Your Google Business Profile is the listing that appears in Google Maps and in the map results when someone searches for your trade nearby. For many contractors, it brings in more calls than their website. It is free, it takes an afternoon to set up properly, and it is surprisingly easy to get wrong.
This guide walks through setup step by step, then covers the mistakes that get contractor profiles suspended. For photos, posts and reviews in more depth, see our article on Google Business Profile and reviews.
Step 1: Claim it, verify it and make sure you own it
Search for your business name on Google Maps. If a profile already exists, claim it. If not, create one through Google Business Profile.
Use an account your business controls. Not a former employee’s personal Gmail, and not your marketing agency’s account. You should be the primary owner. Add employees and vendors as managers, so you can remove them when they leave. If someone else set up your profile years ago, transfer ownership to yourself now, while you can still reach them.
Be ready to verify. Google decides how you verify. It is often a short video recording. Be ready to show:
- Where you are, such as the street, your building or nearby landmarks
- That the business is real: signage, a branded truck, equipment or tools
- That you run it: keys to open the shop or truck, or business documents
Keep the video short and continuous, and make sure your business name is visible somewhere in it.
Step 2: Use your real business name
Enter your business name exactly as it appears on your signs, trucks, license and paperwork. Do not add keywords or towns, like “Smith Roofing – Best Roofer in Columbus.” Adding keywords breaks Google’s guidelines, competitors can report it, and it is one of the most common reasons contractor profiles get suspended.
If you really want the keyword in your name, the only legitimate route is to change your legal business name and branding. That is rarely worth it.
Step 3: Choose your categories carefully
Your primary category has a big effect on which searches you appear for. Pick the one that best describes your main business, such as Roofing contractor, HVAC contractor, Plumber, Electrician, Concrete contractor, Excavating contractor, Landscaper or Kitchen remodeler.
Then add secondary categories for other real services. Only add categories for work you actually do and want more of. A short, accurate list beats a long one.
A quick check: search for your main service in your town and look at the top three companies in the map. Their primary categories tell you what Google expects for that search.
Step 4: Address or service area
This is where many contractors go wrong.
- If customers come to you, like a showroom, storefront or yard where customers pick up materials, show your address during your posted hours.
- If you go to your customers and they do not visit you, you are a service-area business. Hide your address and set a service area instead.
- If you work from home, use your home address and hide it.
For your service area, list the towns, counties or regions you actually serve. Google allows up to 20 areas and says your service area should not extend farther than about two hours of driving from where you are based.
Post office boxes and virtual offices are not allowed as business addresses. Mailbox services and unstaffed shared offices can get you suspended too.
One more thing to know: your profile tends to show up most in the map results near your actual address, even when it is hidden. Adding a distant town to your service area will not, on its own, make you rank there. To win work in farther towns, use town pages on your website, ads and reviews from customers in those areas.
Step 5: Phone, website and hours
- Phone: a local number that someone actually answers. If you use call tracking, a common setup is to put the tracking number as the primary number and your main business number as an additional number, so your listings stay consistent.
- Website: link to your home page, or to the matching location page if you have more than one location. Add tracking tags to the link, so your analytics can separate visitors from your profile from regular search visitors.
- Hours: your real hours. Add holiday hours ahead of time. Only show 24 hours if someone really answers the phone around the clock.
Step 6: Services, description and details
Services. Google suggests services based on your categories. Add the ones you offer and create your own for anything missing, with a short, plain description of each. Use the names customers use.
Description. You have 750 characters. Use them to say what you do, where, who you work for and what makes you different, such as years in business, licensing or warranties. Keep links, prices, promotions and all-caps text out. They break the guidelines and look spammy anyway.
Details. Fill in everything that applies to you: the year you opened, and attributes such as veteran-owned or women-owned. Which ones are available depends on your category. Every accurate detail helps customers and gives Google a fuller picture of your business.
Step 7: Photos that win the click
Customers judge your profile by its photos before they read anything. Add:
- Your logo and a strong cover photo of your best work
- Finished jobs, before-and-after pairs and work in progress
- Your crew in uniform, your trucks and your equipment
- Your shop, office or showroom, if customers visit
Use real photos only. Add new ones regularly, because a profile with recent photos looks active and busy. Customers can add photos too, so check every so often that nothing misleading or unflattering has been added. Our job site shot list covers what to capture on every job.
Step 8: Posts
Posts are short updates that appear on your profile, with a photo, some text and a button. Good posts for contractors:
- A finished project, with a photo and two or three sentences about it
- Seasonal reminders, like furnace tune-ups, spring booking or winterizing
- Offers with a clear end date
- Company news, such as a new service, a new truck or a new hire
Posting does not need to be daily. A couple of good posts a month keeps your profile fresh and gives customers one more reason to call you instead of the company next to you.
Step 9: Reviews
Reviews affect both where you show up and whether you get the call. Ask every customer, reply to every review and never offer anything in exchange. Our guide on how to get more Google reviews has scripts for asking and replying.
Step 10: Keep it accurate
Anyone can suggest edits to your profile, and Google sometimes updates details on its own. Wrong hours or a wrong phone number can quietly cost you calls for weeks.
- Check your profile at least once a month while signed in as the owner.
- Review and accept or reject any updates Google flags.
- Update hours, services and photos whenever your business changes.
What gets contractor profiles suspended
A suspended profile disappears from the map, sometimes for weeks. These are the usual causes:
- Keywords or towns in the business name.
- A fake, virtual or PO box address, or an address where you have no real presence.
- More than one profile for the same business, such as creating extra profiles in towns where you have no office. You get one profile per real location.
- Breaking review rules, like offering incentives or posting fake reviews.
- Changing many key details at once, such as name, address and categories together. That can trigger a new verification. Make big changes one at a time.
If your profile is suspended, fix the problem first, then appeal through Google’s Business Profile appeals tool. Include evidence like your business license, a utility bill, photos of your signage and branded vehicles, and anything else that proves your business is real and located where you say.
Measure what it brings in
Your profile’s performance section shows calls, website clicks, direction requests and the searches that showed your profile. Check it monthly and look at the trend, not single days. For a fuller picture, use a tracked phone number and tagged website link. Then you can see which calls and estimate requests came from your profile and what they turned into. Our call tracking and reporting service sets that up.
A quick setup checklist
- Profile owned by an account your business controls
- Verified, with managers added as users
- Real business name, no keywords
- Accurate primary and secondary categories
- Address shown or hidden correctly, with a realistic service area
- Answered phone number, tagged website link, real hours and holiday hours
- Services listed with plain descriptions
- A 750-character description with no links or promotions
- Logo, cover photo and recent job photos
- A post in the last month
- Every review answered
- A monthly check on the calendar
We set up and manage Google Business Profiles for contractors, including verification, categories, services, photos, posts and review replies, and we make sure you own the profile. To see how yours compares to the companies above you in the map, ask for a free marketing audit.