One of the biggest challenges that most investment advisors face involves not just getting found online via search engines like Google, but getting found by the right audience at the right time – meaning a local one. Obviously, ranking highly for certain keywords only matters if the people who discover you are those who live and work in the same areas you operate in.
All of this is compounded by the fact that, according to one recent study, a massive 46% of all Google searches these days involve people looking for local information. If successful, about 72% of people say that they’ve visited a store within five miles after locating it via a local search. All told, about 88% of searches for local businesses in particular yield either a call or a visit to that business within just 24 hours.
So obviously, being found locally is of paramount importance. But unfortunately, it’s also quite difficult as your competition is undoubtedly fierce.
That, in essence, is what Google My Business is supposed to help with.
What is Google My Business and Why is it Important?
Also commonly referred to as GMB for short, Google My Business is an opportunity to claim a page dedicated to your financial advisory business right on Google in a way that also allows you to update and maintain contact information, provide more information about your products and services and, most importantly, collect as many positive reviews as you can.
A lot of people don’t realize that as far as Google is concerned, local results always favor the most relevant results for each search. Meaning that if someone searches for a particular keyword and two pages show up with relevant information, the page represented by a local business (relative to the searcher) will always show up higher.
This is why you want to not only claim your Google My Business page as soon as you can, but you also want to make sure you keep your information up to date at all times. Google My Business lets you provide essential information like your physical address, your phone number, the category of your business and even its most important attributes. You can keep your business hours accurate as things change and you can even add photos to tell the story of your business in a more relevant way.
But one of the most essential aspects of Google My Business from an SEO perspective has to do with how it lets you manage and respond to reviews. Your real customers can easily use their Google accounts to leave reviews, similarly to the way they might on a site like Yelp.
However, Google says that when businesses reply to reviews, it “shows that you value your customers and their feedback.” Likewise, high quality and positive reviews from your customers “can improve your business visibility and increase the likelihood that a shopper will visit your location,” this according to Google’s own documentation.
In layman’s terms, what this means is that the more positive reviews you’re able to collect, the higher you’ll rank on Google for relevant local searches. Even if you just go out of your way to respond to the reviews you’ve already gotten, this too will go a long way towards making sure that your site ranks as highly as possible.
In the past, you may have considered incentivize your customers to leave reviews on Google after a positive interaction. Sure, you could just ask them politely to take a few moments to leave some thoughts on your page, but if you offer something like a discount that will really push them over the edge, right?
Yes… but if that’s the path you want to go down, the Securities and Exchange Commission would like to have a word with you.
What You Need to Know About the New SEC Marketing Rule
In late December of 2020, the Securities and Exchange Commission (otherwise known as the SEC) released an updated, “modernized” version of the Investment Adviser’s Act of 1940. You may have heard of this referred to as the “Marketing Rule,” as that is primarily what it has been focused on for so many years.
Obviously, when the “Marketing Rule” was first introduced, the technological landscape looked very, very different than it does today. A lot has changed even in the 40 years since the Investment Advisor’s Act was last amended. If nothing else, this is an attempt to catch this piece of legislation up with the times – and it brings with it some very interesting implications in terms of testimonials that you’ll need to be aware of moving forward.
In the past, Rule 204(4)-1 of the Investment Adviser’s Act of 1940 was dubbed the “Testimonial Rule” because it prohibited “any testimonial of any kind concerning the investment advisor or concerning any advice, analysis, report or other service rendered by such investment advisor.” In 2012, the SEC even made it beyond clear that this applied to not only statements made by advisers and their representatives, but to third parties on social media as well.
This left a few questions concerning the new “review culture” that is taking place on the Internet, so the SEC further clarified things in 2014. They indicated that the “Testimonial Rule” applied to literally any public commentary on social media that was made directly by a client or a third party where the financial adviser or representative played either a direct or indirect role in obtaining or requesting said testimonial.
In other words, asking someone to leave you a review on a site like Google My Business was expressly forbidden. This is a large part of the reason why it’s been recommended over the years for financial advisors to just deactivate the comments sections on their social media channels altogether – you don’t want to run the risk of accidentally violating the “Testimonial Rule,” even if you did so through no fault of your own.
Thankfully, all of that has changed as of December, 2020 as the “Testimonial Rule” is largely eliminated. In its place is a new “Marketing Rule” that governs both compensated and uncompensated testimonials.
Essentially, both types of reviews simply need to meet the general prohibitions for advertisements. If a testimonial talks about how profitable your services are, for example, this needs to be true of ALL of your clients – not just the person leaving the review.
Likewise, both those reviews that you get organically and those that you compensate someone for in some way must:
- Clearly disclose whether the review is from a client or a third party.
- What type of compensation was given in exchange for the review, and
- Outline any conflicts of interest that may exist, if applicable.
If all of this sounds like a lot to take in, don’t worry – the SEC has offered a grace period of 18 months so that financial advisors can “become familiar” with the implications of this new “Marketing Rule.” So if you don’t fully understand it today (or if you suddenly realize you’re not in compliance), you still have a lot of time to get things right.
How to Optimize Your Google My Business Page
With regards to optimizing your Google My Business page, the first thing you’ll want to do is claim it if you haven’t already done so. At that point you’ll be able to go through and make sure all of your contact information is accurate and up to date, as previously mentioned.
Along the same lines, you’ll also want to categorize your business appropriately to increase your chances of appearing at the top of the results and add a business description that gives a brief overview of who you are, what you do and why that matters so much to your clients.
You should also add high quality photos to your Google My Business page that reflect the impression you’re trying to give off, and make sure that all of your contact information is accurate for localization purposes.
How to Solicit Third Party Reviews on Google
Keep in mind that the new “Marketing Rule” fully prohibits the use of third party ratings in any advertisement, including ones that you run on Google, “unless the advisor provides disclosures and satisfies criteria pertaining to the preparation of the rating” as outlined above. So if you’re planning on running an advertisement with a positive review that someone has left for you, you need to disclose A) that it’s an advertisement and not a traditional review, and B) state what type of compensation was given in exchange for the review.
However, it’s more than okay to be reviewed on Google by third parties and now, thanks to the SEC, you can outright encourage people to do so. You’re also able to direct people right to your Google My Business page instead of hoping that they find it on their own, which is a great way to establish trust and build authority at the exact same time.
So long as you have no control over the content of the third party review on Google, and that you’re allowing both good and bad reviews to be published, and you’re not paying for advertisements on the pages where those reviews appear, you’ll be in compliance and you have nothing to worry about.
Local Visibility Depends on Other Factors, Too
Of course, your local visibility in terms of your Google My Business page depends on other factors, too – not just reviews. “Relevance” is a big element that Google looks at, as in how well your business profile matches what someone is actually searching for. That’s why it’s so crucial to make sure your information is as accurate and as up to date as possible.
Distance also matters, as Google considers how far potential search results are from bmwslot88 the location term being used in a search. This is why you need to have your physical address listed prominently.
Speaking of prominence, Google also takes into consideration how well known your business is when determining rankings. So in addition to reviews, try to create as much compelling content as you can and publish blog posts, write guest posts for other sites and collect as many high quality backlinks as you’re able to.
In the end, if you’re having a hard time ranking highly with your Google My Business page in the wake of the new “Marketing Rule” or for other reasons, please don’t hesitate to reach out to your friends at Midstream Marketing for assistance. We even have a new program aimed specifically at financial advisors to fast track your Google review in a cost effective and compliant way.
