Guide to Google for Business Profiles

Even if you’re not aware of it, you have interacted with Google for Business Profiles before. Think back to a weekend where you wanted to try a local café but weren’t sure which ones were open or if there was a new café on the block. Using your mobile phone, you opened Google Search (or possibly Bing) and typed in “local café near me open now” or more likely just “café”.

By doing this search from your phone, you have prioritized the physical distance from yourself to the local cafes in this search. Google assumes that you want a café that is near you and with at least a decent reputation, that is why the search result is often display in Google Maps format in the first place, because that allows you to see how close you are and subsequently what other options are available.

The local café’s shown on the Map search result are shown not just because of how close they are to you, but also because of the number of Reviews they have. Particularly, the number of 5-star reviews. The more reviews that a business has on their profile (which is, by the way, the Google for Business Profile), the more likely they will be shown in such proximity search results.

Google Search for “local café near me” showing three local cafes “popping out” on the Map. You can make your business “pop out” for local searches too by collecting Reviews on your Google for Business Profile.

Here is an example of a Google for Business Profile of a Dazzly customer:

Google for Business Profile of Cromwell Heritage Project (CHP) Bike Rentals, located in Cromwell, New Zealand. Note the 313 5-star Reviews that customers have left them.

This is a huge number of 5-star reviews and represents a business that has not only stood the test of time but has also done it with a dedication to customer support and experience. Hence, Google and other search engines are willing to recommend them in mobile searches when the person is also nearby or searching within their region. Also note the photos that have been added for a better visual appeal and demonstration of the service (renting pushbikes).

How to Setup your Google for Business Profile

Click Here To Create a Google for Business Profile

Takes a few minutes and requires no website, just some basic information about your business and some photos to accompany it.

Once online it will display on the right-hand side or center of Google Search Results but may require steps to verify your profile before customers, suppliers and others interacting with your business can leave Reviews.

How to Update Photos and Videos on my Google for Business Profile?

Image showing the ‘Select images and videos’ or ‘Drag images and videos’ into your Google for Business Profile dialogue box.

Once your Google for Business Profile is open and online, browse back to your page, or simply search your own business name in Google and hit the “Add Photos” button shown at the top of your profile. It will open a window (as seen in the previous screenshot) where you can select Photos to upload and display on your profile.

For more information about the types of photos Google recommends uploading, as well as specification for photo files and other queries regarding your company logo image, please see the following Google Business Profile Help web page titled 'Manage photos & videos for your Business Profile'.

How do I update the Contact Details on my Google for Business Profile?

Screenshots showing the ‘Edit your business information’ link on your Google for Business Profile and the following ‘Business Information’ box that pops up enabling you access to edit your Business information for your Google for Business Profile.

Keeping your phone number and contact details up to date on your Google for Business Profile is essential. Not having this correct could lead to customers contacting you from the wrong region, or worse, not being able to contact you at all!

The process of updating your contact details is much like photos, you just scroll down a bit further and select the specific contact details you wish to update. It is all available on your preview of your profile shown on the right-hand side of your screen.

For more information about updating contact details please refer to the Google Business Profile Help document located at:

https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/3463280

Will my Home Address be shown on my Google for Business Profile?

It will show your personal address if you use that address as your office location on the address field displayed but it will not show the address that you use to verify your business if you only use it for that purpose. Google is respectful of privacy and only shows the address that you choose/allow to be displayed on your Google for Business Profile. For more information we recommend looking at Google’s official documentation ‘Manage your business address’.

What content should I post on my Google for Business Profile?

The latest happenings in your business and any information that any new or old customers might be interested to hear when they’re searching either for your business or others in your local area that provide a similar service. Consider questions you or your on-site staff have been asked about before, perhaps other people have those same questions. Consider any specific jobs you might have worked on that could be interesting to do a write-up on, such as a heritage building restoration.

How often should I post on my Google for Business Profile?

Our SEO guide suggests that monthly is ideal but quarterly is more realistic. It really comes down to how competitive is your business in the area that you service and what the personality of your business brand is. If you’re a local café, you could post much more frequently than monthly, however, if you were a niche legal firm, monthly would likely be too often, and the frequency wouldn’t be necessary for competition present.

We suggest posting when you have genuine news or a good customer story to share with your existing and new prospective customers. If there aren’t any new happenings, then you can always write about a question that customers frequently ask or otherwise consider writing about a technical aspect of your work.

Remember, in the ideal world, first you create the website article, then you post it out on your website. Following that, you create your Google for Business (and social media posts) and have them linking back to the Article on your website. That is the best way for customers to read the full story of the news while ensuring that they have genuinely landed on your website and had a more close and controlled interaction with your brand.

Who sees my Google for Business Profile?

Anyone who types your business name into Google will see your Google for Business Profile. It will also show if your business has enough reviews compared to the other businesses located near yours, when people use proximity search terms such as “café near me” or “building supplier near me”. This is because Google can have confidence in having your business location pop-out on Google Maps if your Reviews are sufficiently good and you are sufficiently close to the customer making the search.

With this in mind, it makes sense to keep all your business information up to date and to include your Google for Business Profile amongst the external posting locations that are separate from your website. Keep the public updated about your latest news too. An active business will rank better for search terms in Google.

How do I get more people to see my Google for Business profile?

The best way to get more people to see your Google for Business profile is to work hard to have your website rank higher in Google for more search terms. This is because these customers have a stronger intent to purchase (searching for the specific search term) and because they’re entirely new customers (they didn’t know your specific business/offering prior to searching).

Another less obvious way to get more people viewing your profile is to run an advertising campaign. Whether it is offline or online advertising, by simply getting your business name out there, people will naturally search for your name directly (upon hearing it in the brief advertising) and this will increase your total view count on your profile. It is expensive, but it does work to help kickstart your Review count.

Why is collecting Reviews on my Google for Business Profile important?

Reviews are important to establish that your business is in good standing with customers and active (via Reviews and News Posts – see below) and also so that you can be found by more customers (both existing and prospective) via search and proximity search results from customers with intent to use your services.

How do I collect more Reviews for my Google for Business Profile?

Simply letting people know you have a Google for Business Profile is a great start. Second to this, could print a poster to Review Us on Google. Third, you could get your Google for Business Profile Review link and place it on invoices or office stationery or an email template that you send to customers upon job completion (appropriately). Be sure to check out ‘Tips to get more reviews’ by Google to ensure that anything you do isn’t seen as promotional or incentivizing reviews and that you stay on the good side of Google.

If you’re wanting to really dominate local proximity searches then we really recommend that you get a copy of your Google for Business Review Link and ensure that every time you complete a job, the invoice sent to the customer contains the Review Link so that you can continuously get reviews from some percentage of all customers, this will help ensure you keep on top of your competitors for good reviews. If putting the link within the invoice doesn’t make sense in your case, you could simply have an email template created that politely requests the customer to leave a review on your online profile and send it to them at the most appropriate moment possible for your specific project.

If I create a Google for Business Profile do I still need a website?

A Google for Business Profile is complementary to a website, and while it is very informative and can contain new information such as news posts (see below), it is in no way a substitute to a website. Google knows this because they also have a website builder tool called GoogleSites but also because they have information fields such as “Website” that is essential in linking your website to the profile which are explicitly setup for this purpose. By linking through to your website, you are given an opportunity to show an even more expanded picture of your small business, staff, culture and product/service information in a digital website design that you control.

What is the difference between a Google for Business post and a social media post?

Google for Business Post will be displayed on your business profile during searches for your business name or related keywords that you rank highly for. This means that existing and new customers will get to see the content of this post, as well as when it was posted, so it can be helpful in forming their first impression of your business without having yet even viewed your website. Another solid reason to ensure that you have, at the very least, a handful or more of positive reviews is that so any prospective customers have an automatic psychological first impression of your business from seeing reference to the 5-stars (filled in gold) on Google Search as showing your business is in decent standing generally.

In contrast, while a social media post also appears on a social media profile that you can control the appearance of, it may be the case that the visitor viewing your profile has zero intent to engage with your business, but simply just likes the content of your post and is viewing it for entertainments sake. This is unlikely to happen with a Google for Business Profile post due to the nature in which it is shown to viewers. This is not to suggest that there is no value in social media posts, in-fact we recommend it as a source of backlinks as well as working with local social media professionals who we can refer you to.

Can I put links in a Google for Business post?

Yes, you can include links in your Google for Business Post. As part of the SEO Guide suggests, having links back to Articles that you’ve written on your own website can be advantageous for SEO purposes. Certainly, if you are featured in local news or an industry related group, we would highly recommend that you publish this feature on your Google for Business Profile and include a linkback to the related organization.

In conclusion, Google for Business Profiles are a simple but powerful way to display your small business information online without having to setup a website, but in no way do they substitute for a website. They complement any website you create online because they lead people through to it but also serve as an external source to promote the content within your website and show how active you are to the wider public who are searching for your services (but don’t yet know you). So, ensure that, along with setting up a website, that you also setup a Google for Business Profile correctly and then incorporate collecting Reviews and other Search Engine Optimization (SEO) tasks in your business processes/workflows from the outset to ensure you maximize the benefits of Google Search, Google for Business Profile and your website generally. It costs nothing but a little time and effort to implement these processes and the results can be nothing short of breathtaking in the medium-term when you dominate your local search keywords and get a lot of jobs regularly for trades or other work or enquiries in your area.

How do I verify my Google for Business Profile?

Getting your Google for Business Profile verified has changed a bit over the years. In the older days, they would send you a postcard with a PIN attached, and in some cases still do this, but more likely than not, you will simply have to receive a TXT message or Phone call that will immediately provide you with a code/PIN which you can enter into your profile to verify you received them message (thereby verifying your profile).

In rarer cases you may be asked to verify via email, but we don’t see this often.

Sometimes, upon the initial PIN/code being provided, you may also be asked to record a video or to join a live video call to verify yourself. The latter of which is very rare but we have had a number of customers quizzing us on why they were being asked to take short videos of their street, vehicle/signage and anything else to verify their business was legitimate or operating out of an office space (typically, their home office).

In just about all cases, we have seen businesses get successfully verified without much hassle, so we’re sure you will be able to as well.

If you need more information on verifying your Google for Business Profile then we highly recommend you check out Google’s official page on this at ‘Verify your business on Google’.

I think I previously created a Google for Business Profile. How do I reclaim it?

Please see the below link for information on this issue:

https://support.google.com/business/answer/7107242

My Google for Business Profile is being managed by my previous website SEO person. What can I do?

Please see the above answer and also consider searching through your email Inboxes and other folders to see if you can locate any previous emails related to websites/SEO or reputation management from previous persons who may have assisted you you with this. Making contact with them is a key starting point as they may have Management or Owner level control over your Google for Business Profile which you will need to request to be transferred to you. At this point you should also make an inventory of your domain name and email accounts if you already had these. Who were they managed by? Is it the same person as my small business IT or website? If you didn't have a domain name previously (and perhaps were using Gmail or your local ISP for email) then you can easily register a domain name within Dazzly.