Checklist: getting your Google Business Profile right
In this guide
This is the list I go through on any Google Business Profile before touching anything else, roughly in the order things tend to go wrong. Give it 20 minutes with your profile open in another tab and work through it point by point.
Categories
Your primary category carries more weight than it looks: it's one of the signals Google uses to decide which searches you show up in. Pick the most specific one that actually fits your business (plumber beats general repair service, if that's really what you do), and only add secondary categories that are true. Bolting on categories that have nothing to do with your business doesn't widen your reach. It usually does the opposite.
Name, address and phone (NAP)
Your name, address and phone number need to say exactly the same thing on your profile, on your site and on any directory you're listed in. One address written two different ways, or an old phone number still floating around somewhere, won't break anything overnight, but it does create noise that doesn't help Google trust the data.
Photos
Upload real photos of the business: the shopfront, the inside, the team at work, the product or the finished job. Skip stock photos; they're obvious. The cover photo and logo are the ones people see most in the search result, so get those right first; the rest can go up at your own pace.
Opening hours, including special hours
Regular hours are easy to forget updating when the season changes, but it’s the special hours that prevent complaints: bank holidays, Christmas, Easter, a one-off closure for renovations. If your profile says open and someone turns up to a locked door, that bad experience doesn’t stay on Google Maps.
Services and products
Fill in the services or products section with what you actually offer, not a generic list copied from someone else’s profile. The more specific each entry is (a rough price if you can give one, how long it takes, what’s included), the better Google understands who to show you to, and the better a potential customer understands whether you’re what they need.
Review replies
Reply to reviews, the good ones and the bad ones. It doesn't need to be long: a quick thanks for a good review, and a calm, non-defensive reply to a bad one, is often the first thing people read when they're checking you out.
Posts
Posts (updates, offers, events) expire and need refreshing. This isn't a shop window you fill once and forget. If you don't have time to post weekly, one solid post a month beats none at all.
Q&A
The Q&A section has changed shape and availability in different countries and at different times, so check first whether it's actually showing up on your profile as you see it right now. If it's there, it's worth getting ahead of it: post the 3 or 4 questions customers ask you most, and answer them yourself before someone else does with a half-right answer.
The duplicate-listing problem
It happens more often than you'd think: a business moves, changes its name, or someone set up a listing years ago without the owner ever knowing, and now two profiles are competing for the same search. Search for your business by name and neighbourhood on Google Maps, and if you spot more than one listing, get them merged or the extra one removed before putting any more work into the real one.
If you'd rather I go through your profile myself instead of working through this list on your own, just say so.