A fact that surprises almost every business owner the first time they hear it: for local searches ("bakery near me", "employment lawyer in Alcobendas"), Google does not show the normal web results first, but a map block featuring three highlighted businesses, the so-called "Local Pack". If your Google Business Profile listing is not among those three, it barely matters how well ranked your website is, because most people never even scroll down to the results below.
And yet, the Google Business Profile listing (formerly Google My Business) tends to be the poor relative of a business's digital marketing: it gets created once, the logo gets uploaded as a cover photo, and it sits there untouched for years. That is a costly mistake, because it is the free tool with the most direct impact on customers who are about to call or walk into the shop today.
The three factors Google looks at to decide the Local Pack
Google mainly evaluates three things to decide which three businesses to show: relevance (whether your listing matches what is being searched), distance (how far you are from the searcher or from the centre of the searched area), and prominence (how much reputation and presence you have, both online and offline). You can do almost nothing about distance, but you can work hard on relevance and prominence, and that is where the game is won or lost.
The primary category: the decision that carries the most weight and that almost nobody revisits
Many businesses pick a primary category on day one, without much thought, and never look at it again. That is a serious mistake, because the primary category is one of the signals that carries the most weight in deciding which searches you show up for. A "car repair shop" that has actually specialised in tyres should consider switching its primary category to "tyre shop" if that is where it wants to grow, adding "car repair shop" as a secondary category. Google allows up to nine secondary categories in addition to the primary one: using them all, thoughtfully, widens the searches you can appear in without diluting your focus.
Photos: the cheapest trust signal there is
Listings with more photos consistently receive more requests for directions and more clicks to the website than ones with only two or three generic images. You do not need a professional photographer: real photos of the premises, the team, the finished product or the work in progress convey more trust than stock imagery. Uploading new photos regularly (not just on day one) also signals to Google that the business is active, which factors into prominence.
Reviews: quantity, quality, and above all, replying
Reviews influence local ranking in two distinct ways: how many you have and how often they arrive (a business with old reviews and none in the last year looks less active than one getting reviews every week), and whether they contain the words people search for. A review that says "the best emergency plumber in Getafe, arrived in under an hour" reinforces exactly those searches. Replying to every review, good and bad, is not optional if you want to compete seriously: Google reads it as a sign the business is actively managed, and it directly influences the decision of whoever is reading those replies before choosing.
Posts: the feature almost nobody uses
Google Business Profile lets you publish updates, offers and events directly on the listing, much like a social network. It is an almost entirely underused feature, and it is free. Publishing a one-off offer, a holiday schedule change or a product update keeps the listing active and gives one more reason for someone to click instead of moving to the next result.
Questions and answers, and the products and services section
The listing's Q&A section is public and editable by anyone, which means that if you do not manage it, someone else can answer with incorrect information, or a question can be left unanswered, which creates doubt. It is worth getting ahead of it: write the most frequent questions yourself ("do you have parking?", "do you take last-minute bookings?") with the correct answer. Likewise, filling out the product or service catalogue with indicative prices and concrete descriptions helps Google understand exactly what you offer, and avoids conversations that fizzle out because the price was not clear from the start.
Data consistency: the technical detail that sinks entire listings
The name, address and phone number (what the industry calls NAP) need to be exactly the same on your listing, on your website and on any directory you appear in. If one place says "12 Main St" and another says "Main Street, 12, 1st floor", Google detects the inconsistency and that lowers the trust it places in your listing. It is a tedious auditing job, but one of the highest-impact ones relative to the time it takes to fix.
The case of the hair salon with two duplicate listings
A common case, and one that often goes unnoticed for years: a hair salon that moved premises within the same neighbourhood, and instead of updating its original listing's address, ended up unintentionally with a new listing automatically created by Google (this sometimes happens when someone suggests it from Google Maps without knowing one already existed) on top of the old one, which kept showing up in searches with the old address. For months, the result was that reviews, tenure and photo history were split across two different listings, neither one strong enough on its own to compete for the Local Pack. The fix involved claiming and merging both listings within the Google Business Profile tool itself, concentrating all the accumulated reputation into a single profile. Within two months, the merged listing started showing up consistently in the three-pack for neighbourhood searches, something neither listing had ever achieved separately.
Special hours: the signal that gets forgotten at key dates
Keeping special hours up to date (local holidays, summer closures, closures for renovation) is one of the smallest and most cost-effective tasks on the entire listing. Outdated hours not only lead to frustrated customers showing up at a closed business, they also send a signal of a poorly maintained business that affects the listing's overall trustworthiness. Checking the local and national holiday calendar in advance, and scheduling hour changes with several days' margin, avoids this recurring problem many businesses only fix after already losing several frustrated visits.
An optimisation checklist to start today
For a business wanting to catch up on its listing without knowing where to start, a reasonable order of priorities is: first, confirm the primary category is as precise as possible and add every relevant secondary category; second, upload at least fifteen or twenty real photos of the business, the team, and the product or service; third, reply to every pending review, starting with the most recent; fourth, fill out the service or product catalogue with indicative prices; and fifth, write the most common frequently asked questions in the Q&A section ahead of time. None of these five steps requires technical knowledge or any cost, only time, and together they usually represent most of the difference between a listing that competes for the Local Pack and one that does not.
The link between the listing and the website: no loose ends
The Google Business Profile listing should link to the most relevant page on the website for each type of business, not always the generic homepage: a restaurant can link directly to its booking page, and a business with several services can link to the page for whichever service it most wants to promote at that moment. Periodically checking that link is still active and points to the right place (not to an old page already removed, which happens more often than it seems after a website redesign) avoids losing valuable clicks over a simple technical oversight.
Step-by-step case: optimising a listing from scratch in one afternoon
A dry cleaner with two locations had claimed its listing three years earlier but had barely touched it since: seven photos (all of the logo and the storefront), four reviews over a year old with no replies, and the generic primary category "dry cleaner" with no secondary ones. In a single afternoon of work, the following was done: categories were reviewed and "ironing service" and "rug cleaning" were added as secondary, because they were real services the dry cleaner offered that nobody knew to search for by exact name; twenty-five new photos were uploaded (the interior, the team, before-and-after examples of a special treatment); the four old reviews were replied to, with a specific apology on the one negative one; and ten real frequently asked questions were written, gathered from what customers actually asked at the counter ("can you remove a red wine stain?", "do you offer home pickup?"). Six weeks later, the listing had gone from appearing sporadically in the Local Pack to appearing consistently for "dry cleaner near me" and, above all, for "rug cleaning" in the area, a search they had not even previously considered relevant to their business.
Common mistakes when managing the listing over time
Beyond initial neglect, mistakes show up even in listings well optimised at first but poorly maintained afterward. One common one is letting the most recent, visible photos be old or low quality, because Google tends to prioritise newer or more highly rated photos in the main view, and a listing with old photos up front conveys less activity than the reality. Another is ignoring direct messages if the listing has chat enabled, because a slow (or nonexistent) response time on that channel affects a publicly visible metric comparing the business's response speed. A third, less obvious one, is not checking whether a former employee or associate no longer connected to the business still has management access to the listing, which is both a security risk and a loss of control over published information.
Frequently asked questions
How long does it take to notice an improvement after optimising the listing?
Changes like adding photos or replying to reviews can show up within weeks. Structural changes, like adjusting the primary category or steadily gaining new reviews, usually take one to three months to clearly show up in the Local Pack.
Can I have several listings if my business has several locations?
Yes, and in fact it is recommended: each physical location should have its own listing, with its own address, phone number and hours, rather than trying to make one listing represent all of them.
Is it worth buying fake reviews?
No, and it is increasingly risky: Google detects fake review patterns (many arriving at once, accounts with no prior activity, generic text) and can remove them or, in serious cases, penalise the entire listing. The risk does not outweigh the benefit.
What do I do if someone leaves an unfair or fake negative review?
Always reply politely and with concrete facts, without engaging in the emotional back-and-forth; whoever reads that reply afterwards is usually more of a potential customer than the review's own author. If the review clearly breaks Google's policies (spam, offensive language, not from an actual customer), it can be reported for review, though the process is neither fast nor always successful.
Does a Google Business Profile listing replace having a website?
No. It complements the website, but it cannot do what a website does (explain in depth, show the full catalogue, build trust with original content). Ideally both work together: the listing captures initial attention and the website closes the decision.
Do I need to be constantly posting updates on the listing?
Not daily, but with some regularity (every two or three weeks, say) to convey that the business is active. A well-thought-out monthly post is better than none at all.