Who should own your Google Places listing: You or your client?

This isn't a matter of ownership, it's a matter of trust. Technically, Google owns the listing. That said, if you think you're going to have any longevity in this business by hijacking your client's Google listing, you are mistaken.

I sign up new clients every week, and I do it by establishing trust. Ironically enough, one of the ways that I gain their trust is by explaining to them that there are plenty of marketers out there doing exactly what you are proposing. I then show them how I differ from the competition, all the while explaining that they have the ultimate control over their website and listings.

It's like shooting fish in a barrel. In fact, I think I'm going to print out your question and show it to a prospect I'm meeting with tomorrow.

Will

They should be given control of it at the time they cancel with you.

Honestly sometimes reading this forum I wonder how people here get business. Business relationships are built on trust. if you have a good service and the price is right they will pay.

So what exactly would you do if you had control over the listing and they wanted to stop paying? Take it down? lol

You do realize that they have the right to that listing, right? WAY more right than you have to it, since it's THEIR company and THEIR brand. Even if you were to hijack it from them, they'd have a 100% case with Google to have Google get it back for them.

If they pay you to get it to the first page and then you get it there and they want to stop paying you it doesn't give you the right to take it down or do anything harmful to it. They paid you for the work you did. Depending on the competition, a listing might need on-going work to keep the high ranking, so if they start slipping they'll probably come back to you anyway. Or maybe they'll want another service like social media or web design or something.

Don't hijack your client's listing if they don't want to keep paying you once you get them to a high ranking. They paid you to get them there and you got them there.

Protect yourself by pricing right. If you are doing more in the begining charge more for the first month or so and then go into a lower monthly basic maintence ppackage. Let them know if google has a major revision or such you may need to have a special project again like in the begining to fix it.

You're building trust and pricing in a way they won't leave.

If I am paying you $100 a month I will likely not cancel if I am seeing value. If I am paying $500 a month and don't think you are doing anything I will cancel.

But if you show me that it will take time and effort in the begining I might pay $1500 for the first 3 months and startup and than be willing to pay $100 a month.

You want to get recurring income which means you want it to be little work on your part and be unlikely to cancel. If it doesn't require much work price it so they never have a reason to cancel.

Easy solution: Charge enough up front that you are satisfied if that ends up being the ONLY money you were to receive for your work...all additional payments are then a bonus.

Charge $500 Setup + $100/mo (for example), and then if by month 3 they stop paying you...then you stop working on their marketing.

Your margins should be more than enough that the $800 (just an example, pricing differs by the niche) you would have collected would easily leave you a healthy profit.

Cheers,

~Dexx

I am going to put this in another perspective... A business perspective... Any good business person, if they are serious, should have an exit strategy. Whether or not you implement it is another story, but you should always have an actionable plan of exiting (i.e. selling) your business.

Now, consulting businesses are a tricky thing to exit. Why? Because in most cases - YOU ARE THE BUSINESS! So, here is what I recommend: own and control EVERYTHING you can! I am not saying or suggesting you take on a client and hijack their places listing - that is crap business practice. What I am saying is that you can optimize a site, and perhaps a places listing for a niche, if you so choose - and lease it out. If it is valuable, they will lease it. Simple. And I am not really saying this is right for places, but since the subject came up on who owns what, I thought I'd chime in...

The reason behind this... You have an asset that has a cashflow value. Remember that whole exit plan? Now, before I give up all of my tricks - I encourage you to think about ways you can have more assets that produce cashflow for your biz that can replace your service income. Doing so will give you a very valuable business in which you can easily place a favorable multiple.

Some folks may disagree with me, but we will see who has the big smile on his face and gets the big multiple on their biz when (and if) it comes time to exit :-)

Keep Rockin!
--Ben

As everyone else said, they are the business, not you. They are paying you to optimize their listing, if at some point they don't want you to perform that service anymore you haven't lost anything and the listing isn't some bargaining chip for you to try to get more fees out of.

I have a current client where the last guy registered their domain name in his name. When he didn't get the giant contract that he hoped he held the name for 2 years, legal threats, etc. Now they are totally gunshy and only opened up when I went in for a meeting and we sat and talked for awhile. Even then one of their employees got worried when I said I needed the login for the website so I could update their pages.

Don't be that guy.

The Google Places & the Website are 2 different things to me.

Remember...Business Owners talk to other business owners. A good name is worth more than all the money in the world to me.

That being said, I think they own the Google Place page.

But depending on who is hosting the website and how much it cost you to design the website that will determine who "owns" the website. Unless the website was built under a trademarked name you can keep the website and sell the leads to another business in the niche.

But if you're going to do that make sure you're upfront about it. Make sure the business owner knows that if they discontinue service with you, you will keep the website and sell it to one of their competitors. Or something like that.