How To Optimize Your Description and Additional Details

You get 200 characters with which to describe what your business does.  That's not a lot of space, roughly 30-40 words.

In order to best optimize your description for search engine optimization, you will want to make sure you include the main keywords that you want to rank for.  And if you are in a smaller city adjacent to a larger city, and you want to try to rank in the larger city, I recommend putting that first.

Here is an example, for a home inspector, whose physical address is located outside of the Buffalo city limits.  He wants to capture a place in search results for Buffalo, so I'd write the description something like this:

Buffalo, Cheektowaga and West Seneca, NY home inspector with 20 years experience providing professional home inspections, radon testing, mold testing, and asbestos testing.

Notice how I put "Buffalo" as the very first word in the description - this immediately tells Google where he does business.  Additionally, I mentioned several keywords that we hope to rank for in Google Places listings:  home inspector, home inspections, radon testing, mold testing, and asbestos testing.


Your additional details (attributes) give you a great opportunity to provide data on what you do and what services and/or products you sell.
Note the examples that Google provides such as Parking available: Yes and "Brands Carried".  





Additional Details are setup like a database with a broad description on the left and detail on the right.  I recommend listing plenty of additional details to give Google and your customers the most information about your business.  

You are probably noticing a common theme throughout this blog and that is to fully complete your profile at every opportunity.  Googlebot loves data and the more you give it, the better chance you have of ranking highly in search results.  Plus, you'll be giving your customers the information they need to choose your business and your profile will look professional.

If you want to claim and optimize your Google Places listing yourself, I've provided a lot of information here so that you can do that.  If you have any questions, I'm happy to answer them for you, just give me a call or send me an email.

If you decide you'd rather have me do it for you, I am happy to do that.  That way, you know it is getting done right, and you can focus on operating your business.