Key points
- Google ranks local results mainly on relevance, distance and prominence
- A complete, accurate Google Business Profile is the starting point
- Your website and your profile should say exactly the same thing
How Google picks local results
Google says local results are based mainly on three things:
- Relevance: how well your profile matches the search
- Distance: how far you are from the person searching, or from the area they named
- Prominence: how well known you are, from reviews, links and mentions across the web
Get your Google Business Profile right
- Choose the most accurate primary category; it matters more than any description
- Fill in hours, services, service area and photos, and keep holiday hours up to date
- Use your real business name without extra keywords; Google can suspend profiles that stuff them in
- Post updates and answer questions from time to time, so the profile looks active
Make your website agree with your profile
Google trusts a business more when the same facts appear everywhere. Your website should show the same name, address and phone as your profile, link to it, and use LocalBusiness structured data. One clear page per location works better than one page listing every branch.
Running a business in Sarawak? See SEO in Kuching for our local results.
Reviews: the part you control most
Reviews help both your prominence and the customer's decision. Ask every happy customer, make it easy with a review link or a QR code at the counter, and reply to reviews politely, including the bad ones.
Common mistakes
- Two profiles for the same shop, which splits your reviews (ask Google to remove the duplicate)
- A different phone number on the website and on the profile
- No address or map on the website, so Google can't connect it to the profile
- Buying fake reviews: it breaks Google's rules and can get the profile suspended