Google Business Profile Guide for Small Businesses

When someone near you searches "plumber near me" or "bakery open now," the first thing they usually see isn't your website. It's your Google Business Profile: the box with your name, stars, hours, photos and a call button. It's free, and for a lot of local businesses it brings in more calls than anything else they run. This Google Business Profile guide walks through setup, the sections that matter most, and the local SEO (search engine optimization, or showing up higher in search) basics that help you get found.

1. Claim or create your profile

There's a good chance Google already has a listing for your business, built from public information. Start by checking.

• If a listing exists and nobody has claimed it: search for your business in Google Maps, select it, then choose "Claim this business" and "Manage now," according to Google's setup instructions.
• If no listing exists: go to business.google.com/add and follow the steps to add your business.
• If someone else already claimed it (a former employee, an old marketing vendor), Google lets you request ownership from the current owner instead of starting over.

Use a Google account the business controls, not a personal account belonging to one employee. If that person leaves, you don't want your profile walking out the door with them.

2. Get verified

Verification proves to Google that you're allowed to manage the business. Google lists it first in its tips for improving local ranking, because verified businesses are more likely to show up in results.

According to Google's verification help page, the options can include a video recording, phone or text, email, a live video call, or a postcard. Google chooses which ones you're offered, and you can't change them. A few things that trip people up:

• Phone verification won't work through an automated phone menu. Someone has to be able to answer the business line or receive the text.
• Video verification usually means showing your location and proof you run the business: signage, equipment, your work truck, keys to the shop.
• Postcards usually arrive within 14 days and the code expires after 30 days. Don't change your name, address or category while you wait, and don't request a second code, because that cancels the first.
• Review can take up to 5 business days, sometimes longer.

Google also says it will never ask you for your verification code. If someone calls claiming to be from Google and wants it, hang up.

3. Get the basics exactly right

Google's guidelines for representing your business are strict, and breaking them can get a profile suspended. The big ones:

• Business name: use your real name as it appears on your sign, truck and invoices. Don't add keywords, cities or taglines. "Smith Plumbing" is fine. "Smith Plumbing Best Emergency Plumber Dayton" is not.
• Address: use your real location. P.O. boxes and virtual offices aren't allowed.
• Service-area businesses: if you go to customers (roofers, cleaners, pest control, mobile mechanics), Google says to hide your address and set a service area instead. Google says that area generally shouldn't stretch past about two hours of driving from your base.
• Phone and website: use a number your business directly controls, ideally a local one, and link to your own site.

Keep your name, address and phone number identical everywhere else they appear online too: your website, Facebook page, Yelp, industry directories. Mismatches make it harder for Google and customers to trust which version is right.

4. Pick the right categories

Your primary category is one of the most important choices on the whole profile. Google's category help page says it affects your local ranking and may be used to label your business in search.

• Be specific. If there's a category for exactly what you do ("Roofing contractor" instead of "Contractor," "Nail salon" instead of "Beauty salon"), use it.
• Add a few secondary categories for real parts of your business. A hypothetical HVAC company that also does duct cleaning could add that as an additional category.
• Don't pile on categories as keywords. Google advises using only a few.
• Expect possible re-verification if you change categories later.

You can't create your own category, so look at what your strongest local competitors use for ideas.

5. List your services

For service businesses, the Services section tells Google and customers exactly what you do. Google's services help page says the editor suggests common services for your category (for a plumber, things like faucet installation or toilet repair), and you can add custom services when yours aren't listed. Google also notes a service may be highlighted on your profile when a local customer searches for it.

Tips:

• Add every service you actually want to sell, especially the profitable ones.
• Use the words customers use. "Water heater replacement," not "thermal appliance solutions."
• Write a short, plain description for each one. Custom service names can't include prices, phone numbers or gibberish, or Google will reject them.

6. Add real photos, and keep adding them

Photos show customers what they're getting before they call. Google's photo tips recommend at least three each of exterior shots, interior shots, photos of your team and photos "at work," where those apply to your business. The technical requirements are simple: JPG or PNG, between 10 KB and 5 MB, with 720 by 720 pixels recommended.

Google also asks for photos that are in focus, well lit and not heavily filtered or altered. Good choices for most local businesses:

• Your storefront or your trucks, so people recognize you
• Your crew in uniform, on a job
• Before-and-after shots of real work (with the customer's permission)
• Your shop, showroom or dining room on a good day

Add a few new photos every month. A profile with photos from years ago looks like a business that might not be around anymore.

7. Use posts for offers, events and news

Posts are short updates that appear on your profile in Search and Maps. According to Google's posts help page, there are three types:

• Updates: news, tips or a recent job, with an optional button like "Call" or "Learn more"
• Offers: a deal with a title and start and end dates, such as a spring tune-up special
• Events: something with a date and time, like an open house or a workshop

Google says posts older than six months are archived unless you set a date range, so a single post won't carry you. You can schedule posts ahead of time or set them to repeat. Google may reject posts with spammy or auto-generated-sounding text, or with phone numbers it can't tie to your business. One or two posts a month is a reasonable, sustainable starting point for a busy owner.

8. Ask for reviews, and answer every one

Reviews affect both whether you show up and whether people pick you. Google lists the number of reviews and ratings among the things that make a business more "prominent" in local results. And in BrightLocal's 2026 Local Consumer Review Survey, 89% of consumers said they expect business owners to respond to reviews, and half said generic, templated replies put them off.

How to do it the right way:

• Ask everyone. Google lets you share a review link or QR code from your profile, per its review help page. Put it on invoices, receipts, follow-up texts and a card your techs hand out.
• Don't offer anything in exchange. Google's content policy bans incentives like discounts or free services for posting a review.
• Don't only ask the happy customers. The same policy prohibits selectively soliciting positive reviews, sometimes called "review gating."
• Reply like a person. Thank people by name and mention the job. For bad reviews, stay calm, own what's yours and offer to fix it offline.
• Flag reviews that break the rules. Google lets you report reviews you believe violate its policies.

For a full playbook, see how to get more customer reviews.

9. Keep hours, including holiday hours, current

Nothing sours a new customer faster than driving to a shop Google said was open. Set your regular hours, then add special hours for holidays and closures. Google's special hours page recommends confirming your hours for official holidays even when they don't change, so customers know the listing is accurate. Special hours cover closures of up to six days in a row. For a week or more, mark the business temporarily closed instead.

10. What happened to Questions and Answers

Older guides tell you to seed your profile's Q&A section with common questions. That advice is out of date. Google shut down the My Business Q&A API on November 3, 2025, saying in its developer change log that it was updating the Q&A feature. Since then, BrightLocal reports that Google has replaced the traditional Q&A section with Ask Maps, an AI tool in Google Maps that answers customer questions using information about the business, including reviews.

What that means for you: the AI can only answer from what's out there. A complete profile, a clear services list, accurate hours and detailed reviews give it good material to work with. Your website matters here too, so make sure it answers the questions customers ask most: service area, pricing approach, warranties, how fast you can come out.

11. Local SEO basics that move the needle

Google says local results are based on three things, per its local ranking page:

• Relevance: how well your profile matches the search. Complete information helps.
• Distance: how close you are to the person searching. If they don't share their location, Google works from what it knows about where they are.
• Prominence: how well-known you are, including links to your website from other sites and your reviews and ratings.

You can't change your distance, and Google states plainly that there's no way to pay for a better local ranking. So work on the other two:

• Fill in every section of your profile that applies to you.
• Keep your name, address and phone consistent across the web.
• Earn links and mentions locally: chamber of commerce, sponsorships, trade associations, local news.
• Make sure your website has a page for each main service and the towns you serve.
• Keep the reviews coming in steadily.

Then check your results. The Performance section of your profile shows the searches people used to find you, profile views, calls, direction requests and website clicks, according to Google's performance help page. Look at it once a month. If calls dip, check whether your hours, photos or reviews have gone stale. Your profile is one channel among several; for how it fits with your website, email and social, see how to build a marketing channel strategy.

Where Crusader helps

A Google Business Profile needs a steady stream of words and pictures: service descriptions, monthly posts, offer copy, photos and honest review replies that sound like you. In Crusader, a real human strategist builds your brand first, and that brand trains your own AI portal. From there you can write on-brand posts and service descriptions, draft review replies in your voice and create images sized for each platform, so keeping your profile fresh stops falling to the bottom of the list.