Understanding Google My Business & Local Search
Google Insights – Queries used to find your business
I just saw this Google My Business Insight feature: Queries used to find your businessSend feedback. Per Google these are “The most popular queries for your business by unique users”
I have been on a trip for the past week and less than observant of Insights so this could have shown up at any point and I wouldn’t have known.
That being said it appears that it is a useful upgrade to Insights. They currently are only showing for 1 month and 1 week but they seem to surface the kind of detail that has been harder and harder to find from Google:
Let me know how long you have been seeing this, if you have been seeing this, whether you find the data useful and how you might use it.
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Comments
50 Comments
How well are they matching up to Search Console?
I don’t have this in my GMB Insights. Super new or you’re in a test, maybe?
I am only seeing it if your user is the primary owner of the listing. I can’t see it for accounts that I am just a manager on. Let me know if that’s the same for you or not
Just seeing your question in Jan. 2019 but I am a manager not owner and I am noticing it in my interface
Not in any of my accounts yet either.
Same here; I’ve checked a couple dozen accounts, and didn’t see this.
Nice find.
I wonder whether the search terms in your example simply are what you’d see in Analytics minus “(not provided).” It’s interesting that none includes “Buffalo” or a similar place name.
Once this thing rolls out more broadly, it sure will be interesting to compare it with GA + GSC + AdWords search-terms reports.
I haven’t seen it yet either. Your question is interesting one Phil. It reminds me of one of the ways Google used to report local data to smb’s who had claimed the business, in of the former names before GMB.
In those days local was sending a list of most looked at or most clicked keywords. They truncated out ALL locational keywords. All of them.
So they would show Mike’s client as having been seen/or received maps traffic for things like jeweler, jewelry, rings, etc etc etc…but they would NEVER add in the geo terms. NEVER.
Since others aren’t seeing what Mike has seen this must be in test mode. We’ll find out if they include local geo terms or not in short order once it becomes more prevalent.
Hey Dave,
They do show geography terms in these reports. I’m seeing city and neighborhood level keywords that contain it.
I am not seeing it yet either. Are you able to share the URL for the insights?
Mike, are you running an AdWords Express campaign for this business? Maybe that’s why you’re getting this new Insights report.
Great find. We are not seeing this yet but we will sure be checking!
I as well have not seen this as of date, I hope it will be rolling out soon, as this would be handy for some of our clients!
I don’t see it in any of my accounts. Reminds me of some of the data we used to get in GA.
This article has a screen shot of how Google Local used to highlight GMaps keyword visibility for local smb’s. Circa 2013 before GMB came into existence. Mikes example looks similar to what we used to see in the local dashboard in 2013. https://wrightimc.com/google-my-business-whats-changed-in-2014/
Can’t find it in my account either
Not seeing it yet either. Hope it does roll out soon to all. I agree with Phil- it will be interesting to see how it compares to GSC et al!
Thanks for sharing… good to know and be on the look out for this!
Not seeing it yet either.
Mike, what particular medication did you take prior to seeing this? 😉
…not here in Canada either – yet – thanks for the heads up though 🙂
I as well have not seen this as of date, I hope it will be rolling out soon, as this would be handy for some of our clients!
Mike: I looked at the third result; ring
Wedding ring, engagement ring, diamond ring????
Come on Google test case. What is the purpose of providing half baked data to SMB’s and their web marketing folks. Should we get on our knees and praise you for dribbling out some highly filtered data when you control all the info and no other entity sees it at all???
It’s a ridiculous exercise of your monopoly position and exercise of that power. Thanks for the example!!!!
I am not seeing this for any of my clients.
I don’t see it on any accounts I manage yet but I’m very excited to see it. That is a huge step in making GMB more effective and seeing how to optimize the current content even better. There’s always progress to be made and more improvements can be made the more information we have.
This would be extremely helpful!
Nothing here… something like this seems too good to be true from Google. At least I’m not seeing “not provided” 😉
Hey Mike,
Not yet reflected in my account. This will be useful!
Thanks for sharing ☺️
Mike’s just messing with us.
These insights have been rolled out to all the GMB listings in my account. Very cool info, it confirms that we’re purchasing the correct keywords in our paid channels for local campaigns and it provides insight into how we should optimize local pages on our website.
Overall good move on Google!
Hi,
I see it on all my GMB listings in Poland.
Very nice feature. Thanks for the article.
See it here in Edmonton Canada now 🙂
Good for you and your clients. Still don’t see it in the States yet. Are the keyword phrases truncated at all?
All my accounts have them showing as of today, both US & Canada based clients.
Are you seeing them in accounts that you have manager access to? Or only accounts that you are the primary owner on?
@dave – I’m seeing full kw – most look appropriate, although there are the usual odd ones… e.g. for my Internet Marketing GMB page —> “walk path near me”
Okay yes finally seeing this in the US also, but it’s underwhelming. Why do they have options for 1 week & 1 month but that’s different than the monthly/quarterly options for Actions? Oh now I see weekly views for actions too. This must be new. This gives me very little to go on. As a business owner I’m looking for growth/trends over time, eh? Giving me 84 pages of 10 search phrases is a bit of a waste of my valuable time. Can’t they put more than 10 to a page? Well this seems like a nice little addition but it truly provides little actual value, IMO. Perhaps it will improve over time. Wow, I’m sounding so jaded and negative today. Hmmmm
I’ll say, it’s underwhelming 🙂 Looking at my clients well optimized listings I’m seeing that they’ve shown up for some of the most odd search terms too. There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to the information so far. Hopefully they are just beginning to pull info together and will improve upon it very soon.
Great find! I contacted Google and the rep wasn’t aware of which accounts would receive this roll out (or what criteria causes the roll out). Hopefully we get this soon and businesses can save on Google Ads when conducting keyword research!
It is not possible to optimize the My Business Profile for keywords or to store certain keywords for which the My Business Profile is to be displayed.
Then why does Google display the My Business Pages for these specific keywords? What do you think?
Seeing this over in the UK now, for the record.
Nice find. I’m interested in comparing to GSC as other posters have mentioned.
Hi,
Google is currently rolling out the “queries used to find your business” report. I can then see in the My Business Account which keywords visitors have used to access my company profile. However, the company profile itself cannot be optimized for specific keywords, apart from the company name and the branch/category. What do you think: How does Google make this assignment for certain keywords?
Now Google My Business insights are being sent at gmail id as well that owns the GMB page.
This is a great insight and new feature in GMB. I think they pull the data from GWT. I am comparing the data and they seem to match.
Just noticed them showing up this month (although might have appeared earlier).
I see other commenters are suggesting a comparison between this data and Search Console. I had wondered whether SC tracks search volume to the GMB page and assumed it doesn’t as its not the website itself. Is it confirmed that Search Console does track this data?
Also, for me it says
“Queries used to find your business
The most popular queries for your business by unique users”
It’s not clear from the language whether its impressions or clicks, any thoughts on that?
Cheers,
Nick
Nothing showing. For those who see queries in GMB, any correlation in Console under “search”? (That could be interesting. Also, Console will show pages that are pulled up so could lead to other discoveries.)
i have not seen yet on my account, but thanks sharing this with us. This info will help us in google insights.
Not showing up in mine, either – and I’m the primary. Would love to see this information…
I just noticed this as well, however, I can’t figure out how “cheap emergency dentist near me” qualifies as a query for an SEO company.
It should have an option to synchronize the GMB data to Google Analytics. It will save time.
This has now become a pretty useful feature that seems to be here to stay. If only you could download them all into a .csv.
You can download csv
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