Someone in your town types what you do into Google. Before they see a single website, they see three businesses under a map. They ring one of them.
Whether that is you comes down, more than anything else, to your Google Business Profile.
It is free. Most of it takes an afternoon. And most of the advice written about it is busywork.
Below is what actually matters: what the profile is, how to set one up and verify it, how to get back into one someone else set up, what moves it up the map, and how to close one down.
Every rule here comes from Google’s own documentation. Everything Google has switched off in the last two years is flagged too, because plenty of guides still tell you to use features that no longer exist.
If you would rather it was simply done properly, that is what our Google Business Profile service is for.
What is a Google Business Profile?
It is your business’s listing on Google Search and Google Maps. Name, address or service area, phone number, hours, website, photos, services and reviews, in the panel that appears when someone searches for you by name, and in the map results when they search for what you do.
For a local business, it is often seen by more people than the website is. Customers read it, make up their minds and ring you from it without ever clicking through.
Is it the same as Google My Business?
Yes. Google renamed Google My Business to Google Business Profile in 2021. Same listing, same account, new name. If a guide still calls it Google My Business, check the date on it.
How to set up a Google Business Profile
Search Google for your business name first. There may already be a listing, created from public information or by someone who worked for you years ago. If there is, claim it rather than making a second one. Two profiles for one business is a duplicate, and duplicates get suspended.
If there is nothing there, this is the order:
- Go to business.google.com/create and sign in with a Google account the business will always control. Not a staff member’s personal Gmail.
- Enter your business name exactly as it appears on your signage and your documents. Nothing added.
- Choose your primary category. More on this below, because it matters more than anything else you will pick.
- Say whether customers visit you, and if so, enter the address.
- Add the areas you serve if you travel to customers.
- Add your phone number and website.
- Verify, using whichever method Google offers you.
Storefront or service area?
If customers come to you, show your address. If you go to them, like a plumber, an electrician or a mobile hairdresser, hide the address and set a service area instead.
A lot of Irish trades are run from home. Leaving a home address visible on a service business breaks Google’s guidelines, and it is one of the most common reasons profiles get suspended.
Get the address and Eircode right
Irish addresses are awkward. Two houses can share a townland, and rural roads often have no name at all. Use your Eircode, check the pin lands on your actual door, and write the address the same way everywhere: on the profile, on your website and on every directory. Google compares them.
How to verify your Google Business Profile
An unverified profile does very little. Verification is Google checking that you are real and that you are the one who runs the business.
You don’t get to choose how. Google says verification methods are automatically determined and can’t be changed, and they depend on your business type, public information, region and hours. The methods it uses are:
- A code by phone call or text message.
- A code by email.
- A video recording of your business.
- A live video call with Google support.
- A postcard, which can take around 14 days to arrive. Its code expires after 30 days, and you shouldn’t edit your details while you wait.
- Instant verification, for some businesses, through a website already verified in Google Search Console.
Google says its review can take up to five business days. Video is the one people get wrong. It has to be a single, unedited recording captured live, showing where you are, your signage or tools, and something only the business owner could access. Our guide to getting a suspended profile back walks through exactly what to film, and it applies to verification just the same.
Our guide to Google Business Profile verification covers every method in full, what to film, and why verification fails.
How to log in to your Google Business Profile
There is no separate app any more. Sign in to the Google account that owns the profile, then search Google for your business name, or open Google Maps. The editing tools appear right on your listing.
If you look after several businesses, Google’s Business Profile Manager at business.google.com shows them all in one place.
Can’t get in at all? That usually means the profile belongs to a different Google account. An old agency, a former employee, or an email address nobody remembers. The next section is for you.
How to add someone to your Google Business Profile
A profile has three kinds of user, and the difference matters.
The primary owner has full control, and there is only one. Other owners can do almost everything too, including adding and removing people and deleting the profile. Managers can edit the listing, post, add photos and reply to reviews, but can’t add or remove users or remove the profile.
To add someone, open your profile, go to the Business Profile settings, then People and access, and select Add. Enter their email, choose Owner or Manager, and send the invite. Google makes new owners and managers wait seven days before they can use some features, such as transferring primary ownership.
Our advice: make yourself the primary owner and give your agency, or anyone else, manager access. When people move on, you remove them. The profile stays yours.
If someone else owns a listing that should be yours, try to add the business yourself. Google will show you that it is already managed and offer to let you request access from the current owner.
How Google decides who shows up in the map pack
Google is unusually open about this. It ranks local results on three things.
Relevance is how well your profile matches what someone searched for. Distance is how far you are from them. Prominence is how well known your business is, which Google says includes how many websites link to you and how many reviews you have.
You can’t move your premises. Everything else is yours to improve.
And one line from Google is worth repeating to anyone who tries to sell you otherwise: there’s no way to request or pay for a better local ranking on Google. The map pack is earned. Ads can sit above it, but nobody can buy their way into it.
How to optimise your Google Business Profile
Here is where it pays to know which jobs matter. The first three below do most of the work. The rest take five minutes each and stop the profile looking abandoned.
Choose the right primary category
This is the single biggest relevance decision on the profile. Pick the most specific category that describes your core business. “Kitchen remodeler” beats “Contractor” if kitchens are what you do. Add further categories only where they are genuinely true. Google’s own guidance is to use as few as possible.
Write a description people actually read
You get 750 characters. Say what you do, where, and for whom, in plain words, in the first couple of lines, because that is what shows before the reader taps for more. No links, no keyword lists, no shouting.
List your services, and your products if you sell any
Services tell Google, and the customer, the specific jobs you take on. Add each one you want to be found for, with a short line on what it involves.
Add real photos and video
Your premises, your team, your van, your work. Real photos of real jobs beat stock images every time, because the person looking is trying to decide whether you are a real business they can trust.
Keep your hours honest, bank holidays included
Set special hours for Christmas, St Patrick’s Day and every bank holiday. Nothing loses a customer faster than a locked door on a day Google said you were open.
Fill in the attributes
Wheelchair access, parking, Wi-Fi and the rest. Google lists these among its own tips for keeping the profile complete, and they answer the quick questions customers otherwise ring to ask.
Post when you have something to say
Offers, news, events, new work. Posts keep the profile alive and give people another reason to get in touch. They don’t move rankings on their own, and we explain why in does posting on Google My Business help SEO. Post because you have news, not to hit a quota.
How to get more Google reviews, and what to say back
Reviews do two jobs. They count towards prominence, and they are what the customer reads before deciding to ring.
The way to get more is simple, and most businesses still don’t do it: ask. Every customer, every time, straight after a job that went well, with a direct link to your review form. Share it by text or email, or put it on a QR code at the till.
To see how many 5-star reviews it takes to reach the rating you want, use our free Google review calculator.
Ask everyone, not just the happy ones. Google’s review policies rule out selectively asking satisfied customers, and they rule out offering anything in return for a review. Break them and you risk losing the reviews, and possibly the profile.
Reply to every review, good or bad. Google itself says replying shows you value the feedback. A calm, specific reply to a bad review often does more for the next customer than the five-star ones around it.
Each of those has its own guide: how to get more Google reviews within the 2026 rules, how to respond to Google reviews with templates, and how to remove Google reviews that break them.
How to add WhatsApp to your Google Business Profile
Google’s own chat inside the profile is gone. What replaced it is a Chat option in your contact details, where you can add either WhatsApp or a text message number.
Open your profile, choose Edit profile, then Contact, and add the WhatsApp link or the number under Chat. The profile must be claimed and verified. Google says chat options are only available in select regions, so it may not appear on yours yet.
One catch. If you add both, Google only shows the text message option.
Google Business Profile for solicitors, accountants, architects and engineers
Professional practices have their own rules, and a lot of firms in Ireland get them wrong.
An individual practitioner can have their own profile if they are public-facing, usually with their own clients, and can be contacted directly at the verified location during stated hours. Support staff can’t have one.
Where several practitioners work from one office, the practice gets its own profile, separate from each practitioner’s. If one person is the only public-facing practitioner at a branded practice, Google’s guidelines say to use a single profile named with the brand and then the practitioner. And no practitioner gets extra profiles for each specialism.
Titles and qualifications are allowed in a practitioner’s name. For how search works for your profession more widely, see our guides to SEO for solicitors and SEO for accountants.
What Google has switched off
Old guides are full of features you can no longer use. These are gone:
- Chat and call history. Customers could no longer start chats from July 2024, and chat and call history were removed from profiles at the end of that month.
- Business Profile websites. The simple websites Google let you build from a profile were discontinued in 2024.
- Questions and answers. Google has been winding the feature down since closing it to developers in November 2025.
If an agency’s plan still includes managing your Q&A or your Google-built website, it is working from an old checklist.
Why is my Google Business Profile not showing up?
Search for your exact business name first. If you appear then but not for what you do, the profile is working, and the issue is ranking: relevance, distance and prominence, covered above.
If you don’t appear even for your own name, check these in order. Is the profile verified? Is an edit waiting for Google to approve it? Has it been suspended? If it has, don’t create a new one. Our guide to a suspended Google Business Profile covers what to do instead.
And if it is a new profile, give it time. It is starting with no reviews and no history against businesses that have had both for years.
How to delete or close a Google Business Profile
Deleting a profile doesn’t always make it disappear, and that surprises a lot of people. Which route you take depends on why you want it gone.
If the business has closed
Mark it as permanently closed in your profile. Google says it may still show on Search and Maps for people who look for it, clearly marked as closed, and it fades out of results over time.
If you want to stop managing it
An owner can remove the profile from their Google account in the Business Profile settings. Google is clear that this doesn’t guarantee the business will stop showing on Search and Maps. If you are a manager leaving a business, remove yourself under People and access instead, and the profile carries on without you.
If it is a duplicate
Report it on Google Maps through Suggest an edit rather than deleting the listing that has your reviews on it. Keep the one with the history.
Our guide to deleting a Google Business Profile has the exact steps for each, and what happens to your reviews after.
Questions people ask about Google Business Profiles
Is a Google Business Profile free?
Yes, completely. And Google says there is no way to pay for a better local ranking. What you can pay for is Google Ads, which appear separately, above or among the results.
Do I need a website to have a Google Business Profile?
No. But a profile with a good website behind it gives Google more to understand you by, and it gives the customer somewhere to go before they ring.
Can I have a Google Business Profile if I work from home?
Yes, as long as you meet customers in person, either at your premises or at theirs. If they don’t come to your house, hide the address and set a service area.
Can I have more than one Google Business Profile?
One per location. If you genuinely run from two premises with signage and staff at each, each gets its own profile. A second profile for the same premises is a duplicate.
If you’d rather someone else looked after it
A Google Business Profile is one of the few things in marketing that is free, fast and fully in your control. It is also the thing most small businesses set up once and never touch again.
If you want yours set up properly, verified, optimised and kept honest every month, our Google Business Profile team will do it with you, and show you each call it brings in. For how the profile fits into ranking locally as a whole, our guide to local SEO in Ireland is the next read.
