Introducing Google Beacon

Retail specialists, iThinkMedia has recently acquired a little Google Beacon and placed it above our door. Today, I want to share with you what exactly the Google Beacon is and how it can benefit your business.

What is a Google Beacon?

The Google Beacon is a small battery powered device that you can place in a building that creates proximity-based experiences for your users. The beacon sends one-way signals that are readable by low powered Bluetooth devices such as smartphones and tablets.

When a user is in close proximity to the beacon, it can send and receive data and provide helpful information for both the user and business.

Why Google Beacon?

Google Beacon can accurately track a user’s location when their location services are enabled on their smartphone. It will know when a user walks through that door and can collect data that is useful to your business.

What Google Beacon Can Do:

• Ad Conversions – Ad campaigns can be placed in a very specific location to where a product is placed. This tells you if your Google Ad campaign has caused someone to visit your business.

• Visit data – Provide information based on popular visiting times and how long users are sticking around for with visit duration data. 

• Real reviews – Gather user-generated content such as reviews and photos from people who have actually visited your business.

• Location Insights – Provide insights on how customers engage with your business.

• Ready out of the box – There are other Beacons out there, but with Google Beacon, you do not need to implement 3rd party features. It comes preloaded with features straight out of the box.

How Google Beacons Can Impact Local SEO

Having a Google Beacon will not automatically boost your rankings in Local Search. What it can do however is entice users to leave reviews and upload photos for your business. Users with their location services turned on will receive a prompt upon leaving your business to leave a review or upload photos that were taken at the location of the beacon. As you may know, the two major ranking factors for Local SEO are GMB reviews and business engagement signals. So by having a beacon, it genuinely can increase the chance of ranking higher!

The Verdict

Having a Google Beacon provides you with valuable data that can help you understand your business and customers more. It also entices users to engage with your company more which can improve your rankings in local search. But the potential of this technology is much more than just that.

The beacon’s understanding of the exact location gives you the ability to orchestrate creative new marketing opportunities.

The technology can allow you to prompt users based on where they are. So if you have a business that’s hidden away and tricky to find, directions can come up on a users screen when they are in close proximity. If you have a detailed product in store, users can get prompted with instructions and specs that are displayed on their webpage.

Have you received a Google Beacon? Let us know what you think of it. Tweet us @honcho_search or drop a comment below.