What is a Google Business Profile?

A Google Business Profile is the free listing Google keeps for a business. It is the box with your name, phone number, hours, reviews and photos that appears on the right of the results, or at the top on a phone, when someone searches for you. It is also what puts you on Google Maps.

It used to be called Google My Business. The name changed, the thing did not.

Why it matters

For anyone searching for a service nearby, the profile is often the first thing they see and the thing they act on. They call from it, get directions from it, and read the reviews on it, sometimes without visiting your website at all.

It is also the main source for the “map pack”, the three businesses shown above the ordinary results for a local search. And AI assistants answering local questions draw on the same data. I cover that in how ChatGPT decides which local business to recommend.

Who can have one

Businesses that deal with customers in person, either at a location or by travelling to them. A shop, a restaurant, a dentist, a plumber who visits homes. Google calls the second kind a service area business. Those hide their street address and list the areas they serve instead.

Businesses that exist only online, with no in-person contact, are generally not eligible.

What goes in it

• Name. Your real, everyday business name, with nothing added to it. Stuffing keywords into the name is against the guidelines and can get a profile suspended.
• Primary category. The single most specific description of what you do. This is one of the stronger signals Google uses to decide which searches you appear for.
• Additional categories. Others that genuinely apply.
• Address or service area. Whichever matches how you work.
• Phone and website. The same ones you use everywhere else.
• Hours. Kept current, including holidays.
• Services. Each thing you offer, described in a sentence.
• Photos. Real ones of your work, your premises, your team.
• Description. A plain paragraph on what you do and where.

How you get one

Search for your business on Google Maps first, in case a listing already exists. If it does, you claim it. If not, you create one. Google then asks you to verify that the business is real, usually by video, phone, email or postcard depending on the case. Verify it yourself, from an account you control, so the profile does not end up owned by a former employee or an agency you stop working with.

Keeping it working

Once it is set up, three habits do most of the work. Answer every review, good or bad, briefly and politely. Add photos now and then. And check that the details still match your website and other listings, because inconsistencies are one of the most common reasons a good business underperforms.

A profile is not a one-off task, but it is not a daily one either. An hour a month is usually enough.

Profile management is part of the local SEO work I do, alongside the website and the other listings.