I have a love/hate relationship with Google.
In my 10-step Checklist for Growing Your Funeral Home Business, step #6 is to dominate Google. That’s the subject of this week’s newsletter.
I love…how they can give you access to 90% of all internet searches worldwide.
I love…how they try to provide localized results for local searches, so I’m not competing with the entire country for terms like “funeral homes near me.”
I love…how their advertising platform (Google Ads) is based on a direct response marketing model because brand marketing is too expensive for 90% of businesses.
But also…
I hate…how they are constantly changing everything. Sometimes, it’s just a minor change, like removing a useful feature. But other times, it’s a complete overhaul of their system, and we must spend weeks getting everything to work correctly again.
I hate…how they keep pushing their Artificial Intelligence system as the solution to every problem even though it does a horrible job and costs my clients far more than if we manage it ourselves.
I hate…how they’re actively trying to make it harder for people to see the source of information, and instead, they want to scrape the information from your website and deliver it to the searcher. Companies like Legacy.com should be worried because Google is coming for obit traffic; it’s only a matter of time.
I love Google, and I hate Google. It’s a dysfunctional relationship, but as long as Google controls 90% of all internet searches, we must play their game.
Dominating a massive high-tech company like Google is impossible for the typical funeral home business. But as I point out in my 10-Step Checklist, you are not competing against Google. You compete on Google against every other funeral home and cremation provider in your market.
Your goal is to dominate the Google search results compared to your competition. That means when someone searches “funeral homes near me” or “funeral homes <town name>,” they find your listing and call you first. Your goal should be to leverage Google to win more calls…it’s that simple.
A handful of funeral owners (such as my clients) do a good job of dominating Google. However, most owners do not proactively manage their Google presence, and their businesses suffer as a result.
However, dominating Google is not a small undertaking. Here are two recommendations for you to consider before tackling this challenge.
Recommendation #1 – Understand Strategy versus Tactics
Your strategy answers the questions…what do I want to accomplish? And what is the action plan?
Your tactics answer the question…what tools and specific steps will I take to complete the action plan?
The strategy to grow your funeral business is to leverage Google to connect with more at-need callers in your market. The action plan is to dominate the first page of Google results for important keywords like “funeral homes near me” and “cremation services near me.”
The tactics to accomplish this are to:
- Improve the onsite SEO of your website.
- Optimize and rank our Google Business Profile.
- Use Google Ads to shore up our results until the organic listings improve.
But here’s the key….over time, your strategy may stay the same, but the tactics will probably change. As I said above, Google is constantly changing. How we leverage them today and how we leverage them in a few months will probably change.
Recommendation #2 – Remember that Google is not your friend
Google has grown from being a start-up to having a market capitalization of $1.72 Trillion. They are not a charity and certainly do not have your best interest at heart every time they make a change.
As I said above, there are things that I love about Google and things that I hate. But it helps if I always remember that Google will always recommend something in their best interest.
Google is not your friend, but they do control 90% of all internet searches, so we have to play their game. The good news is that you do not have to compete with the entire internet. You just have to leverage Google to compete with the other funeral homes in your area.
If you do a good job of leveraging Google, you can win more calls. If you ignore Google, your business will suffer.
Last week, I offered a free audit of your Google presence and was flooded with responses. I’ll extend that same offer again this week because I believe this is a critical issue for many owners and is an important part of growing your funeral home business in 2024.
If you would like to receive a complete audit of your Google presence, click here.
Until next time,
John
PS: If you do request an audit of your Google presence. Here’s the process
- I’ll be in touch to confirm your request and ask a few questions,
- My technical team will run their audit,
- I’ll interpret the results and develop a recommendation,
- You and I will have a zoom meeting to go over the results.
- You can decide how you want to proceed
