If you’re a local or service-based business, your Google Business Profile is an important asset.
It’s the listing that can appear when someone searches for your business, or searches for a service you provide in their area. It shows your reviews, photos, contact details, services, opening hours and other information before they’ve even clicked through to your website.
And yet, we regularly come across businesses that either haven’t fully optimised their profile, rarely update it, or worse… don’t actually have access to it.
If getting found in Google and AI, is important to your business, your Google Business Profile deserves some attention.
First things first: make sure you own and have access to it
We deal with a surprising number of business owners who don’t have access to their own Google Business Profile.
Sometimes a previous employee set it up using their personal Google account or worse a business has been purchased without ownership of the Google listing being transferred.
It both are be a real nightmare to sort out!
Make sure you / the business owner has primary ownership of the profile, then add trusted staff or marketing partners as additional users rather than handing over your main login details.
Think of your Google Business Profile as a valuable business asset. Make sure you control it.
Fully optimise your Google Business Profile
Simply having a listing isn’t enough.
Google says complete and accurate business information makes a business more likely to appear in relevant local search results. Google looks at factors including relevance, distance and prominence when deciding which businesses to show.
Go through your profile and make sure you have completed as much information as possible, including:
- Your correct business name and contact details
- Your website
- Opening hours
- Your primary and secondary business categories
- The areas or locations you service
- All of your main services
- Detailed descriptions of those services
- Products, where relevant to your business
- A good business description
- Plenty of recent, genuine photos
When adding services and descriptions, use the same natural language your customers use when searching. If you’re a builder in Whangārei, for example, your profile should make it very clear that you’re a builder, what type of building work you do and the areas you service.
The goal isn’t to stuff keywords everywhere. It’s to give Google a really clear understanding of what you do, where you do it and who you help.
Do you have a Google review strategy?
Google reviews are one of the most powerful parts of your profile.
Google itself says that more reviews and positive ratings can help your local ranking. They’re also hugely important for building trust with people deciding which business to contact.
Don’t leave getting reviews to chance.
Put a simple system in place so asking for a review becomes part of your normal customer process. This could mean:
Sending a follow up email with a Google review link when a job is completedUsing a QR code in your shop, office or vehicleMaking one team member responsible for askingBuilding the request into your CRM or customer follow-up systemLeave a personalised thank you card, with a request for a reviewWe’ve previously shared some practical ideas in our article on how to ask for a Google review.
And remember, Google reviews should always be genuine. Don’t offer incentives in exchange for positive reviews.
Reply to every review, especially the negative onesGot a five-star review? Reply to it.Got a three-star review? Reply to it.Got a one-star review that makes you want to throw your laptop out the window? Definitely reply to it. These are the most important ones!Your response isn’t only for the person who left the review. It’s for every potential customer who reads it afterwards.
A calm, professional response to a negative review can demonstrate how you handle problems and potentially build more trust than a page filled entirely with glowing five-star reviews.
You can read more about the importance of reviews in our article What do your Google Reviews say about your business?
Keep your profile active
Your Google Business Profile shouldn’t be something you set up once and forget about.
Add fresh images regularly. Upload photos of completed projects, your team, new products, your premises or examples of your work.
Make Google Business Profile posts too.
Are your customers sitting at home scrolling through Google Business Profile posts like they scroll Facebook or Instagram?
Probably not.
But Google Business Profile is a Google-owned product and keeping your business information complete, useful and current supports your overall local search presence.
Google specifically recommends adding photos and videos and keeping your business information up to date.
For more on the bigger SEO picture, have a read of how to rank on page 1 of Google.
What about ChatGPT and AI search?
This is where things are getting really interesting.
Customers aren’t only searching Google anymore. They’re asking AI tools questions like:
“Who is the best builder in Whangārei?”
“Recommend a good hairdresser near me.”
“Who is the best arborist in Northland?”
ChatGPT Search can use web search and location information to answer these types of questions. That makes your wider online authority increasingly important.
In the local searches and audits we’re doing, we are also seeing a strong pattern:
Businesses with a strong online presence and lots of quality reviews are regularly being recommended by AI search tools.
That doesn’t mean reviews are the only factor ChatGPT uses. They aren’t. But reviews provide a very strong public trust signal about a business, alongside your website content, local relevance and overall online authority.
If you haven’t already, read our guide on how to optimise your website for AI search to understand how search is changing.
Google and AI visibility need to work together
The businesses winning online aren’t relying on one magic SEO trick.
They’re building a strong overall presence.
Your website, Google Business Profile, Google reviews, service pages, local information and useful content should all be telling Google, ChatGPT and your potential customers the same story:
- This is who we are.
- This is what we do.
- This is where we do it.
- And here’s the proof that we’re good at it.
If you want your business winning the race when customers search on Google or ask ChatGPT who they should use, we can help.
Find out more about our SEO services and let’s get your business showing up where your customers are searching.
Or book in your Online Authority Audit and we’ll give you 5 tips to improve your google rankings and ai recommendations.