Key takeaways
- Google ranks local results on relevance, distance and prominence, and you can influence the first and last.
- Your primary category and an accurate, unstuffed business name are among the most important choices.
- Fill in services, products, attributes and the description, and add your own photos regularly.
- Ask every customer for a review, never incentivise or gate them, and respond to all reviews professionally.
To optimise your Google Business Profile, pick the most accurate primary category and keep your name, address, hours and phone number correct everywhere they appear. Fill in every section that applies to you (services, products, attributes and description), add your own photos regularly, and ask for and reply to reviews. Google ranks local results on relevance, distance and prominence, so a full, accurate profile that you keep up to date gives you the best chance of showing in the map results, though nobody can promise you a particular position.
What Google Business Profile is and why it matters
Google Business Profile (formerly Google My Business) is the free listing that controls how your business appears in Google Maps and in the local results shown on Google Search. When someone searches “electrician near me”, “cafe in Penarth” or your business name, the profile is often the first thing they see. Your hours, reviews, photos, phone number and directions are all there before they reach your website.
For many local businesses the profile brings in more enquiries than the website, because people call, ask for directions or turn up straight from it. Google’s AI features and other services may also draw on it when describing local businesses, so a wrong phone number or old opening hours can travel further than you might expect.
How Google ranks local results
Google says local results are mainly based on three things.
- Relevance. How well your profile matches what someone is searching for. Categories, services, description and reviews all help Google judge this.
- Distance. How far your business is from the searcher, or from the place named in their search. You cannot change this, which is why ranking across a whole city is harder than ranking near your premises.
- Prominence. How well known your business is, judged from information across the web such as reviews, links, articles and directory listings.
The work below improves relevance and prominence. It sits alongside your website, citations and reviews as part of wider local SEO.
Claiming and verifying your profile
If you have not done so already, search for your business on Google Maps to see whether a profile exists. A customer or Google itself may have created one. Claim it rather than starting a duplicate.
- Sign in with a business-owned Google account. Avoid using a personal account belonging to one employee or an agency’s account. You can add managers later without giving away ownership.
- Enter your exact business name. Use your real-world name as it appears on signage, stationery and your website.
- Choose your primary category (covered in the next section).
- Decide whether customers visit you. If they come to your premises, add your address. If you travel to customers and do not serve them at your address, set it up as a service-area business and hide the address.
- Add contact details and your website. Use a local number your business answers and the most relevant page of your website.
- Complete verification. Google offers different methods depending on the business, and video verification is now common. Have evidence ready, such as signage, equipment, branded vehicles and proof you can access the premises.
Only businesses that make in-person contact with customers are eligible. Virtual offices and addresses you do not staff during stated hours are not acceptable locations, and using one risks suspension.
Choosing your categories
Your primary category is one of the choices that most affects where you appear. It tells Google what kind of business you are.
- Be specific. A dental practice that mainly does cosmetic work may be better described by “Cosmetic dentist” than by a broader category, as long as that is where most of its work comes from. Browse the options by typing different terms, because Google’s category list is long and the exact wording matters.
- Pick the category for your main line of work, the thing you most want to be found for, rather than a sideline.
- Add secondary categories sparingly. Only include ones that cover a real, sizeable part of the business. Irrelevant categories muddy the picture and can attract edits or a closer look from Google.
- Check competitors. Look at which primary categories the businesses ranking well for your main searches use. Our guide to running a competitor analysis explains a structured way to do this.
Categories also affect which features you can use. Depending on category, you may see options for menus, bookings, product listings or specific attributes.
Getting your core details right
Customers and Google both lose confidence quickly when the basics are wrong, so start here.
Business name
Do not add keywords or locations to your name unless they are actually part of your legal or trading name. “Smith Plumbing” should not become “Smith Plumbing | Best Emergency Plumber Cardiff”. Keyword stuffing breaches Google’s guidelines and can lead to suspension or competitor edits.
Address and service areas
Your address should match your website and directory listings exactly, including formatting where possible. Service-area businesses should list the towns and regions they really cover, not distant places added in the hope of ranking there.
Hours
Keep regular hours accurate, set special hours for bank holidays and closures in advance, and use “more hours” for things like delivery, collection or appointment-only times where relevant. Wrong hours cause frustrated customers and negative reviews faster than almost anything else.
Website link
Link to the page that best matches the profile. A single-location business usually links to the home page, while a branch of a multi-location business should link to its own location page. Add UTM parameters to the link so visits from your profile appear clearly in Google Analytics rather than being merged with organic search.
Filling in every relevant section
A complete profile gives Google more to match against searches, and gives customers more reasons to pick you. Work through the sections below.
| Section | What to add | Tip |
|---|---|---|
| Description | Up to 750 characters on what you do, who for, where, and what makes you different | Put the most important information first, and leave out links and sales gimmicks |
| Services | Each service you offer, with a short description and price if suitable | Use the words customers use (“boiler repair” rather than “heating system remediation”) |
| Products | Key products or packages with images, descriptions and prices | Useful even for service businesses to showcase fixed-price packages |
| Attributes | Accessibility, payment options, amenities and any identity attributes you choose to show | Only select attributes that are accurate |
| Opening date | When the business started | Takes seconds and shows how long you have been trading |
| Booking or appointment links | Link to your booking page or a supported booking provider | Lets people who are ready to book do it there and then |
| Social profiles | Links to your official social accounts where available | Ties your profile to the accounts customers may already follow |
Writing a description that works
A good description answers “what do you do, for whom and where?”. As an illustration, a fictional heating firm might write: “Family-run heating engineers covering Cardiff and the Vale of Glamorgan. We install, service and repair gas boilers and heat pumps for homes and small businesses, and we are Gas Safe registered. We offer fixed quotes, tidy work and a written guarantee on every installation.” It names the services, the area, the type of customer and a checkable credential, with no hype, shouting capitals or keyword lists. Write yours the same way, and only make claims that are true and that customers can verify.
If you trade in Wales and work bilingually, make sure your website reflects that too; our article on bilingual websites for Welsh businesses covers how to handle both languages well.
Photos and videos of the real business
Photos help customers decide and show the business is open and trading. Customers can add photos too, so uploading good ones of your own gives you more say over first impressions.
- Logo and cover photo. Sharp, correctly sized and in your brand colours.
- Exterior. The premises from the street, in daylight and after dark, so people recognise it when they arrive.
- Interior. The space customers will walk into.
- Team. Your staff at work, which helps people feel they know who they are dealing with.
- Work and products. Finished jobs, before-and-after shots, dishes or stock.
- Short videos. A walk-through of the premises or a job in progress.
Use your own photographs rather than stock images, and add new ones regularly. Skip heavy filters, text overlays and anything misleading. A few new photos every month do more than one big upload followed by years of silence.
Earning and managing reviews
Reviews affect both prominence and whether people choose you. How many you have, how recent they are and what they say all tell customers and Google something about your business.
Getting more reviews
- Ask every customer when they are happiest, such as when a job is finished or after they have thanked you.
- Make it easy by sending the review link from your profile by text or email, or printing it as a QR code on receipts.
- Build the request into your process so it happens every time rather than whenever someone remembers.
What not to do
- Do not offer discounts, gifts or prize draws in exchange for reviews.
- Do not “gate” reviews by only asking customers you expect to be positive.
- Never buy reviews, write them yourself or ask staff and family to post them. Fake reviews breach Google’s policies and UK consumer protection law, and Google may remove them, restrict your profile or display a warning.
Responding to reviews
Reply to reviews, good and bad. Thank people for something specific rather than pasting the same line each time. With a negative review, stay calm, acknowledge the problem, keep private details out of it and offer to sort it out by phone or email. Future customers read your replies as closely as the reviews. If a review breaks Google’s policies, for example it is spam or from someone who was never a customer, you can report it for removal, but Google will not remove a review just because it is negative.
Posts and regular updates
Business Profile lets you publish updates, offers and events as posts. They appear on your profile and can carry recent news, seasonal services or promotions, which shows the business is active and gives searchers a reason to get in touch.
- Post on a schedule you can keep up, such as every week or two.
- Use a clear photo, a short message and a button that matches what you want people to do.
- Use event and offer posts for anything time-limited, with the correct dates.
- Post things people can use, such as a new service, a seasonal tip, a recent project or a change to opening hours.
Also log in regularly to check for suggested edits. Google and members of the public can suggest changes to your details, and these are sometimes applied automatically. Reviewing your profile monthly catches incorrect changes before they cause problems.
Measuring what the profile brings in
The performance view in Business Profile shows how people found and interacted with you, including views, searches that triggered your profile, calls, website clicks, direction requests and, where relevant, bookings or messages.
- Track calls, website clicks and direction requests month by month, and compare with the same period last year to account for seasonality.
- Look at the search terms that triggered your profile to spot services worth adding or emphasising.
- Use UTM-tagged website links so profile visits and conversions are visible in Google Analytics.
- Ask new customers how they found you and write it down. It catches things no tool will, such as someone who saw your van and then looked you up on Maps.
Common mistakes and how to avoid them
- Duplicate profiles for the same location split reviews and confuse Google. Merge or remove duplicates.
- Inconsistent details between your profile, website and directories make Google less sure which version is right.
- Keyword-stuffed names risk suspension and invite edits from competitors.
- Ineligible addresses, such as virtual offices, are a common cause of suspension.
- Ignoring reviews, especially negative ones, looks careless to potential customers.
- Set and forget. A profile untouched for years drifts out of date and loses ground to active competitors.
If you operate several branches, each needs its own verified profile, linked to its own location page with consistent details. Local market context matters too; our guides to ranking higher locally in Cardiff and marketing your business in Newport show how profiles fit into a wider local plan.
A monthly routine for your profile
Setting up the profile is the easy part, and keeping it current is where most businesses slip. Once a month, check for suggested edits, reply to any new reviews, add a few photos, publish a post or two and compare calls and direction requests with the month before. Before each bank holiday, set special hours. A short monthly check keeps most profiles in good shape.
We audit profiles, clean up duplicates and suspensions, and tie the listing into a wider local growth plan covering your website, citations and reviews. We work within Google’s guidelines and avoid the shortcuts that get listings suspended.
How Eigme can help
Turn this into results.
We can help you put this into practice with a clear plan, hands-on delivery and reporting in plain English.
Book a free strategy call →Frequently asked questions
Is Google Business Profile free?
Yes. Creating, verifying and managing a Google Business Profile is free. You can update your details, add photos, publish posts and respond to reviews without paying. Google offers separate paid advertising, such as local ads and Local Services Ads in some categories, but these are optional and do not affect how your free profile ranks in the organic local results.
Can I add keywords to my business name on Google?
Only if they are part of your real-world business name, as shown on your signage, website and stationery. Adding extra keywords or locations to the name breaches Google’s guidelines. It can lead to suspension, and competitors can suggest edits to correct it. Use your categories, services and description to show what you do instead.
Should I show my address if I work from home?
If customers do not visit your home address, set up your profile as a service-area business and hide the address. You can then list the towns or regions you serve. If customers do visit you during stated hours, you can show the address. Virtual offices and unstaffed addresses are not eligible and risk suspension.
How often should I update my Google Business Profile?
Check your profile at least monthly for suggested edits, new reviews and accuracy of hours and details. Update special hours before bank holidays and closures. Add new photos and publish posts on a schedule you can keep up, such as every week or two. Respond to reviews promptly, ideally within a few days.
Why has my Google Business Profile been suspended?
Common causes include an ineligible address such as a virtual office, keywords added to the business name, duplicate profiles, misleading categories, or significant changes that triggered re-verification. Review Google’s guidelines, correct any issues, and submit a reinstatement request with supporting evidence such as signage, utility bills or business registration documents.
