Setting up a Google Business Profile properly

For a local business, the Google Business Profile is usually worth more than the website in the first year. It's what puts you in the map pack, it's free, and most profiles I look at are about 40 percent finished.

Claim it before you build it

Search your business name, a listing may already exist, auto-generated or created by a previous marketer. Claim that one rather than making a duplicate. Duplicates split your reviews and confuse the map.

Get the categories right

Your primary category has more influence on which searches you appear in than almost anything else you'll do. Pick the one that matches the work you most want, then add secondary categories for the rest. "Painter" and "painting contractor" are not the same listing behaviour.

Fill in the parts everyone skips

• +The full service list, with a short description for each
• +Service areas, if you travel to customers
• +Opening hours, plus public holiday hours
• +Attributes, wheelchair access, appointment required, women-owned
• +Products, where they apply
• +The Q&A section: ask and answer your own most common questions

Photos matter more than people expect

Real photos of your work, your vehicle, your team and your premises. Add a few every month. Profiles with recent photos look active, and active profiles get clicked.

Reviews are the ongoing job

Ask every happy customer, in person or by text, with a direct link. Reply to all of them, including the bad ones, calmly and briefly. A steady trickle of reviews beats twenty in one week and then nothing for a year.

Then keep an eye on it

Profiles get edited by the public, hours drift out of date, and Google occasionally suspends listings without warning. Check yours monthly, it takes five minutes.