For most local businesses, the Google Business Profile matters more than any social account. We are building it into Social Relay as a fourth destination.
Here is something that surprises people who assume social media is the whole game.
For most local businesses, the single most valuable page you own is not Facebook or Instagram. It is your Google Business Profile — the panel that appears on the right of a search, and the pin that shows up on Maps.
It is the thing people see when they search “plumber near me”. It is where your phone number, hours and reviews live. And it is very often the only page a customer looks at before deciding to call.
The bit most people miss
Almost everyone sets that profile up once and never touches it again.
But a Business Profile is not just a listing. You can post to it — updates, offers, photos of recent work — the same way you post to a social account. Those posts show up in your listing when somebody looks you up, and a profile that is regularly updated looks like a business that is regularly operating.
Same argument as everything else we bang on about, in the place where it counts most.
What we are building
Google Business Profile is becoming a destination inside Social Relay, alongside your website, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn.
Same as the others: you write the post once, tick Google along with everywhere else, and it goes out. No separate app, no separate login, no remembering to do it later.
You will connect your own profile through Google, exactly the way you connect Facebook today — we never touch a profile you have not personally connected, and you can disconnect it whenever you like.
When
We have applied to Google for access and we are waiting on their approval. That is entirely their timetable, not ours, so we are not going to invent a date.
What we will say: it is included. When it arrives, it is part of what you already pay for, not an upgrade.
What to do in the meantime
If you have not claimed your Google Business Profile yet, do that now — it is free, and it is the single highest-value hour you will spend on your online presence this year. Search your own business name, and if there is a “Claim this business” link, follow it.
Get it claimed and verified now, and you will be ready the day this lands.
Rick H Founder, Social Relay
