You know how important a Google listing is. You know showing up in the results when someone searches for your products or services is essential in order to contend with your competitors. But maybe, you don't necessarily know where to start to accomplish this.

Not only is having a listing critical, but maintaining accurate and updated information on your listing is just as crucial. It will help with local search, SEO, customer service, user experience, and will reduce the time you use taking phone calls about your hours, services, etc.

Fortunately, the steps to take to claim and control your listing are simple. Here's how to set your business up on Google My Business:

1. If you don't already have a Google account, you'll need to create one.
2. Go to google.com/business and sign in to your Google account.
3. Search for the name of your business in the search field. (*Note: if your business pops up in the box, click on it. If it doesn't pop up, select "create a new business with this name."
4. Follow the guided steps by filling out the information about your business.
5. Once you've completed the guided steps, click "Finish."

If you'd rather watch a video of the steps, here you go:

That's it, that's all it takes. Now you have claimed and have control of your business listing on Google. From here, you can see analytics about your listing, post updates, highlight products, services, and offers, respond to reviews, ensure your information is accurate, and much more. We'll hit on how to do some of these things within Google My Business in future blogs. Until then, let us know if you have any questions!