In August I caught up with the owner of a brand-new small business in Melbourne. Their Google Business Profile had just gone up, and the question was a fair one: now that it's there, what do I actually do with it?
It takes a few days to show up
The profile didn't appear in search straight away. It took a few business days before it started showing. If you've just set yours up and can't find it, give it most of a week before you start worrying.
Their name also clashed with a TV show, so for a while a search for the business brought up the show first. If your name is shared with something bigger, add your trade and your area when you search for yourself. Over time your reviews and posts will do more of the work.
The first review came from asking
Their first 5-star review came from a customer the owner asked in person. A new profile with no reviews is easy to scroll past, and the people most likely to help are the ones you've already done good work for. So ask them, directly.
After that, my advice was to reply to every review within a day or two. Your reply sits right under the review, and the next customer reads both.
Post steadily
I suggested posting on the profile two or three times a week. A steady run does more than five posts in one afternoon and then nothing for a month. Write each one in your own words and change up the wording. Cramming your trade and suburb into every line reads badly, and customers notice.
You can put products on the profile too, and link each one to an online store. For a business that sells things, that's a way to be found and take orders before you've got a full website.
Facebook, as a person first
Their Facebook page had one follower and hadn't posted in weeks. Posting more to an empty page wasn't going to change that.
What's worked for me is joining local community groups as yourself, then introducing yourself with a real photo. When I did that for my own business, the intro post got far more likes and comments than anything I posted afterwards. A short reel with my face in it got several times the views of a static post. People in a local group want to know who you are before they care what you sell.
Holding off on the website
The owner decided to hold off on a website for a month and see what the Google profile and Facebook brought in first. For a business that new, I reckon that's a sensible test. It costs time rather than money, and it shows you what customers actually ask about.
When the site does go up, be patient with it. After I launched our own site, it was about three months before it saw much traffic and about six months before enquiries came in steadily.
For more on keeping reviews coming in, see our guide to getting more Google reviews. If you'd like a hand setting the profile up properly, that's our Google Business Profile management. The easiest start, though, is asking one happy customer for a review this week.