of business person you are.

Speaker 1: 15:55

have them leave your review, trade reviews, it's the same thing yes, I love trading reviews because then you know everyone's gaining something from it, um and I also like reviews, even if they're negative, because then I can see where can I improve. It's not, it's not just about how can I be known more, but it's like you know, how can I grow.

Speaker 1: 16:14

So you know my customers are continuing to be happy whether that means I didn't realize this lesson in the group coaching program really mattered so much. We're gonna pour in and invest on that or someone leaving or viewing like this wasn't helpful. We need to. We need to reach out to people and see is this actually helping them Exactly, it's really great to be able to grow as a business owner, not just in your reputation, but grow and edit your product as needed or your service.

Speaker 2: 16:43

Exactly.

Speaker 1: 16:44

Well, thank you so much for coming on. If you could say one thing to the listeners about SEO and Google business profile, what's one final tip you would give them?

Speaker 2: 16:55

Well, I'm going to plug my book here.

Speaker 1: 16:57

Yes please.

Speaker 2: 17:00

So I have a lot of clients that are ads clients and a lot of clients that are not yet ready to run ads. So I put together a book that takes you step-by-step from claiming your Google business profile to optimizing it to dominate your local map pack, and it's called the Google business profile training guide and it's $27 and it is at maximize your gbpcom. Okay and um, it will walk you through step-by-step with visuals of how to do that and it's the value of your Google business profile is incredible. You know you want to be the number one in the map pack. What you're going to have to do is get in there 10 or 15 minutes a week, get it done and just update it, be involved, be engaged and get those reviews and Google will reward you. If you've got less reviews than your competitor down the street, but you're involved and engaged in your Google business profile, you can outrank them in the map pack. So it's that important.

Speaker 1: 18:05

A lot of my listeners are busy but to be like, okay, I don't have to pour hours into it.

Speaker 2: 18:09

No 10 minutes.

Speaker 1: 18:11

That's amazing.

Speaker 2: 18:11

Take a photo, take a photo of your storefront, take a photo of your team, take a photo of your newest product. Add photos, add videos, add products and services. Find something to add every week.

Speaker 1: 18:23

I love that. That's so good, and then you're not overwhelmed either.

Speaker 2: 18:27

Exactly.

Speaker 1: 18:28

You know, I have some people that are like, oh my goodness, I can't start all of this and make it look like I've been going for months. Well, you haven't been going for months, so you don't need to, you know, automatically have that expectation. Let's take one step at a time and grow you in a way where it's not overwhelming.

Speaker 1: 18:43

Exactly Because I know, when I first heard of Google business, I was like, oh my goodness, I'm never going to be able to get to what everyone else was. And then I kind of went through this one step at a time. It's a process, it's a journey. It's not an overnight thing necessarily.

Speaker 2: 18:56

Yeah, it's not as big as building out a website. You can't launch until it's done. We're talking one little thing and the other big thing on it is question and answer. That gets overlooked If there is an FAQ type thing with your business. Like every client, every customer asks this question. Put it on your Google business profile as a question and answer. That's an engagement.

Speaker 1: 19:17

That's really good. I love question and answer sections. Honestly, Even if I'm unsure about a product, I'm going to go and read that just because I feel like I'm learning a whole lot. I didn't know you could add that to your Google business profile.

Speaker 2: 19:29

Absolutely.

Speaker 1: 19:29

That's really cool. Well, we'll have all of Marilyn's information linked below. We'll have her book linked, where you can buy it. Get that checked out. Thank you so much for coming on. I learned a lot and I know my listeners did also.

Speaker 2: 19:42

Thank you so much. It's been a pleasure to be here.