Application of Google My Business to Increase the Number of Customers

The aim of this research is to find out the level of use of Google My Business in increasing the number of customers at the RJK Motor Karawang car repair shop. Based on research results, it shows that the level of use of Google My Business in increasing the number of sales customers before the Covid 19 pandemic was said to be very good. Promotion is also an element that needs to be considered. The success of a promotional activity carried out by a company is greatly influenced by promotional mix variables. Selection of appropriate, efficient and effective promotional mix variables is the main key to a company's promotional activities. The promotional mix carried out at the RJK Motor Karawang car repair shop is personal selling. Meanwhile, personal selling involves seeking orders from government and private agencies. So there is a positive relationship between promotional activities carried out and the value of sales of services obtained. The higher the value used, the higher the sales value obtained. Because there is a strong relationship between promotional costs and sales value, the RJK Motor Karawang car repair shop should create attractive promotional activities and increase its promotional activities. The research results show that the use of Google My Business in increasing the number of consumers has a high willingness to create increased promotions also makes the company better.


INTRODUCTION
Marketing communications is one of the four main elements of company promotion (Amin & Priansah, 2019).Markets and advertising must know how to use advertising, sales promotions, publicity and personal selling to communicate a product and its value to intended or target consumers.The communication process itself consists of nine elements, namely sending a message, receiving a message, encoding, decoding, message, media, response, feedback and interference.In this era of globalization, every business actor is required to be able to communicate well with customers, so that business actors are required to be able to compete with similar businesses in attracting customers' interest in making purchases (Crane et al., 2019).Companies use promotions to trigger transactions, so that consumers want to buy a particular brand and encourage sales personnel to aggressively sell it (Rindfleisch, 2020).Moreover, promotions can stimulate demand for a product.With this promotion, it is hoped that consumers will want to buy the product and encourage consumers who have purchased it to buy the product more often, so that there will be repeat purchases and sales volume of a company's products.Promotions have also been carried out by the RJK Motor Karawang car repair shop.This business is an individual business that focuses on fourwheeled vehicle repair activities.
At the beginning of 2020, precisely in March, Indonesia was hit by the COVID-19 virus outbreak; this had a huge impact on the economy of the four-wheeled vehicle repair industry sector.The implementation of Large-Scale Social Restrictions (PSBB) has resulted in a decrease in customers at the RJK Motor Karawang car repair shop.Several months after the COVID-19 pandemic, the owner of the RJK Motor Karawang car repair shop tried to take the initiative to use technology on the Google platform, Google My Business.Google My Business (Google My Business) is a tool provided by Google to make it easier for potential customers to find out information about a business, such as business name, company address, company telephone number, email address, operating hours, company website, office photos, and client reviews.With Google My Business, data about the business can appear on the search page so that people can find the business easily.This is very suitable for businesses with a local target market reach.Research on the ability of Google My Business to increase business has been carried out by previous researchers as explained below.Research by Awangga et al. (2020) provides results that using Google My Business can enrich mapping in Wangunharja village.The application of Google My Business for SME businesses in Wangunharja village is to enrich the MSME business location mapping model, so that SME businesses started or built by Wangunharja village residents can be found and easily accessed by optimizing the Google Maps feature.
Another research that discusses the use of Google My Business which can increase the ranking of local businesses in MSMEs in Gresik, East Java.Research conducted by Yuliani & Novita (2022), on CV Patriot Baja, showed that the existence of the Google My Business site could increase visits to the company profile and the direct location of CV Patriot Baja Mas.This can be an advantage for the company to increase sales of spandex products at CV Patriot Baja Mas using strategies to reach its target market.Research conducted by Manu and Fallo (2019), which discusses the implementation of Google My Business (GMB) in tourism promotion in the city of Kupang and its surroundings.Google My Business provides a feature for visitors/tourists to share photos and information through reviews.With this, tourist attraction managers can manage tourist objects in a more focused manner and can improve services, related to the facilities and comfort of the tourist attraction.Based on previous phenomena and

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research, this research was carried out with the aim of knowing, analyzing and explaining the use of Google My Business and its impact on the number of customers using RJK Motor Karawang car repair services.

LITERATURE REVIEW
Price The marketing mix can be interpreted as internal elements that are very important for forming a marketing program (Yuliantine et al., 2018).Furthermore, the key for companies to gain profits is by deciding on the right marketing strategy to increase consumer purchasing decisions.According to Kotler et al. (2001) the marketing mix is a series of marketing tools (marketing mix) used by a company to achieve company goals in the target market.According to Kotler and Fox (1995), service marketing offers services with a marketing mix consisting of 7 marketing tools, known as 7p, namely product, price, place, promotion, process, physical evidence, and people.
It is concluded that the marketing mix is a series of marketing tools that are interrelated in an effort to form an appropriate marketing program so that the company can achieve marketing goals effectively and at the same time satisfy consumer needs and desires (Thabit & Raewf, 2018).According to Google Business is an easy-to-use tool for businesses and organizations to manage their internet presence through Google.This is to help customers find specific businesses.The business person concerned can verify the business and edit business information.Google My Business is a platform from Google that displays businesses on Google search and Maps (McQuire, 2019).The main benefit of Google My Business, business people can find out their business performance online (Varadarajan, 2020).For example, for knowing the number of clicks and phone calls, as well as how many times the listing was viewed.

METHOD
This type of research is mixed methods research.According to Creswell (2013), mixed methods research is mixed research and this research approach combines qualitative research and quantitative research.The research method used is the action research method (action research), namely providing action in the form of implementing Google Business at the RJK Motor Karawang car repair shop when this shop experiences problems with decreasing number of customers, then the results are measured.This action is carried out repeatedly until the expected results are achieved.The research was carried out from December 2022 to June 2023 at the RJK Motor Karawang Car Workshop.The subjects of this research are the owners, employees and customers of the RJK Motor Karawang Car Workshop, users of Google My Business.The research procedure is in Figure 1.(Forinash, 2012).This research uses triangulation of sources (business owners, customers and employees).The researcher acts as a participant who is directly involved (participant observation), namely as a business owner.Moreover, triangulation methods (observation, interviews and documentation) were also used.

RESULT
The number of customers at the RJK Motor Karawang workshop has experienced ups and downs, especially seen in the transition before the COVID-19 pandemic, during the COVID-19 pandemic, and after the COVID-19 pandemic.Customer visits before the COVID-19 pandemic was quite stable with a monthly visit range of 20 to 30 units.Meanwhile, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the RJK Motor Karawang car repair shop experienced a very drastic decline in the number of customers; this was due to the outbreak.Since the corona virus spread in Indonesia, many business sectors have been forced to "die" due to the loss of customers and the Large-Scale Social Restrictions (PSBB) policy (Prasetyandari, 2021).Therefore, many business owners have to rack their brains to look for business opportunities to run their business in the midst of a pandemic (Hidayat et al., 2021).From December 2022 to June 2023, the RJK Motor Karawang car repair shop will try to take the initiative to use digital services by using Google My Business to make it easier for consumers to find the nearest repair shop location.Based on Google business data for the RJK Motor Karawang Workshop in February 2023, it shows that 92 visitors interacted, 531 visitors viewed the business profile and 120 visitors searched for the RJK Motor Karawang Google business.Based on data in March 2023, it shows that 129 visitors interacted, 674 visitors viewed the business profile and 113 visitors searched RJK Motor Karawang's Google business, this can be seen in Figure 3. Based on Google business data for RJK Motor Karawang Workshop in April 2023, it shows that 151 visitors interacted, 911 visitors viewed the business profile and 232 visitors searched for RJK Motor Karawang Google business.Based on data in May 2023, it shows that 112 visitors interacted, 691 visitors viewed the business profile and 64 visitors searched Google for the RJK Motor Karawang business.Then, based on data in June 2023, it shows that 127 visitors interacted, 607 visitors viewed the business profile and 95 visitors searched Google for business RJK Motor Karawang, this can be seen in Figure 4.

DISCUSSION
The first characteristic that must be possessed is strategic.This means that the plan created must be easy to understand and also able to help businesses get targeted guidance that is comprehensively organized in marketing efforts.According to Morgan et al. ( 2019), the marketing strategy created must be able to achieve its goals.To help determine the right final goal, use the SMART framework to determine the targets to be achieved.Determine measurable targets, both measured in terms of time and results, as well as the impact that will be caused.Set realistic and achievable goals based on existing resources, such as funds, manpower, and time.Determine the final goal that has an impact on the business, with a goal that only increases awareness without increasing sales, then replace it with another goal.Determining when goals will be achieved by deadlines, this is very useful when ensuring all plans are on the right track.Time will make all members motivated and able to work optimally.
Marketing strategies must be creative, don't just provide information that is only heard or seen but not paid attention to (Altstiel et al., 2019).Find unique ideas that will differentiate from the others, so that it can leave an impression in the minds of potential consumers.Don't just be "different", make sure there are interesting things to offer in a marketing strategy (Crick & Crick, 2020).Measuring the performance of marketing strategies that have been implemented can provide insight and an overview of their performance.This serves to produce better strategies in the future.Nowadays, it has become easier with the many social media platforms and data to easily track the success of marketing strategies, reach, and feedback on marketing efforts.Strategies that are realistic and whose success can be measured will help produce the desired results.Through data and research, a marketing strategy must have innovation to be different.Showing things that have never been seen before is an effective way to attract the attention of many people (Redjeki & Affandi, 2021).Try to create a marketing strategy that is not afraid to take risks or try new things.
According to Yong et al. (2020), an effective strategy needs to be credible, which means the company's goals can be achieved sustainably within the specified time and amount.Don't let the strategy that has been prepared can only be used for a short time and is unable to achieve the specified goals.Marketing strategy is the best way for marketers or business owners to achieve goals, to find engagement, build an image, and find potential customers (Varadarajan, 2020).Don't take it as an afterthought and try to make marketing the first thing to think about.According to Lang & Liu (2019), to become a reliable businessman, market the products and services well to obtain income which will become capital for business development.From these characteristics, it is evident that the RJK Motor Karawang car repair shop has carried out effective promotional characteristics.It can be seen that the owner of RJK Motor Karawang has implemented a new strategy after the pandemic by promoting his workshop on Goggle My Business.Through Google Business, a potential customer can find out some information, such as the name of the business, business address, email, operating hours, telephone number, website, photos of the office/place of business, and reviews from customers.
The first benefit that can be obtained is that the business will be easily found by potential customers.That way, potential customers will find it easier to find a business through the various information on Google My Business, including the address.It should be noted that there are at least more than one billion people in the world who already use Google Maps (Baryshnikov & Ghrist, 2023).Google Maps has been named

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the most popular digital mapping application even today.Other benefits of Google My Business can also help to improve.When people search for a business on Google, it is very likely that it will appear on the first page of a Google search.Apart from getting direct promotions from Google Maps, Google My Business also gets direct reviews from customers who have made transactions or purchased products offered by the business itself.Through reviews obtained from customers.It can really increase the credibility of the business itself.The more reviews that are collected, the more customer trust in the business will increase.This benefit of Google My Business makes customers no longer hesitate to buy products or use the services offered.Therefore, the more and better the reviews, the greater the opportunity to gain greater profits from the business.
Communication plays an important role in determining the success of a marketing strategy (Blakeman, 2023).
The next benefit of Google My Business is to increase visitors.The Google Maps feature of Google My Business can of course display business locations within a certain radius with predetermined keywords.This will of course also make it easier for visitors to find the location of a business that is currently running.That way, Google My Business can increase the number of shop visitors as well as build an ongoing business brand (Saragih, 2020).Equipped with a free website creation service with easy procedures, it will certainly be very useful for business people, especially if the business owner has a business website.The existence of Google My Business can help business people manage working hours online.With existing features, business people can arrange holiday times or when the shop is closed so that it will certainly make things easier for customers.Business people can also help customers find detailed information about business premises.In this increasingly sophisticated era, many customers do online research first before coming to a place of business (Karn et al., 2023).By using Google My Business, customers will get detailed information about products.If the information provided is detailed, of course customers will not hesitate to come.Before coming to a business location, customers can first see information about the business, for example the name of the place, products sold, prices, complete address, opening hours and other information.With all this information, it is easier for customers to recognize the business before finally deciding to come.
Google My Business is a marketing tool that can be used for free.Not only that, it doesn't take a long time to create and verify it.Plus, the features in it really help make the business more popular and more people will know it.Google My Business also makes it easier for novice business people to promote their products online, as well as helping potential customers to quickly find and connect with ongoing businesses.These are some of the benefits of Google My Business, which really helps business people who don't have an offline shop to continue promoting their products online and of course helps to increase sales of the business.In December 2022, it can be seen that the number of customer interactions at the RJK Motor Karawang car repair shop has increased quite high because in December there are national holidays, namely Christmas and New Year.Most customers repair their vehicles first before going on holiday.Meanwhile, in January there was a decline due to the absence of national holidays and the addition of new school children entering the even semester.

CONCLUSION
Google Bisnisku provides a valuable platform for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to engage in digital promotion.As of the current moment, Google Bisnisku remains free of charge, thus utilizing it can significantly reduce overall business expenses.Its features, including testimonials and integration with Google Maps, facilitate potential customers in finding the business location and providing feedback.Leveraging Google Bisnisku to its fullest potential can greatly enhance business promotion, as everything can be managed directly from the customer's smartphone.This platform offers SMEs a cost-effective and efficient way to establish an online presence and reach a wider audience.By utilizing Google Bisnisku, businesses can increase their visibility, attract more customers, and build trust through positive testimonials.Furthermore, the seamless integration with Google Maps enables customers to easily locate the business, enhancing convenience and accessibility.Google Bisnisku serves as a powerful tool for SMEs to thrive in the digital age, empowering them to compete effectively in the online marketplace and expand their reach beyond traditional boundaries.