Google Update Business Hours In Local Listings With AI

Your Google Business listing (also known as your Google Business Profile) is a free listing that can help your company be found in more local searches, rank higher than competitors, and attract more customers. This isn’t a one-and-done list, though. If you want to stay on top of the search result, you must optimise and maintain your listing in the same way that you would your websites. 

According to Google, if it believes the business hours listed in the local listings are incorrect, it can use machine learning and AI to update them. “We create the machine learning (ML) model that automatically detects if business hours are incorrect and instantly updates them with AI-generated predictions,” Google wrote.

What is Google Local Listing?

Google local listings are the map-based businesses that appear at the top or middle of Google’s first page results. These results are more likely to appear when you search for keywords. As a result, local search results differ from organic and sponsored pay-per-click results. 

It’s not a website; it’s a Google listing that shows up when people search for your company name and the service you provide. It acts as a central location for customers to find all of their contact information in one place, right on Google’s search page. 

Google Update Business Hours

Businesses have undergone a lot of change in recent years, including constantly updating operating hours in response to changing pandemic-related restrictions. To keep up with the rapid pace of change, we created a machine learning model that detects whether business hours are likely incorrect and updates them instantly with AI-generated predictions.

Google has revealed how it is using artificial intelligence, including its restaurants-calling Duplex technology, to keep business hours up to date on Google Maps. If it is confident enough in the AI’s prediction of what a business’s hours should be, google says it will update the information in maps. 

Google outlines the various factors that its AI considers when deciding whether or not to make these updates. To determine how likely the hours are incorrect, it looks at when the business profile was last updated, other similar shops’ hours, and Popular Times data. For instance, if Google notices that a large number of people visit a shop when it’s supposed to be closed, that could be a red flag. 

According to Google’s post, if it determines that the hours should be updated, its AI will examine even more data. To determine when the business is open, it will use information from the business’s website and may even scrape street view images (which may include business hours signs). Google says it will also consult with actual humans, such as Google Maps users and business owners, to validate the AI’s predictions — the company even says it will use Duplex in some countries to directly ask businesses about their hours.

Why Update My Google Business Listing?

Updates and changes are among the most important Google My Business optimisation you can make to improve your local search rankings. The more you use the platform, the more signals you send Google that your listing is accurate and trustworthy. The higher you rank on Google Maps in the local section of Google search, the more Google trusts you. The following advantages come with a higher rank:

• Get Discovered: You can change your Google My Business category using this feature. By choosing a category, you make it easier for people looking for your product or service to find you rather than your specific business name. This is especially useful for companies whose names don’t indicate the services they offer. Categorising your company’s Google listing is a simple way to make sure that more of the right people know about you.

• Improve Your Search Engine Optimisation(SEO): SEO is something that many people are afraid of, but it can be broken down into manageable chunks. One of the simplest ways to improve your local SEO is to update your Google listing. Also, ensure that the information in the rest of your listings is identical to that of your Google listing. To provide the most accurate and reliable search results, Google is constantly crawling the internet for updated information. The more your contact information is consistent across the web, the more Google favors you.

• Boost Exposure: People don’t just use search engines to find the products and services they require. There are hundreds of apps and directories available today that direct people to the most appropriate destination for them. These platforms, on the other hand, build their databases by crawling the web and relying on larger search engines like Google to do so. As a result, a lot of the information in these smaller but more widely used directories comes from Google business listings. Update your Google listing to ensure that the hundreds of other apps out there have the correct information and can help you expand your reach.

Final Thoughts

Many websites and apps are constantly being updated, with new user-friendly features being added. As a technology business partner, Alkye strongly advises our clients to keep up with current marketing trends to reach the target audience.