Local Guide Program: All You Need to Know

Google Local Guide program is where people write reviews, share photos, add or edit business information, and check facts on Google Maps. 

It is a community-driven initiative of users, who are known as Local Guides that contribute to the improvement of Google Maps and Business Profiles. After all, Google can not fact-check every irregularity that is created locally, so it incentivizes its users to help improve such businesses and attractions. 

Being a local guide for Google Maps has its perks. In return, you earn points, badges, and benefits for your contribution. This is more like a game where you earn high scores and unlock badges as you advance to new levels. 

In this blog, we shall be discussing how you can join the Local Guides program, earn perks and benefits, and make the most of this experience.

How to Become a Local Guide Google?

Joining the Local Guides Program is quite easy. You just need to follow these requirements:

• Create a valid Google Account (if not already)
• Meet the minimum age requirements of your home country
• Sign up for the program and agree to the program’s policies

How does Google Local Guide Program Work?

Once you successfully join the Local Guide Program, you can:

Contribute to Google Maps

Contribute content by sharing your local knowledge as millions of people rely on the information provided by Local guides. The responsibilities of a Google Local Guide are:

• Write reviews for businesses that appear in local search results
• Submit review stars
• Add photos to Google review (or even videos)
• Add or Edit missing places in Google Maps
• Respond to questions
• Edit Google Business Profiles
• Add or fix roads in Google Maps
• Create Google Map lists
• Mark closed locations
• Report spam content
• Check facts that have been added to places

But remember, being a guide you have to stay unbiased and give your natural opinion on the matter. Share truthfully what you have experienced to drive growth for local businesses.

Earn Points for Engagement

Participation is gamified to make users feel more prompted to make contributions. Instead of doing it like a job or chore, it feels fun to influence GBP local SEO searches.

The more points you collect, the higher the Google Local Guide level and the more perks you unlock. At level 4, you achieve the Google Local Guides badge.

Join “Local Guides Connect” Community

Google’s “Local Guides Connect” is a virtual community where you meet Local Guides in your area and all around the world.

Attend In-person Local Guides Events

You can also choose to go to physical events where you get to interact with other Local Guides in your community.

Benefits for Google Local Guides

There are indeed benefits for Google Local Guides and these come to enthusiastic Google users who love to spend some time making contributions.

Here are some prominent rewards for Google Local Guides:

• Early access to new features within Google
• Discounted Udemy Courses
• Discounts on Apps & Media
• Free Phone Case
• 1 TB of free storage on Google for two years
• And more!

Google Local Guide – Points,Levels,and Badges

Here is a breakdown of how you can earn points as a Google Local Guide by making Google contributions:

• Write a Review – 10 points 

If you write a review of 200+ characters - you get 10 bonus points

• Rate a Business – 1 point
• Upload a Photo – 5 points
• Tag a Photo – 3 points
• Add a caption to a Photo – 10 points
• Upload a video – 7 points
• Answer a question – 1 point
• Respond to Q&As – 3 points
• Edit information (GBP, place) – 5 points
• Add a Place – 15 points
• Add a Road – 15 points
• Check a fact – 1 point
• Report incorrection –  

As you build up points, you will reach higher levels in the Local Guide Program. 

The levels of the Local Guide Program are as follows:

• Level 1 — 0 points
• Level 2 — 15 points
• Level 3 — 75 points
• Level 4 — 250 points
• Level 5 — 500 points
• Level 6 — 1,500 points
• Level 7 — 5,000 points
• Level 8 — 15,000 points
• Level 9 — 50,000 points
• Level 10 — 100,000 points

When you reach level 4 or higher, you will receive a badge that is displayed next to your name whenever it appears in Google Maps.

Here is a list of Google Maps contributions stars:

The Max Google Maps Local Guide level is:

• Local guides level 9 badge
• Local guide level 10 badge

Very few people in the world have actually achieved this level. These are likely to be the ones who are enthusiastic Google users and receive special perks. These special perks can vary and you never know which Google Partners will sponsor it.

How can Google Local Guide Program help your Business?

The Local Guide Program is the reason why Google Maps is so detailed and informative.

After all, Local Guides has contributed millions of photos, videos, and reviews since its launch in 2015.

You can use these contributions to your advantage in an ethical manner to boost your authenticity and popularity.

Here is how positive reviews from Local Guides can benefit your business:

• Improved business visibility
• Trust and Credibility 
• Attract new customers/clients
• Enhanced mobile local search
• Community engagement and support
• Relevant information for users
• Highlighting business strengths and USPs
• Positive word-of-mouth referrals
• Insights and corrections 
• Free local marketing and awareness

A higher position in Google Places ranking

User-Generated Content Advertising

It’s free advertising. UGC pays huge in terms of local marketing and brand awareness. It saves you the money and time needed to authenticate your presence. But never shrug it off, the power of UGC marketing, the people are more interested in Local Guide reviews and opinions than your own commercials. 

GBP Local SEO

With increased engagement and the local reviews, search engines recognize your business as promising and useful. It helps you stand out from the rest of the competition and boosts popularity.

The photos, videos, and reviews, all play their role in improving your local relevant searches and producing higher ranking, which ultimately results in more leads and sales.

Building Local SEO outside your core location is another fantastic approach for expanding your reach to nearby or strategically chosen locations to attract a whole other audience.

The perfect fusion of user reviews and local search optimization can bring a massive amount of customers and help you establish yourself as the most relevant company in town.

Enhance Google My Business visibility with our seasoned experts.

Note:

Only customers and individuals can become Local Guides — there are no updates regarding businesses being local guides, as of yet.

WebDigitalSphere knows full well how important search relevance can be and has helped several businesses become more prominent in their area of operation. By outsmarting competitors with our superior SEO strategy, we now own the search result pages. 

You can achieve this feat too by partnering with WebDigitalSphere. Employ our Maps SEO services to make your business appear in the results shown at the top of the Google search.