If you were wondering how Google could become even more awesome and small business friendly, here’s your answer. On March 25, Google has announced a huge small business initiative entitled Let’s Put Our Cities on the Map. The aim of the program is to help every small business in every city in America get discovered across its services.
What happens when you do a Google search and you type in the name of your business? Does the company’s website, the working hours and the address appear when individuals type in the name of your company or not really? If that’s not happening you’re probably missing out on some good business. The good news is that Google intends to help you solve that problem.
The American multinational corporation has announced last week a fresh and huge small business initiative entitled Let’s Put Our Cities on the Map. The goal of the initiative is to aid every small business in every American city get discovered across its services.
On the Get Your Business Online website, business owners are able to see the mission of the team: “to make it fast, easy, and free for businesses to get online”. They add that they “have traveled to all 50 states where we’ve helped thousands of businesses. But we have more work to do.” According to the website, “Only 37% of businesses have claimed a local business listing on a search engine – i.e. a lot of missing information. Also, with 4 out of 5 people using search engines to find local info like business hours and directions, it also means a lot of missed opportunities for local businesses. ”
In this regard, Google has created a website for “virtually every town and city in the U.S.”, around 30,000. The site offers instructions for small business owners so that they are able to not only create a Google My Business listing, but also ways of improving the information that pops up about their businesses on Google search, Google+ and Google maps.
The head of marketing for Google’s Get your Business Online Program, Soo Young Kim has said that “We wanted to make the process of getting online easier for small businesses, and help them find their customers in those moments that matter.”
Moreover, Google states that its localized Let’s Put Our Cities on the Map sites provide small company owners with access to a new diagnostic tool that enables them to see how their companies appear on both Google Maps and Google Search. In addition, the websites allow company owners to have their companies verified for Google searches, add a location, working hours, photos and a website and domain name from StartLogic, Google’s partner. As a bonus, the website will be free for a year.
Also, the people that will visit the Let’s Put our Cities on the Map websites will be directed to local in-person training workshops which will be hosted by Google in partnership with local organizations that are focused on small business growth such as Chambers of Commerce, Small Business Development Centers and SCORE chapters.
If you are interested in finding your local Let’s Put Our Cities on The Map websites, check out the GYBO website and enter your ZIP Code.
To find your local Let’s Put Our Cities on the Map website, go to and enter your ZIP Code.
While Google’s initiative is amazing, some small business owners found some things that still need to be solved. For example, a user wrote us that he was surprised to see that “Information Technology was not added as a category”. Moreover, he added that “the category limitation should be expanded as you are limiting the target audience.”
A close friend of mine, the person who broke the news about Google’s initiative to me, was bitterly disappointed to see that “coaching was not included as a category”. He wanted to promote his small business with the use of this feature, yet he can’t.
A user from Europe and one from Australia were wondering why these great possibilities for small businesses were not available on their continents. They went on to say that this opportunity will definitely help them greatly.
What do you think of Google’s news? Do you intend on putting your small business on the map? Let us know in the comments section below.
