Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 If your church wants to reach more people, you need to focus on local search engine optimization. And one of the keys to local search engine optimization is knocking your Google business profile out of the park. In today's episode, we'll tell you all about how to do that. We hope this conversation helps your church reach more people and grow. This is the reach right podcast. You're listening to the reach right podcast, the show dedicated to helping pastors and church leaders reach people the right way, hosted by me, Thomas Costello, and with me as always as my co-host Ian Hyatt, we're here to help your church see more visitors and grow,
Speaker 2 00:00:53 Ready to get ready to get.
Speaker 0 00:00:59 Hey guys, welcome to the re podcast episode number 111. I am your host Thomas Costello. And with me as always is my co-host Ian Hyatt. Hey, what's up Thomas? Hey, I'm much man. Excited to talk today. We're you talking about nine Google business profile hacking tips, uh, to help churches? I think this is a really good conversation. Now. I, I think one of the things about talking about Google business profile, uh, is that a lot of people don't really know what, what does that do for a church? Like what, yeah. Why is it so important that we really dial in our Google business profile the way that it needs to be dialed in? Yeah. Um, you know, I think that's one of the things that we probably wanna start off by talking about that before we get into the, the tips. Here's why it's so important.
Speaker 0 00:01:46 Why don't you tell our audience why it's it's vital that we do that Ian? Well, first of all, you wanna be recognized, uh, as an organization by Google, you wanna be found when people do a search for churches in your area, churches in your city, um, think of your Google business profile as kind of your, your address on the internet. Right? So it's, uh, that's maybe one way to look at it. So if you don't have a Google business profile, you're kind of, uh, in one, not necessarily totally non-existent, but in one big way, you're kind of recognized as non-existent you're location. That is for your church. Yeah, sure. Here here's the thing like 99% of the people listening to this podcast, if you, if you're work at a church or you're yeah. A part of a church, you probably have a Google business profile.
Speaker 0 00:02:31 Mm-hmm <affirmative> you just might not use your Google business profile or you might not have claimed yeah. Your Google business profile. So, uh, it's not a matter of whether or not you don't have any control of whether it's out there or not. Google is gonna have you out there, you just need to claim it. Uh, and here here's what really matters is that when people look for churches online, they type in search terms like churches near me or churches in Austin. And they put in those terms and the, the first thing that usually comes up is ads. Yeah. And the second thing usually kind of the way our minds are trained is that the second thing that comes up is we, we kind of train our minds to look at that. We skip over the ads. I don't know. Yeah. You're probably like me. I think most of our audience knows, add, add, add, okay, here's the real results.
Speaker 0 00:03:17 Yeah. And then what comes up is all of the map pack, and this is all information pulled directly from churches, Google business profiles. Yeah. That's where that's gonna come from. So if you want to appear at the very top of search engines, it used to be all about making tons of content and doing little tips and tricks on your church's website. Now it is mostly more than anything. It's about dialing in that Google business profile. So yeah, in this episode today, we're gonna teach churches how you can hack your Google business profile so that you show up on more of those local searches. And really, yeah. It's not tough stuff to do. Most of it is pretty easy. Yeah. Um, we use hacking very, uh, liberally in this case. It's not, it's nothing that you need to be a hacker to accomplish, but you get these few things.
Speaker 0 00:04:06 Right. And I think you're gonna start showing up in more churches. We've seen this work and we've seen churches grow by leaps and bounds because new people are finding them all the time on these churches and, uh, kind of give you our secret sauce on how we do. Absolutely. Why don't you kick us off Ian? Uh, tell us the first Google business profile hacking tip. I will. And it's a good one. The first one is showcase your church's culture with high quality, uh, photos of your people. Um, and some of this could be of the building too, but when we say culture, I think that's the key word here is that, you know, when you have candid images of your people, the culture of your church, people will see that in your Google business profile, they'll see that online and you wanna get good photos in here.
Speaker 0 00:04:50 So not just, uh, uh, it's funny. Uh, there was a church, uh, a couple of weeks ago that, that they were unaware that on their Google business profile, there was a picture of the, the building when it had burned, uh, it had burned and that they had it restored and everything. And then there was a graffiti wall, uh, that was by the church. So that was their, the photos on, they were totally unbeknownst to them. That's what was there. So <laugh>, we pointed that out and helped them with it, but good photos. Um, Google's looking for that, you know, to end in this profile. Yeah. I think the mistake I see a lot of churches make here is you have good photos of inanimate objects. Right? Good photos of chairs, good photos of kids, ministry areas, and good photos of seats, cues, or the yeah.
Speaker 0 00:05:39 Yeah. Stage. And I, I get that. That's the reason, you know, a lot of other Google business profiles are set up that way, where they wanna show off their facilities. Um, that's what people are looking for, but for churches, really, we know this and we know it as more than just a saying, churches are about the people, people it's not about the facility. Right. Uh, while you may have a facility where you meet yeah. The people are really the life of your church there. So yeah. Your pictures that you're putting on your Google business profile, you will do much better if you have people in your physical setting. Yeah. Uh, so it can't just be people in their homes or please under no circumstances, should you just use stock photos? Oh, no. Handsome and pretty looking people. Yeah. Uh, that you think might make people want to come to your church.
Speaker 0 00:06:25 People see through that in, in a second. So really the best thing that you can do is having pictures of real people caught in the act doing the values of your ministry at church when they're at the building, whether it's in the children's ministry or in youth ministries or during worship. Uh, but having real, engaging faces of people that goes a long way. So yeah. But I think you're exactly right. Getting photos in there that is, um, that is probably the most important things you can do and tell the story, same reason why you want them on your website and social media and all of that. So same thing. So that's it. Yeah. Awesome. You wanna tap? Second one? Yeah. Second one is you need to make sure you're using good keyword in your Google business profile. Uh, so here is the most important keyword you have to have in your profile is the word church.
Speaker 0 00:07:12 Yeah. You wanna make sure that that's in there? Uh, a lot of times churches don't have the word church in the name of their church. So sometimes, uh, even for a denominational church, you might be, uh, first Baptist. Uh, yeah. Technically your name is first Baptist church, but when you get up there and do announcements and you talk about yourself, you say, Hey, welcome to first Baptist. Right. If that's your name or anything like it, um, you know, I maybe, uh, a lot of maybe younger churches they'll have a name. Like I pastored a church called journey community for a while. Yeah. Yeah. And we still were very intentional in using the word church in our Google business profile and in everything we did online. So even though you kinda went by journey community, right, right. Yeah. We were a community. And I think there was a season where a lot of churches wanted to not have the word church in their name.
Speaker 0 00:08:01 Cause they had certain stigmas that went with it for people. I think that in a, in an internet marketing era, using the accurate term that your community thinks of you as that's something that's so important to do. So absolutely. You wanna use that term church. Uh, if you pastor a hope chapel or a Calvary chapel, these churches are very notorious for this, that they, they are Calvary chapel. So they're not gonna use the word church, but really finding ways to get that word church in there, finding ways to get some of your surrounding communities and your community in there. Yeah. So that's important stuff to get in there. And then also you want to use keyword that are associated with any of your ministries as a church, right? So if you are, um, really well known for your children's ministry and your vacation Bible school, you want to try and get those terms in there because there are people that are looking for great youth ministries, great kids ministries, and they're typing in those terms too.
Speaker 0 00:08:54 So trying to get, get that kind of stuff in and making sure you get those keywords in your profile. That's really important. No, that's great. Yeah. Nothing further to add. And uh, the next one's important too, I'll cover here, which is craft a compelling description within your Google business profile. So they give you 750 characters. So you can have something that stands out something that's invitational to visitors. You know, don't just put, we are a church we hope to see you on Sundays. We meet Sundays at whatever. And so, you know, try to think a little creatively invitational, um, you know, and, and have something there that, you know, cuz again, people will read this and see this. And uh, and Google likes this too. When I say Google likes this, they Google sees if you go the extra mile on this and that all helps in your ranking too.
Speaker 0 00:09:40 Yeah, no, I think you're exactly right. I think a, a, a compelling description. It goes a long way. I think it's worth it to have to have someone that really wants to spend the time working on copywriting for you. Yeah. I think that's really important on your website, in your descriptions online like this, I don't think it's right. Just to copy and paste your mission statement or something like that. That's not what they're looking for. I think you're you wanna approach this the same way you, the same things you would say when you shake a visitor's hand on Sunday for the first time, that's the kind of stuff that you want to be talking about here. Yeah. When you're introducing your church, think of it as like an introduction to the world, I would recommend very conversational kind of tone. That's good making it. So that it's something that someone feels like that they could they'd relate to you or that they feel.
Speaker 0 00:10:24 They're just reading something, reading a conversation between two people there. So that a long way I think, and something like that's good. Next one is, make sure you set up your geographical on your Google business profile. So, uh, this is something that you have the option to do when you set it up. There's a couple of different ways. So this is especially important for churches that are meeting in a facility that is not your own. Um, there's a few ways around this and it's kind of a, one of these things that's in a gray area when it comes to Google business profile set up. So, um, we wrestle with this all the time. So if you're a church that meets in a school or you meet in a theater or in a hotel, which a lot of churches are at that place now. Yeah. Um, I think that it, if, if you, if you can, it's still good to find a way to make your place basically, uh, your church, a suite, or a like consider it a, um, a place that you are renting.
Speaker 0 00:11:23 Cause you're probably paying some money for that school. So it is usually best to set it up in a way that you claim that spot on the map as your church's locations. So there's a few things that happens when you claim your Google business profile. They're gonna wanna send you a postcard at that address just to make sure that you get mail there and that you're a reorganization and those kinds of things. Right. And so you probably need some relationship. Like if you, uh, are at a school, you might need to have, uh, relationship with the secretary or the principal there. Yeah. And say, Hey, I'm gonna be getting a postcard here. Is it okay if you just pass that along to me, it'll say, uh, care of you guys, but it'll be going to us. Can you pass that my way? Right. And that way you could actually claim that listing.
Speaker 0 00:12:04 Now, if that's impossible, that's where this step comes in of claiming your geographical area. Yeah. Um, this is for you think about it this way. If you are a plumber, you don't have people bring their plumbing needs into a storefront. Right, right. They come to you. Yeah. So think of it that way. Like if you don't have a physical location as a church, you can set up a service area. So usually this is done by zip code or by cities and you'll say, Hey, we service this entire area. That's a good way to get onto that map pack and make sure you get results too. So you can go both ways for it. Yeah. Yeah. And I liked that you covered if, even if, uh, churches meeting in a school or a hotel, because we do run across a lot of churches. We had a, a church that, uh, was in the Hyatt and, and uh, the Hyatt hotel.
Speaker 0 00:12:45 And so, um, and it reminded me of like, just when, uh, I did a search, I guess, you know, I do these searches often for like breakfast tacos near me. Uh, and, and there was a, some dynamite breakfast tacos in a gas station, but you know, they were, the, the place was a mom Paul place within a gas station, but you know, it came up on Google. So it's kind of that, that's a, a funny example, but it's one that holds that that's relevant. Yeah. It's similar for churches. Yeah. That's good. Yeah. Cool. Next one I'll get is utilize. There's a services and product feature within the Google business profile. Now, what does that mean? That sounds a little confusing. Um, if you have different, you have a youth service women's Bible study, you can under this services area within the Google business profile, you can have descriptions and organize your ministries and offerings, uh, under these categories, if you will.
Speaker 0 00:13:39 So, um, so it, it's, it's really helpful because you're able to promote other aspects of, you know, your church in this area. Yep. Yeah. I think a lot of churches get stuck on this because you gotta remember that the Google business profile is yeah. Made for general businesses. That's why it's called business. Right, right. Business profiles. And we're not really that as a church, but we can still use the tool and, you know, we function that way. Nonprofits do so, uh, in their eyes, we have to kind of fit ourselves into this. Well, we don't have products or services, so that would be things that we sell or, um, you know, if we, you did, uh, septic tank cleaning, you could put that as a service, you offer churches, don't do that kind of stuff. So we have to get creative with it. And so usually it's gonna be things like highlighting special ministries that you have yeah.
Speaker 0 00:14:26 Youth and children or obvious ones. But if you do celebrate recovery or financial peace university or divorce care, or yeah. Anything that's outside of maybe your normal Sunday morning, uh, uh, services there, I think these are the kind of things you want to put in there as descriptions. So yeah, that's the kind of stuff I think they're looking for. That's good. And then it just shows that your church is meeting different needs. And if someone might, uh, stumble across that and, uh, and have a need with different ministry that you have other than just, they may not just be looking for a church, so that's good stuff. Yeah. So absolutely. Yeah. Next one is, uh, number six, post updates and events. Uh, Google business profile has a you'll remember it started out as Google plus you remember that back when I was trying to compete with Facebook.
Speaker 0 00:15:09 Yeah. Facebook, there have been so many iterations of this, but initially they were trying to compete to, to be a Facebook competitor. Yeah. There was Google plus there was something before that too. I don't even remember what it was. Yeah. And then it went to, uh, several things before it landed at Google, my business. And then they just rebranded about six months ago to become Google business profile. So if you're sitting here wondering what is Google business profile? You've heard of Google my business, same thing. It's just their rebrand that they did with that. That's it. But I say all that about how it used to be Google. Plus, this is something that is kind of left over from that back, uh, the way you used to post onto Facebook or you post onto Instagram. Well, your Google business profile has a leftover component there, uh, where you can create posts yeah.
Speaker 0 00:15:54 For your business. So for most businesses, this is intended to be something where, uh, you post specials or certain, uh, hot items that have just come in or those kinds of things you're posting, uh, just new updates and those things at your business. Well, that's great for churches and for events, those kinds of things, they really work well as posts. So chances are, you're already doing an event on your church. I was gonna say, churches have more events and often more things going on than even a local business. So it's perfect. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. So this is a great thing to do. I think it's probably the most valuable place to put that information is onto your Google business profile because, uh, it delivers that information to a wide audience that in most cases you've never met before, remember these are searchers. These are people looking for things like things to do in Austin, or they're looking for children's events or whatever it would be.
Speaker 0 00:16:46 That's where you're gonna pop up. It's a great way to introduce your church to new people. And the more that you put content into your Google business profile, this is gonna tell Google, it's basically a signal that says, this is an active business. That's actively using our platform. We want to help them, uh, kind of move up. And the algorithm tends to favor you when you do this. So make it part of your routine. Every time you add a new event, uh, to your church calendar, make a point of getting that onto your, uh, Google business profile. Also new sermon series. That's a great thing to put on there. Oh yeah. So you have a graphic that goes with it. Cuz you can add graphics to these updates, put in the graphic, talk about your sermon series. That's once a month probably you have another kind of post that would really help your audience online there.
Speaker 0 00:17:32 So I think that's really a good thing to do. Yeah. Good. Uh, next thing to do would be to utilize the FAQ section. Mm-hmm <affirmative> we see this on church websites, uh, FAQ answering. Okay. What time of the services? What's the dress code? You know, what do you have in place for my kids do it here too. I mean, again, this is something that not only will help your Google business profile, but it's something that is visitor geared. They have these questions, you can answer these questions, not only on your website or social media, but here in this area too. So yeah, that's in there. That is a no brainer to, to utilize since, uh, with what we do with churches. There are often a lot of questions. It isn't like a breakfast taco stand, uh, you know, this is, uh, you know, what do I have to wear to, to come order a taco?
Speaker 0 00:18:19 It is okay, what's this church like, what am I getting into? So this is a perfect section, uh, for churches, the FAQs FAQs are great for reducing apprehension. Uh, yeah. So it helps people get over that hump of showing up at church for the first time. So anything we can do to help them get over that hump and my advice for these FAQs, same things for FAQs on your website is make them again, ultra conversational. Yeah. Uh, don't be too stuffy with it. Don't take yourself too seriously. Yeah. Feel free to make jokes. Uh, we've all seen FAQs before that are just kind of getting information out there. That's not what this is for. This is about building relationship and helping people get over that hump to come for the first time. So I think that's a good one to do. Good. Next one. Very important respond to all reviews.
Speaker 0 00:19:08 Uh, number eight is respond to all reviews and that goes for both positive and negative reviews. Yeah. So, um, I think it's natural for us to respond to the negative reviews because you feel like you need to put up a fight. Um yeah. And you know, kind of make sure you put that person in their place, exercise caution with that. Yeah. Uh, when you get a negative review on things, I gotta tell you most of the time negative reviews are gonna be from just potshot from people you can't even identify and you won't really know what word this is coming from or it's, they wouldn't let, let me do my show far or bark in church. They wouldn't let do that. Yeah. That you might be able to pinpoint. But I, I find that a lot of times it's gonna be people that'll say, you know, you believe in fairy tales from 2000 years ago and no one, you know, it's just a, your local friendly atheist giving you a little, uh, correct.
Speaker 0 00:19:57 Encouragement on your <laugh> on your Google business profile there. So respond to them. We did a whole episode that we can link up in the show notes here, uh, or in the show notes below and then up on top if you're watching us. Yeah. Uh, but we did a whole episode about how to respond to reviews and what to do when people get all negative with you. But here's what you need to know is that every review is a signal to Google that this is a prominent organization or a prominent ministry in our case. Yeah. So even the negative ones, they tell Google, Hey, people are going here. At least, you know, a lot of people are showing up at this place. And so every time you respond to a review, think of it almost like counting as an additional review, it's more, uh, more of a signal it's people it's letting Google know that you're engaged with people.
Speaker 0 00:20:42 Yeah. As they're putting reviews in there. So every time you get a review, even if it's someone said, you know, it was a great first service or love this church, uh, make sure you respond, thank them for that. Uh, if they're giving you a negative review, respond and say, I'm sorry about that. Uh, but those things are, uh, it's just so important that you get that out there, that you respond to every review. It's a great signal for Google that will help boost your ranking. Good. Yeah, absolutely. And, and last but not least make sure your Google business profile is complete and accurate. Um, so we've talked about a lot of the, the steps to take in here. I think that's what we've seen. Like you said, at the very beginning of this podcast, Thomas, most churches have a Google, uh, they have a Google business profile, but it's not complete and it's not accurate.
Speaker 0 00:21:29 Um, so take the time to go through all the steps. It's not too complex. It, it takes a little bit of time, uh, and make sure it's accurate too. So make sure all the information is, is accurate in there. And cuz stuff changes at churches, service times change, uh, different things change. So don't, don't forget that you gotta make those updates ongoing too. Yeah. I think it's helpful to go on there at least once a quarter and make sure everything's still accurate. Uh, we have all of our information in there. One of the things that every kind of social platform does is they want you to fully utilize the platform and really they want all of your information too, as a business, anything they can get from you. Yeah. So they basically incentivize you to complete your profile, put in everything you can about your church into your profile here and Facebook and Instagram.
Speaker 0 00:22:17 Yeah. LinkedIn and all those places at once. All of that info and they want it so that they can kind of better get your information and sell you products and those things. But they incentivize that by giving you better results on the algorithm. Yeah. If it is fully completed. So usually there's gonna be like a checklist that comes up and says, you know, your nine of 10, uh, items are complete. Yeah. Do these, this last one and then you'll be fully complete. And they're always trying to get more of that information to help you boost your, your scores on the algorithm. So do it go along with it. Um, I think if you want to get your word out there about your church, uh, help them kind of get that information that they need to put you in their algorithm better. Uh, that'll go a long way.
Speaker 0 00:22:58 So absolutely. Anything else to add any other, uh, tips to share or anything Ian? No, no, this was good. We hope it's, uh, helpful to anyone who was listening to this and checking it out, get it done. Yeah. We really do hope it was helpful. Uh, if it has been, it would be a lot to us. If you would rate, review, subscribe, like comment, do all of those things. If you have another thing that you've done on your Google business profile or something else you've just done to help more people find your church online. We'd love to know in the comments below. So drop us line there. We'd love to have a conversation. We try to respond to all of our comments and reviews. Uh, just like we said in this episode. So yeah. Do that. And we'd love to get back with you on it. So, uh, thanks so much guys, for being a part of our reach, right. Family. And we hope to see you next week. Thanks for listening to the reach right podcast. We hope this episode will help you reach people the right way, looking for more resources for your church. Check us out online and reach right studios.com. If this episode has been helpful to you, it would mean the world to us. If you would rate, review and subscribe on iTunes or wherever you get your podcast. Thanks again for listening. And we'll see you next week.
Speaker 1 00:24:18 You.
