Local Searches and Google Maps: The benefits


Look around: drag the image and move around

Smartphones are your new shop window

Smartphones and PCs are so much more than a business listing for you. It is also an opportunity to go beyond what your existing shop window can do, and show people around (and I mean around), with a virtual tour of connected 360-degree panorama photographs.

There are over 4 billion Google searches per day (Internet Live Stats). Of those relating to searches for local businesses:

Local Business search statistic from Social Media Today (2019):

  1. 97% of search engine users searched online to find a local business
  2. 86% of consumers rely on the Internet to find a local business
  3. 78% of local mobile searches result in an in-store purchase
  4. 76% of people who search on their smartphones for something nearby visit a business within a day
  5. 72% of consumers who search for local businesses, end up visiting places within five miles
  6. 72% of consumers say that searching is their first choice to find information on local merchants
  7. 50% of “near me” searches results ina store visit
  8. 46% of all Google searches are looking for local information
  9. 29% of consumers search for local businesses at least one a week
  10. 28% of consumers who searched for and visited a business online, resulted in a purchase

According to Google in 2016 (WordStream):

  1. In 2016, over a billion people used Google Maps. Today, the Google Maps app has been installed five billion times (to 4 Jan 2020)
  2. Around 90% of all global sales happen in stores, as opposed to online.

 

UK Interest in Virtual Tours

UK Virtual Tours trendSource: Google Trends (Retrieved 16 May 2020)