Google Business Profile checklist: how to rank in the local map pack

For a local business, your Google Business Profile is often seen by more people than your website. It's what shows up in the map pack when someone searches "dentist near me" or "coaching classes in Pune". This checklist covers the settings and habits that make the biggest difference.

How Google ranks local businesses

Google says local results are based mainly on three things:

• Relevance: how well your profile matches what the person searched for.
• Distance: how far your business is from the searcher, or from the location in their search.
• Prominence: how well known your business is, based on reviews, links, articles and other information across the web.

You can't change your distance from a searcher, but you have a lot of control over relevance and prominence. Everything below targets one or both.

Get the basics right

1. Claim and verify your profile. Unverified profiles have limited visibility and can be edited by others.
2. Use your real business name. Adding keywords or city names that aren't part of your actual name breaks Google's guidelines and can get your profile suspended.
3. Choose the most specific primary category. "Pediatric dentist" beats "Dentist" if that's what you are. Add secondary categories only for services you really offer.
4. Keep name, address and phone (NAP) identical everywhere. Your website, Google profile and directory listings should match exactly.
5. Set your service area if you visit customers. Plumbers, electricians and home tutors who don't serve customers at their address should hide it and list the areas they cover instead.
6. Add accurate hours, including special hours. Update them for public holidays and festivals so customers don't arrive to a closed shop.

Fill in every section

7. Write a clear description. You have up to 750 characters. Say what you do, who you serve and where, in natural language.
8. List your services or products with short descriptions. These help Google match your profile to more specific searches.
9. Upload real photos regularly: your storefront, interior, team and finished work. Real photos build trust far better than stock images.
10. Publish updates. Share offers, events and news through posts to show the profile is active and give searchers more reasons to choose you.

Build a steady flow of reviews

11. Ask every happy customer. Send your review link by WhatsApp or email right after a good experience, when it's fresh.
12. Reply to every review, good and bad. Thank people specifically, and handle complaints calmly and publicly.

Connect your profile to your website

• Link to the right page. A single-location business can link to its homepage. A multi-location business should link each profile to that location's page.
• Add UTM tags to the link (for example, ?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=gbp) so you can see profile traffic separately in Google Analytics.
• Add LocalBusiness schema to your website with the same name, address and phone as your profile.
• Create a useful page for each area you serve with real, local details, not the same text with the city name swapped.

Build consistent citations

Citations are mentions of your business name, address and phone number on other websites. List your business on the directories your customers actually use. In India that often includes Justdial, Sulekha and IndiaMART. Internationally, Bing Places, Apple Business Connect and Yelp are good starting points, plus any directory specific to your industry. Consistency matters more than quantity.

Track what's working

Your profile's Performance section shows how many people found you, and how many called, requested directions or visited your website. Check it monthly alongside your Analytics data, and you'll see which changes brought in real customers.

Want a hand with your local visibility? See my local SEO service or ask for a free profile review.