It’s a no brainer that customers search online for local businesses, and if you’re not easily found you’re missing out on customers. If you’re a local business, you can get a head start on your local SEO efforts by creating a Google Places page in 10 easy steps.

Google Places is a directory of business listings collected by Google, sort of like a phonebook. Google uses this information to display the most relevant local results to users looking for local businesses. It’s used in their organic search results, as well as in maps searches from mobile phones and tablets.

There are some initial requirements to create a places page, you’ll need:

• A Google Account
• A business name and phone number
• A physical address where you can receive mail; A PO Box won’t cut it for verification.

Step 1: Go to Google Places

http://www.google.com/placesforbusiness/
Go ahead and log in with your Google account, or create one here.

Step 2: Start a Listing

Google will first attempt to verify that your business does not already have a listing in Google Places. Go ahead and enter your country and business phone number. If it finds a listing with your phone number it will guide you through the Google Places Listing claiming process; if it doesn’t it will take you to the next step.

Step 3: Enter Your Business Info

Here you’ll enter your company’s name, location, phone numbers, and other contact information. You will also need to enter a description and pick what categories your business belongs to. Be sure to keep this description brief and useful to customers. Anything spammy could keep your listing from being posted, and even if it does pass it could push customers away. Next you’ll choose up to 5 categories. Again, you’ll want to select the most relevant categories that describe your business.

Step 4: Select Service Areas

This next step is a pretty crucial one. Here you get to tell Google which areas you service. This will affect whether your listing shows up when people search from different areas. You have the option of selecting whether your customers come to your business location, like a retail store, or if you go to them, like a carpet cleaning or pest control company. If you select that you travel to your customers’ locations, Google then gives you the option to hide your physical address from customers. This is important for privacy concerns, like if you run your small business from your home,  or any situation where a customer wouldn’t find services by going to your direct location.

In this same drop down you’ll also need to provide how wide of an area you service. They give you a couple options:

• Option 1: You can say a general area, such as “50 miles around Chicago, Illinois”
• Option 2: You can add specific cities you service if in case a city that is technically within 50 miles isn’t one you service

Step 5: Select your Hours of Operation

Here is where you’ll put your hours of operation. This is great as customers will see this when searching for you and know when they can contact you or show up at your business. Google allows you to leave this blank if you prefer not to mention your hours or if you’re open 24 hours a day. You can even state 2 different times for each day if you close for lunch.

Step 6: Select Payment Options

Next you’ll select the ways customers can pay for services. This helps customers have more information about how they can interact with your business. You can select payment options ranging from credit cards to Google Checkout or PayPal.

Step 7: Upload Some Photos

Next you’ll want to upload some photos of your business. I recommend your logo first, and then some great pictures of the interior and exterior of your location. Customers feel more comfortable with a company after they get to know it, and pictures are a great way to make that introduction. Avoid using images that have messages, or are mostly text as these don’t’ comply with Google’s Photo Submission Guidelines.

Step 8: Attach YouTube Videos

Have a great ad or testimonial? Host them on YouTube and attach them here. There’s a limit of 5 videos, so make them count!

Step 9: Add Additional Details

This section is pretty customizable. Here you can tell customers about other benefits or needed information about your business. You can also mention things like where parking is, and extra commodities among other things.

Step 10: Double Check and Verify

Once you’re done you’ll hit “Next” and be taken to the verification page. Google’s main form of validation is through the mail. This is why you have to have a physical business address that you can receive mail at. Once you click “Finish” they’ll send a postcard to your business address for verification. This postcard takes about 2-3 weeks to arrive and contains a pin you’ll need to enter in your account before your listing can be posted. Once you have verified your listing it should appear on Google within the next few days.

Make sure to double check all of your business information is correct and exactly how you want it. You can change this later, but it’s definitely easier to just have it right from the beginning.

If you run into trouble with verifying your listing, it’s rejected, or needs further action you can go to Google’s support page here: http://support.google.com/places/bin/static.py?hl=en&ts=1399021&page=ts.cs.

Congratulations on taking a major step in local SEO! Now your customers will have another way of finding you online and your one step closer to building your authority online.

How To Create A Google Places Listing In 10 Steps is a post by SEO expert Lorin Steel. For information about our SEO services or more great SEO tips and tricks, visit the SEO.com blog.

There have been many techniques over the years from SEOs who have received “ranking presents” from Google. However, it doesn’t take long for Google to turn these presents into a lump of coal. You see, just like with Santa, it takes years of good behavior to earn a spot on Google’s nice list and be rewarded accordingly. During this season you’ll be giving away gifts to family and friends. Pay close attention to the 9 SEO ranking techniques of Christmas past and make sure you’re not one of these guys:

The Hidden Intentions Gifter

We all know the gifter that gives you something, but you know they must have an ulterior motive. Well, some SEOs use a technique that uses hidden text so users can’t see what’s on the page, but Google can still find and index the hidden text. This means they can stuff keywords or spammy content in hopes of achieving higher rankings without ruining their professional image to their users. You might get lucky and get a few rank increases from this, but it definitely won’t last long.

The Fake Gifter

We all know the gifter that makes the receiver think they’re getting something great, but turns out to be something unexpected and disappointing. Well some SEOs use site-cloaking to show Google one page and users another. This is used sometimes to show Google pages stuffed with spammy keywords and content again while showing users a more usable page in order to get an increase in rankings. Sometimes it’s used to rank for a popular search but shows users content that is completely irrelevant to what they were originally searching. This gifting technique will last as long as most people’s New Year’s resolutions.

The Re-Gifter

This gifter will give you a present they have received and don’t want, or even worse they’ll give you something lying around their house. This SEO technique gives search engines the image that they have lots of fresh new content when in reality it’s just spun content or content “repurposed” and taken from someone else. The worst thing about this content is that it’s unoriginal and not made for the person it’s being delivered to. The receiver doesn’t want the content either because it adds no value to their life.

The Cheap Gifter

This gifter notoriously gives you the cheapest thing they could find and expects you to be surprised, amazed and grateful. This SEO technique uses lots of new, but low quality content in order to seem bigger and “fresh” to search engines. It doesn’t end up getting them much praise and is meaningless at the end of the day.

The Stocking Stuffer

This gifter stuffs, and stuffs your stocking with tons of cheap goodies to make their total gift look more impressive. Some website owners think that the more they use a keyword or phrase in their content the higher they’ll rank for it. Focusing on a keyword is not a bad thing but stuffing keywords winds up being a whole bunch of fluff that doesn’t add any real value to the user. Not to mention search engines find it spammy and can penalize you for it.

The Reciprocal Gifter

This gifter only gives you something if you give them something first. Some websites will promise to share links with you, that is, they’ll give you a link from their web site if you give them a link from yours. This holds to the idea that the more external links you have pointing to your website the more authoritative search engines will think you are. However, this is something Google has been cracking down on and can lead to some serious penalties. The reason is that links should be earned and the person giving you a link should want to do so for the right reasons, not just because you gave them one first.

The Repeat Gifter

This gifter uses the same gift over and over, year after year, for everyone he or she knows. Sometimes in hoping to rank for a specific search term SEOs will use a term over and over, as anchor text for their links pointing back to their website. Google looks at these links as unnatural, since users linking to your site would probably not use the exact phrase over and over again. SEOs can balance their anchor-text portfolio by realizing that different people relate to their product or service in different ways. Search engines and users alike will appreciate a little bit of variety.

The Christmas Wish List

This person makes a giant wish list full of everything they could ever want and sends it out with hopes that they’ll receive everything on that list. The keyword meta-tag has been around as long as search engines but in most cases is completely and entirely ignored (except for news agencies, according to Google). It’s nice to have a wish list of terms you want to rank for, but by simply placing them in the meta-tag area isn’t going to get you there.

The Gift-Card Gifter

This gifter gives you gift cards instead of a more thoughtful gift that actually means something to the receiver. As SEO evolves it takes a lot more thought to be truly effective and earn rankings. Simply optimizing your website for keywords isn’t enough anymore. Now SEOs have to think about how socially shareable their site is, how they can answer potential customer’s concerns and how they can convert users into buyers through conversion optimization. Simply doing the bare-minimum isn’t enough and now SEOs have actually think about how the user will experience their present.. err website!

Whether you’re an SEO or not, you should always try to be a real gifter! Be genuine and real, don’t take the easy way out and you’ll be rewarded accordingly.

9 SEO Ranking Techniques of Christmas Past is a post by SEO expert Lorin Steel. For information about our SEO services or more great SEO tips and tricks, visit the SEO.com blog.