Your Google Business Profile is the listing people see on the map. We fix what's wrong, fill in what's missing and keep it honest.
Search for a roofer, a dentist or an HVAC company on your phone and Google puts a map near the top with a short list of businesses under it. Each of those entries is a Google Business Profile. So is the box on the right side of the results when you search a business by name, and so is the card that opens when you tap a pin in the Maps app.
It's one listing showing up in a lot of places. The name, the phone number, the hours, the photos, the reviews and the little “Call” button are all part of it. For many local searches, it's the first thing a customer sees and sometimes the only thing, because the call happens before the website ever loads.
If a business isn't on the map at all, a new website won't fix that. If it's on the map with the wrong phone number, a new website will just send people somewhere they can't reach you. The listing is quicker to fix than a site, quicker to change, and closer to the moment a customer decides.
That's an opinion, not a rule. Some businesses have a perfectly good listing and a site nobody can use on a phone, and we'd tell them to leave the listing alone. But when we say “look at the listing first,” this is why.
Most of this is plain work. It just has to be right and has to match what's true about your business today.
One main category, picked on purpose. “Roofing contractor” says something. “Contractor” leaves Google guessing. The main category is among the strongest signals on the listing, and a wrong one can hold a business back more than anything on its website.
Add the ones that describe things you really do. Leave off the ones that describe what you wish you did. A plumber who adds “electrician” because the phone line might ring doesn't help anyone.
The list of what you offer, in the words customers use. “AC repair” beats “climate system servicing.” If a customer would say it out loud, put it in.
A short, plain paragraph on what you do and where. Skip the slogans and don't stuff it with town names. Write it the way you'd explain the business to a neighbor.
The business name should be the one you actually use, the same as on your sign, truck and invoices. Google's guidelines don't allow stuffing keywords or a town into the name, and listings that try it can get suspended. The phone number should ring somewhere a person answers. The website link should open a page that works on a phone.
Real hours, including the holidays when you're closed or open late. A listing that says closed when you're open loses the call, and one that says open when you're not makes a customer angry before you've even spoken.
Your own work, your own truck, your own storefront. A photo of a real job beats anything pulled from a library, and customers can tell.
Short updates: a seasonal reminder, a job you finished, a change in hours. They show the listing is alive. They're a small thing and shouldn't take over your week.
If customers come to you, the address shows. If you go to customers, you can hide the address and list the areas you serve. Getting this wrong is a common reason a listing gets flagged or a business shows up in the wrong place.
After the fixes, the job is mostly keeping the listing true. Hours change. A phone number moves. A new service gets added. A listing set up once and never looked at again slowly drifts away from the business.
You should. Your Google Business Profile belongs to your business, and you should be listed as an owner on it. Anyone who works on it for you, including us, should be added as a manager or given access you control, not the other way around.
You can check right now. Open your profile while signed in and look at the people with access. If a name there is someone you don't recognize, or a company you stopped working with, that's worth fixing today. A listing controlled by someone else can be edited without you knowing.
Ask this question of any company that offers to work on your listing. Who owns it when you start, and who owns it when you stop?
Google sometimes asks a business to prove it is real before it lets the listing show. Depending on the business, that can mean a video, a phone call, a text, an email or a postcard to an address. The options and the menu names change over time, so we don't promise a particular route. If you're asked for one and it isn't working, tell us what Google says on the screen and we'll go through it with you.
A tidy listing won't make up for a business nobody has heard of. It can't move your shop closer to the searcher, because distance counts and it's the one thing nobody can edit. It won't hide a bad month in the reviews. And it can't answer the phone.
No one can promise you a spot in the top three. Anyone who does is guessing or selling.
If something's off and you'd rather hand it over, you know the number. The same checks come up in the Google Business Profile section of our services page.
A good listing works best with a website that backs it up. See local website design for Louisville-area businesses for what that site should do. Contractors who mostly want the phone to ring can read about lead generation for contractors in the Louisville area, and there's a page for HVAC contractor SEO in Louisville too. The full list is on the local SEO services page, and about us says who runs the company.
It's the listing Google shows for a business on the map and in search results. It carries your name, phone number, website link, hours, photos, reviews and the services you offer.
Fixing a wrong phone number or category can show up within days or weeks. Building up photos, services and real reviews takes longer. Anyone who gives you an exact date is guessing.
We don't promise a position. Nobody controls Google's results, and they change with where the searcher is standing and what they typed. We work on the parts that are in your hands.
Often, yes. A business that drives to its customers can hide its shop or home address and list the areas it covers instead. How that looks depends on how you work, so describe it to us.
That's common after a move or a name change. Duplicates can split your reviews and confuse customers. We'd look at both, work out which one is the real one, and go through Google's process to deal with the other.
Tell us who set it up and what you know. Google has a process for requesting ownership of a listing, and it takes patience. It's worth sorting out before anything else, because a listing you can't edit can't be fixed.
Not on our say-so. Google makes that call, and a review only comes down if it breaks Google's rules. You can still reply calmly, and ask more of your real customers to weigh in.
No. We don't buy reviews and we don't pick who gets asked for one. Google doesn't allow either.
Give us your business name and your town. We'll pull up your listing the way a customer would and say what we see. You can also contact us by email.