What a Google Business Profile needs before anything else

A lot of advice on Google Business Profile optimization starts with the visible extras: post every week, add more photos, chase reviews. Those help, but only on a profile whose basics are right. If the category is wrong, the profile is a weak match for the searches you want. If the hours are wrong, the customer who finds you finds a locked door. Three things come first, and everything else builds on them.

Choose the right primary category

Google says local results are based mainly on relevance, distance and prominence, and relevance means how well a profile matches what someone searched for [1]. The category is one of the plainest statements of what your business is, so it’s the first thing to get right.

Google’s advice is to choose the category that describes the business most specifically. Its own example is “Nail salon” rather than “Salon” [2]. Its guidelines add a useful test: a category should complete the sentence “This business is a”, not “This business has a” [3]. A physiotherapy clinic is a physiotherapist. It has a car park, and that isn’t a category.

Some practical rules follow from that:

• Choose the primary category for the main thing the business is.
• Add other categories only for real parts of the business, and use as few as possible. Google’s guidelines say so directly, and also say not to choose a category for every product or service [2][3].
• Never choose a category only because it sounds like something people search for. Google’s guidelines don’t allow categories used as keywords [3].

If you aren’t sure which category fits, search for your main service in your area and look at the categories the listings there use. Then choose the most specific one that is true of you.

Make the name, address and hours match everywhere

The next three details are the ones customers act on: the name they look for, the address they drive to and the hours they rely on.

The name. Google’s guidelines say your business name should reflect its real-world name, as used on your storefront, your website and your stationery, and that adding unnecessary information to it isn’t permitted [3]. That rules out taglines, services and locations added to the name, and Google says breaking the rule can lead to the profile being suspended [3]. “Example Physio” is a name. “Example Physio, Best Sports Injury Clinic Oakville” isn’t.

The address. If customers come to you, show the address. If you go to them and don’t serve customers at your premises, Google asks you to remove the address and set a service area instead [4].

The hours. Set your regular hours, then use special hours for holidays and other one-off changes, so the profile is right on the days people are most likely to check [5]. Google also suggests confirming your hours for official holidays even when they don’t change [5].

Then make sure your website says the same. The contact page, the footer and the profile should give one name, one address or service area, one phone number and one set of hours. Our article on keeping your listing, your ads and your website in agreement covers how to check.

Add services in your customers’ own words

For many categories, Google lets you list the services you offer on the profile, choosing from its suggestions or adding your own, with an optional description for each [6]. This is where the profile says what you actually do, beyond the one category.

Write the services the way customers ask for them. A clinic might call the work “musculoskeletal rehabilitation”, while its patients search for “sports physio” and “back pain treatment”. Use their words, and keep each one to a service you really offer.

Then connect each service to the website. Every main service on the profile should have a page on your site that covers it, so a customer who taps through finds the same service described in more detail. If you’re building those pages, our article on one service page for each job explains what each one should answer.

What can wait

Photos, posts and reviews matter. Google’s own tips for local ranking include adding photos and responding to reviews [1], and real photos of your premises and your work help people choose between businesses. But none of them fixes a wrong category, a name the guidelines don’t allow, or hours that send people to a closed door. Get the basics right, then add the rest.

On reviews, one rule matters more than any tip: they have to be genuine. Google’s policies don’t allow businesses to offer anything in return for a review, or to ask only happy customers for one [7]. Ask every customer, make it easy with a link, and reply to what they say.

Common mistakes

• A business name with a service or a town added to it.
• A primary category for something the business offers rather than what it is.
• A long list of categories, added just in case.
• Holiday hours that were never set, so the profile says open on a day you’re closed.
• A profile nobody can log in to, because the login belongs to a former employee or a previous supplier.
• Services on the profile that the website never mentions.

Questions

Can I change my primary category later?

Yes. You can edit it in the profile at any time [2]. Change it when the main thing the business does has changed, not to test which category ranks better.

Should I put keywords in my business name?

No. Google’s guidelines say the name should be your real-world name, and that adding unnecessary information to it isn’t permitted [3].

Do I need to show my address if I go to my customers?

No. If you don’t serve customers at your address, Google asks you to remove it and set the areas you serve instead [4].

How often should I check my hours?

Whenever they change, and before every holiday. Special hours exist for exactly that [5].

If you’d rather someone else kept the profile right, that’s what our Google Business Profile service does. A free audit is the first step.