• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, July 5, 2018

Google confirmed that it is running a small-scale rollout of an Insights analytics report in Google My Business that shows business owners the most popular search keywords that people use to find their listing.

A Google spokesperson confirmed the rollout.

Mike Blumenthal, founder of the website Understanding Google My Business & Local Search, said he is part of the test team and added that the feature could soon roll out more widely if it is successful.

The Google My Business Insights report provides keyword data on the most popular queries for a specific business from unique users. It shows about five weeks of data, but provides the kind of detail that has been increasingly difficult to find from Google, Blumenthal said.

This new feature offers insights based on specific keywords such as “barbara oliver jewelry” as well as the number of users who searched on those keywords within a month.

“This is the first time we’ve seen keywords outside of Google Ads in a long time,” Blumenthal said. “We’re seeing that 70% of actions take place on Google these days and all we have to monitor that is Google Analytics, so this will be a big help to understand where you’re showing and what you’re showing for and how Google understands your local listing.”

What is not clear, Blumenthal said, is whether this will only be applicable to local listings and not organic listings. He also said the insights could help marketers optimize for the types of words in advertising campaigns.

“It will help businesses understand how Google understands their business,” Blumenthal said. “The things that influence showings like reviews, website content, media articles, categories, business names and other things that influence Google’s sense of how it understands the business.”

Last month, Google rolled out subjective attributes in Google My Business. This feature tells business owners what customers think about other businesses. They are defined as characteristics or experiences that consumers assign to the business — restaurants and cafes — such as whether they are perceived as romantic or cozy.