Many businesses are rebranding completely to skirt Google’s guidelines. But when everyone does it, it becomes a branding nightmare.
Colan Nielsen on May 7, 2021 at 10:15 am
Keyword stuffing has been a hot topic in the Google My Business world for a long time. Keyword stuffing or “adding descriptors” to your name on Google My Business is when someone adds words to their business name on GMB that aren’t part of that business’s actual legal name.
The most common example is a restaurant in a big city that lists “New York City Pizza”, even though the address says otherwise. Another popular example that isn’t brand related is a plumber adding “Best Plumber” to his or her business name.
GMB users have been manipulating their business names in this way for years. The practice became so common that Google eventually banned it by updating the “+” character used to add additional words to your business name with the following message:
“Google My Business discourages adding irrelevant, misleading, or excessive keywords to your business’ primary name on Google My Business.
If you’re building a website and want it to be found on Google, you might have heard the term “keywords”. But what do keywords mean for businesses? And how do they impact your Google My business?
In this article, we’ll discuss some ways that keywords can help or hinder your online presence. Let’s take a look at how to use keywords in SEO, the best way to research keywords without hiring a professional, and some pitfalls of keyword stuffing.
What are keywords?
Keywords are the words and phrases that web searchers use to find your site. When you create content for your website, it’s important to write with those words and phrases in mind.
Google, the largest search engine on the web, uses keywords to determine a page’s relevance or lack thereof and ultimately ranks the pages higher into search results. So, building a strong SEO foundation with keywords is crucial if you want your site to be found on Google.
How does Google use keywords for My business?
Google has several ways it uses keywords to rank your website. Here are three key areas of influence that come through:
URL: When someone goes to google.com, he or she searches for a certain phrase. Now this person will never see your website if you don’t have it listed there. To help you reach Google’s top of the page ranking, make sure your URL is easy to understand and contains the keywords you would like to be found with.
When someone goes to google.com, he or she searches for a certain phrase. Now this person will never see your website if you don’t have it listed there. To help you reach Google’s top-of-the-page ranking, make sure your URL is easy to understand and contains the keywords you would like to be found with. Content: If you search for something on Google, chances are that someone has already written a blog post on that subject. If no one has written about it yet, someone may turn to Wikipedia or another reputable resource. Don’t steal people’s content! Instead, create your own and use keywords in your own content so it is more compelling for readers in the search engine results pages.