So you may have heard about this new thing called, ‘Google Place Pages’. It’s a recent launch from Google basically giving users detailed information about any place in the world with an unique, individual page within Google Maps The detailed information includes any place such as businesses, attractions, cities, neighborhoods, and much more.
To access these place pages in Google Maps simply click on the, ‘more info’ link on the listing. This will bring up that business, attraction, city, etc. place page with information like: street address, pictures, reviews, business info, accreditations, videos, related web pages and even user content.
Sponsored links also show up on the right hand side of the Google Place Pages. In order to get a Google Place Page you have to have a Google local business ad. A Google local business ad allows you to create your company profile within Google maps so that correct information like your business address and contact information and logo is displayed when someone is looking for your business. It’s pretty simple to fill out a Google local business ad; you simply create a Google account associated with your business, and go to www.google.com/local/add to sign up for an account. Here you can simply fill in your business information including street address, phone number, hours of operation, a description about your business, etc.
What’s even cooler about Place Pages is that each place will have its own special URL that will be easy to remember and link to. For example, Google says the San Francisco Place Page will be found at google.com/place/us/California/san-francisco-city. This isn’t working for each Place Page right now as Google is still working on developing this friendly URL structure for everyone.
More and more users today are basing their purchasing decisions based off unbiased reviews in which Google Place Pages provides quite nicely. If you’re operating a local business and don’t have a Google local business ad running you need to get one ASAP. Once you have your own Place Page you can encourage people to go and write reviews. It’s a great way for anyone to access more information about a ‘place’, see pictures, read reviews and see more user content. If the information given on these Place Pages don’t allow you to make an informed decision about whether to utilize a business or not I’m not sure what will!
