Google Business Profile
Google Business Profile for trades — what actually matters?
A free listing that, for businesses genuinely eligible, is often the single most valuable local asset they have. Eligibility and requirements are set and changed by Google, so treat this as general guidance and check Google's current rules before you act.
Eligibility, in general terms
Genuine in-person contact is the principle.
Businesses that make genuine in-person contact with customers — at a premises, at the customer's property, or both — may be eligible for a Google Business Profile. Storefront businesses and service-area businesses (those who travel to customers rather than receive them at a fixed location) are treated differently within Google's system, particularly around what address information is shown publicly. Verification methods and exact requirements change over time, so treat anything here as general orientation and check Google's current guidelines before setting up or editing a profile.
Core profile information
Eight things worth getting right.
Business name
Your real, registered trading name — nothing appended. Adding services or towns to the name breaches Google's guidelines.
Categories
Primary category matters most; secondary categories add reach. Getting this wrong caps visibility quietly, with no obvious symptom.
Services
Listed individually and specifically, matching both what you actually do and the language on your website.
Contact details and website
Kept identical to your website — same number, same website link, no discrepancies for Google or customers to trip over.
Hours
Accurate and kept current, including holiday hours. Wrong hours cost real jobs, not just ranking.
Genuine service areas
Areas you actually work in, not every town within an ambitious radius.
Reviews
Genuine, recent, responded to — see Google reviews for trades for the detail.
Photographs
Real job photos, refreshed periodically, showing actual work rather than stock imagery.
Service-area businesses
Travelling to the customer changes the settings you use.
If you travel to customers rather than have them visit a fixed premises — most plumbers, electricians, decorators and similar trades — Google's system has a specific service-area business setup, generally allowing your exact address to stay hidden from public view while defining the areas you serve.
A few practical principles that tend to hold up: list areas you can realistically and regularly reach, keep the list honest rather than maximised, and match the areas shown on your Google profile to the coverage described on your website so the two don't contradict each other.
This is not legal advice, and exact settings, limits and verification steps change — always confirm against Google's current documentation for service-area businesses before making changes.
Profile and website, together
Two different jobs, not one.
Your Google Business Profile is largely what drives Maps visibility, direction requests and phone calls direct from search. Your website is what earns organic rankings for the searches people make before they've decided who to call, and it's also where someone lands once they've clicked through from the profile to check you out properly.
A strong profile with a weak website, or a strong website with a neglected profile, both leave visibility on the table. See Google Business Profile vs website for how the two actually divide the work.
Never do this
Shortcuts that get profiles suspended.
Virtual offices
An address with no genuine operation behind it. Google's guidelines require a real presence, and this is one of the most commonly detected and penalised patterns.
Fake or borrowed addresses
Using a relative's house, a storage unit or an associate's premises purely to gain a listing in that town. If it's discovered — and Google does check — the profile is typically suspended.
Duplicate profiles per town
One profile per service area you want to rank in, rather than one accurate profile with proper service-area settings. This breaches guidelines directly and risks all of them being removed, not just the extras.
Keyword-stuffed business names
Cramming services or locations into the name field — 'Jones Roofing Emergency Flat Roof Repairs Solihull' — is against guidelines and one of the easier things for Google to flag automatically.
Profiles for places you don't operate from
If there's no genuine day-to-day operation at a location, it shouldn't have a profile representing it, however tempting the local visibility looks.
Suspensions
Accuracy is cheaper than a reinstatement.
Suspensions usually follow a pattern that looks like manipulation: an address that doesn't check out, a duplicate profile, a stuffed business name, or reviews that look manufactured. Reinstatement, where possible, means submitting evidence of a genuine business and waiting — often weeks — with the profile invisible the entire time.
That visibility gap is the real cost of a shortcut, on top of whatever work went into taking it. An accurate, unremarkable profile that follows the guidelines has none of that risk.
Before you ask
Google Business Profile — common questions
Next step
Not sure if your profile is helping or hurting?
Get it checked properly before you touch anything.
Tell us what your business does and what you need the website to achieve. We'll come back to you personally with honest thoughts — and a clear proposal if it's a good fit.