If you want to know how to show up on Google Maps, the short answer is a Google Business Profile that is created, verified and filled in properly. When someone searches for "hardware store near me" or "dentist open now", Google usually shows a map with a handful of local businesses before any regular result. This guide walks you through getting into that map step by step, based on Google's own help pages: who can have a profile, how verification works, what to fill in, how Google decides who to show, and the mistakes that get profiles suspended.
Before you start: is your business eligible?
Google lets you create a Business Profile if your business has a location customers can visit, or travels to customers where they are. That covers shops, salons, workshops and clinics, and also plumbers, technicians or movers who work on site.
What the same guidelines do not allow:
- Virtual offices or P.O. boxes as an address.
- More than one profile for the same business at the same location.
- Businesses with no in-person contact with their customers.
Have this ready before you begin: a Google account owned by the company (not an employee's personal one), the exact business name, the address or service area, the phone number, opening hours and your website if you have one.
Step 1: add or claim your Business Profile
Your business may already be on Google Maps even if you never added it, because customers can suggest places. Search for it first.
- If it is listed but unclaimed: in Google Maps, search for the name and city, open the listing and choose "Claim this business", then "Manage now".
- If it is not listed: go to business.google.com/add, choose to add your business to Google and follow the instructions.
- If someone else already verified it (a former employee or whoever set it up), you can request ownership from the current owner.
Step 2: verify that the business is yours
Until it is verified, you cannot manage the profile or show it in full. From Google's verification help page:
- You do not choose the method. Google decides based on business type, region or hours. It can be a video recording, a phone call or text, email, a live video call or a postcard. If video recording is offered, Google recommends it.
- Reviews take up to 5 business days. In rare cases they take longer.
- With a postcard: do not edit the name, address or category while you wait, do not request a new code, and use it within 30 days, when it expires.
- Never share the code. Google will not ask you for it.
If you get the video option, plan it: show the sign or entrance, the inside with products or equipment, and something that proves you run the place, such as unlocking the door or using your work tools.
Step 3: fill in the profile the way Google asks
Google says businesses with complete and accurate information are more likely to show up in local results. Go field by field:
- Name: the one on your sign. Google's guidelines do not allow taglines, services, locations or phone numbers in the name, and warn that doing so can get the profile suspended.
- Primary category: the one that completes "this business IS a…", not what it "has". Use as few as possible.
- Address or service area: if you serve customers on site and do not receive them at your premises, Google asks you to hide the address and set the areas you cover.
- Hours: the real ones, including holidays.
- Phone and website: the same ones that appear on your site and social media.
- Description: what you do and for whom, in plain words. Links are not allowed in the description.
- Photos: storefront, interior, products and team at work. Real photos, not stock images.
Step 4: understand how Google decides who to show
According to Google's help page on local ranking, local results are based mainly on three things:
- Relevance: how well your profile matches what the person searched for, which is why category and description matter.
- Distance: how close you are to the searcher or to the place they named.
- Prominence: how well known the business is, including review count, ratings and what Google finds about you across the web.
Google also states there is no way to request or pay for a better local ranking. Be wary of anyone who promises "the top spot on Maps".
Step 5: get reviews without breaking the rules
Reviews help prominence and, above all, help a new customer trust you. From your profile you can create a link or QR code to ask for reviews and share it by email, messaging apps, on receipts or with a printed code at the counter.
What Google strictly prohibits, per its tips for getting reviews: offering gifts or any benefit in exchange for posting, changing or removing a review. Ask every customer, not only the happy ones, and reply to reviews, including negative ones, politely, promptly and without sharing the customer's private information.
Common mistakes that keep you off the map
- Using an employee's personal account. When that person leaves, you lose access to the profile.
- Stuffing keywords into the name. It is exactly what the guidelines say can get a profile suspended.
- Creating a new profile when one already exists. Claim the existing one to avoid duplicates.
- Editing details while a postcard is on its way. The code stops working.
- Letting hours or phone numbers go stale. The customer calls, nobody answers, and they go elsewhere.
- Having no website. A profile works on its own, but a fast site with your services, location and contact options gives customers more reasons to choose you. Here is what a business website should have.
How Ciguabit can help
Ciguabit, a software company in the Dominican Republic, offers website design for small businesses and companies: fast, mobile-friendly sites with basic SEO and the same details as your Business Profile, so Google and your customers see one consistent business everywhere. We also make sure the domain and the site are registered to your company.
Tell us about your business and we will send you a free quote within 24 business hours.
