Did you know that Google Maps receives over a billion visitors a month? Sure, most people use it to navigate, but many also visit it to interact with the businesses they like. That’s how relevant the best business profile KPIs on Google are for businesses to rank higher and show up when people perform related searches.

However, it’s essential to identify the best Google Business Profile KPIs to pay attention to. We’ve put together a list of Google Business Profile KPIs that will help you optimize your campaign and grow.

What is the Google Business Profile and why is it so important?

Google boasts over 97 billion queries per month, which is huge when you consider that the world’s population is 8 billion. With such a reach, it’s natural for businesses to rely on Google to attract customers and increase sales. For example, if you’re a car dealer working in a certain locality, you could create a verified Google business profile with the following information:

  • Regular opening hours
  • Contact details
  • Relevant photos
  • Customer reviews

When you provide this information, Google verifies your profile and considers you a trustworthy company that generates authentic Google analytics.

Creating a Google business profile means creating an attractive shop window in the digital world. From brand awareness to lead generation, it becomes a complete sales channel for your brand. As more and more Internet users search for businesses online, creating and optimizing a Google business profile puts you on the digital map and increases your chances of making more sales.

The best Google company profile KPIs to consider

1. Profile views

Profile views give you information on the platform and devices used by web users to access your Google business profile via Google Search and Maps. Once you have this data, you can optimize your content for different devices and platforms and deliver a seamless user experience. As a general rule, the more your profile is consulted, the more attention it attracts, and the more business you generate.

Previously, Google counted views in a rather clumsy way: for example, if the same person opened your profile 100 times, Google would count 100 views. Fortunately, this is no longer the case, as Google now measures unique views per user instead of adding multiple views from the same user to the total. The main benefit of this change is that Google now provides you with more accurate data, which you can use to improve your profile.

2. Total searches

The total number of searches is one of the best KPIs in Google’s company profile. It tells you how many times your business appears in Google searches, and how many times Internet users see it displayed on their screen after performing a specific search. For example, if you’re an Indian restaurant in the USA, the total number of searches indicates how often your business appears on Google Maps or in general Google search.

In addition, a business must appear in the right category. The total number of searches also tells you whether customers can see your business in the category they’re looking for. This allows you to determine whether there is a mismatch between searches and the category in which your business appears. For example, if you have a shoe store, you shouldn’t appear when people are searching for grocery stores or hospitals.

3. Referral requests

The Google business profile features a special “Directions” button that allows customers to navigate using GPS and arrive at their current location. Simply click on this button and Google Maps will guide them to your business. It’s important to track referral requests, as they show how much interest people have in your business over a given period.

They show you the location of people who have searched for your business. This allows you to determine where to organize your campaigns and marketing efforts. However, too many referrals isn’t ideal either, as it could indicate that people don’t know where your business is located. So it’s important to inform people about your physical location and tell them about the public transport they can use to reach you.

4. Phone calls

Phone calls are also among the best Google Business Profile performance indicators for measuring impact. They measure the frequency with which web users click on the phone number listed on your profile. According to Google, 76% of customers visit a business within 24 hours of a search on their smartphone. What’s more, 28% of these searches lead to purchases, which represents a significant amount of sales.

This means that smartphone search is a major component of overall Google search, and retailers need to make it easy for customers to rely on it. The overall experience must be seamless, and the phone number you’ve provided must remain operational when customers contact you. Customers are discouraged if you don’t answer their call, if the phone number doesn’t work, or if the call is complicated. What’s more, if you’re a reliable business, most of your bookings may come from phone calls.

5. Messages

This section is for people who have activated the Messages function in their Google Business profile. It simply shows the number of messages you’ve received from your customers, and the quality of the responses you’ve given them. The two most important factors to consider are:

  • How many times have you replied to user messages?
  • Response time: this indicates how quickly you responded to their concerns.

You should try to respond as quickly as possible to satisfy customers. What’s more, if your response time regularly exceeds 24 hours, Google may penalize you and remove the messaging function from your profile.

6. Clicks on website

Since the Google Business Profile also includes a link to your website, website clicks indicate the number of people accessing your website via this link. There are two reasons why this is one of Google Business Profile’s best performance indicators: firstly, it tells you how many people are visiting your website. Secondly, it shows how effectively your Google Business Profile attracts visitors to your website.

Websites are the information most consulted by local businesses when customers use Google Search or Maps. That’s because your website contains all the details about your business, including products, services and more. When they click on your website, the situation changes from discovery to consideration. If you’ve created a quality website, you’re in a strong position to convert them.

7. Average rating

As the name suggests, the average rating indicates what people think about the quality of your business. Social proof comes in handy when we don’t trust our judgment and want to know what others think about something. Reviews function as social proof, helping you to determine your company’s value and reputation in the eyes of the public. They’re so important that 58% of people feel more comfortable choosing a company with a positive review.

Google uses a 5-star rating system, which becomes visible when users click on your company. Although the overall perception of your rating depends on the total number of reviews, the ideal is to aim for a rating of 4 or more.

8. Number of notices

As mentioned earlier, it’s not just the overall rating that counts. Customers also take into account the number of reviews your company has collected. In fact, a perfect rating generally arouses mistrust among visitors, which is not the case if your profile has many reviews.

In addition to the number of reviews, it’s also important to encourage users to record both the positive and negative aspects of their experience with you. The result is an organic perspective that helps build trust between you and your potential customers.

9. The best reviews

If you have more than one site, the best thing to do is to monitor the results of the reviews in Google’s professional profile analysis tool. This allows you to determine which sites are performing best and which are losing the race. Once you have the relevant data, you can go a step further and understand the poor performance of certain branches and solve the underlying problems.

10. Reservations

Reservations give you information on the number of reservations made by customers. To track this metric, you must first register with Reserve With Google. It’s also important to remember that adding data from booking software other than Reserve With Google to Google Business Profile won’t work, and you won’t be able to see booking data. For example, suppose you add data from another application that allows users to make reservations. In this case, Google won’t record it, because the user doesn’t communicate his or her credit card details to Google Business Profile.

Once you’ve consolidated these indicators, you can even generate automatic reports using Looker Studio.