The listing that shows up before your website does
Search for "coffee shop Stellenbosch" or "plumber Hermanus" on your phone and look at what Google shows you. Before any normal website result, you get a map with three businesses underneath it - names, star ratings, photos, opening hours, phone numbers. That's the local pack, and it's powered entirely by Google Business Profile.
For local searches - and most searches for small businesses are local - your Business Profile is often the first thing a potential customer sees. Many of them will call, get directions, or check your opening hours without ever visiting your website. And unlike almost every other marketing channel, it costs nothing.
Yet most small businesses either haven't claimed their profile, or claimed it years ago, filled in the basics, and never touched it again. That's a genuine missed opportunity, because the businesses that maintain their profiles consistently outrank the ones that don't.
What Google Business Profile actually is
Google Business Profile (previously Google My Business) is the free listing that controls how your business appears on Google Search and Google Maps. It holds your name, address, phone number, opening hours, photos, reviews, and a description of what you do.
It matters in three places:
The local pack. The map-plus-three-businesses block that appears at the top of local search results. Getting into that pack for your main search terms is worth more than most paid advertising, because it catches people at the exact moment they're looking for what you sell.
Google Maps. People increasingly search directly in Maps - "breakfast near me", "hardware store" - especially when they're out and about. If your profile is incomplete or missing, you don't exist in those searches.
AI answers. When someone asks an AI assistant to recommend a guesthouse in Franschhoek or a bakery in Riebeek-Kasteel, the underlying data often comes from Google's business listings and reviews. A complete, well-reviewed profile feeds the systems we covered in how to get your business recommended by AI.
Step one: claim and verify it
Search for your business name on Google. If a profile appears with an "Own this business?" link, it exists but is unclaimed - click through and follow the verification steps. If nothing appears, create a profile at google.com/business.
Verification usually happens by video, phone, or a postcard to your business address. It's mildly tedious and worth doing properly, because an unverified profile can't be fully edited and won't perform.
One warning: if a former employee, an old marketing agency, or a previous owner verified the profile years ago, you'll need to request ownership through Google's process. Do this now, not when something on the listing is wrong and you can't fix it. It's the same principle we covered in who actually owns your website - the accounts that represent your business should be in your name.
Step two: complete every section
Google rewards complete profiles. Work through each section deliberately:
Business category. This is the single most important field. Your primary category should be the most specific accurate description of what you do - "Guest house", not "Lodging"; "Pizza restaurant", not "Restaurant". Add secondary categories for everything else you genuinely offer. Wrong or vague categories are the most common reason a business doesn't appear for searches it should win.
Name. Use your actual business name, exactly as it appears on your signage. Resist the temptation to stuff keywords into it ("Joe's Plumbing | Best Plumber Cape Town 24/7") - it's against Google's guidelines and profiles do get suspended for it.
Address and service area. If customers visit you, show your address and make sure the map pin is exactly right - people will navigate to it. If you travel to customers, set a service area instead.
Opening hours. Keep them accurate, and set special hours for public holidays before every long weekend. An "Open" label that turns out to be wrong earns you a one-star review from someone standing outside a locked door.
Phone number and website. Use the same phone number and web address everywhere - profile, website, Facebook page, directories. Consistency is a trust signal for both Google and customers.
Description, services, and products. Write a plain-language description of what you do and who you serve. List your actual services or products with prices where you can. Every field you complete is another way to match a search.
Step three: photos - real ones, regularly
Profiles with good photos get dramatically more requests for directions and website clicks than profiles without. And customers can tell the difference between real photographs and stock images instantly.
Add photos of your premises (inside and out, so people recognise it when they arrive), your products or food, and your work if you're a service business. Then keep adding them - a couple of new photos a month tells Google and customers that the business is alive. You don't need a professional shoot; a decent phone camera in good light is enough.
Step four: reviews, consistently
Reviews are the heart of the profile. They influence your ranking in the local pack, and they influence the human being deciding between you and the business listed above you. We've written a full post on why Google reviews matter more than your website copy, but the short version:
- Ask every happy customer. The businesses with hundreds of reviews aren't luckier than you - they ask. Put the review link on invoices, in follow-up emails, on a small sign at the till. Google gives you a short shareable link in the profile dashboard.
- Respond to every review, good and bad. A calm, professional response to a bad review does more for your reputation than ten unanswered five-star ratings.
- Never buy or fake reviews. Google is increasingly good at detecting it, and a suspended profile is far worse than a modest review count.
Step five: use the parts everyone forgets
Updates. You can post short updates to your profile - specials, new products, seasonal hours, events. Few small businesses bother, which is exactly why it's worth doing. It keeps the profile active and gives searchers a reason to choose you.
Questions and answers. Anyone can ask a question on your profile, and - fewer people know this - anyone can answer, including you. Seed it yourself: add the questions you get asked every week (Do you take card? Is there parking? Are you child-friendly? Do you deliver?) and answer them. Otherwise a stranger might, incorrectly.
Messaging and bookings. If you have capacity to respond quickly, enabling messages gives customers a low-friction way to reach you. If you don't, leave it off - an ignored message channel is worse than none.
The mistakes that quietly cost you customers
- Set-and-forget. A profile last touched in 2022, with outdated hours and photos of a paint job three renovations ago, actively works against you.
- Inconsistent details. Different phone numbers on your profile, website, and Facebook page confuse Google and customers alike.
- Ignoring bad reviews. Silence reads as indifference. Respond, briefly and professionally, every time.
- Duplicate profiles. Old addresses, previous business names, or profiles created by well-meaning staff split your reviews and confuse the map. Find and merge or remove them.
Your profile and your website work as a team
The profile wins the search; the website wins the customer. Someone finds you in the local pack, then clicks through to your site to look at your menu, your rooms, your prices, your work. If the profile is sharp and the website is slow, outdated, or missing the information they came for, you lose them at the last step - and the reverse is equally true.
The two also feed each other: a complete profile linking to a fast, well-structured website is exactly the combination that wins local search, and increasingly, AI recommendations.
This is work you can absolutely do yourself, and this guide covers everything you need. If you'd rather have it done properly while you run the business, our local SEO and Google Business Profile service handles the setup, the clean-up, and the ongoing upkeep. Either way - get in touch if you're not sure where your profile stands, and we'll take an honest look.