Is it still worth creating a Google My Business Account?

With all the controversy around Google Local lately and the fact that there are now just three local listings shown instead of 7 made me wonder if it is still worth creating a Google Local listing.

The PIN cards seem to be taking forever to arrive these days and on more than one occasion I’ve had map locations randomnly change to a different location sending customers to the wrong place amongst other problems.

It’s getting harder and harder to encourage customers to leave reviews on your Google listing because it’s not a straight forward process unlike Facebook where most people are more than happy to leave a review without even being asked.

However, the signals that a Google business listing can provide are still valuable for local SEO, so setup your page, get a handful of local citations using exactly the same address, make sure to get at least 5 reviews and embed your listing onto your website.

Although Google My Business probably isn’t going to be a quick route to the top as it once was, it’s still worth the effort!