Why a finished Google Business Profile still beats more ad spend

When a local business wants more customers, the first idea is usually to spend more on ads. Ads work for as long as the budget lasts. The Google Business Profile, the panel with the map, the opening hours and the reviews that appears when someone searches for a business or for something nearby, keeps working after the budget stops, and it costs nothing to create.

A lot of these profiles are half finished: a category chosen in a hurry, opening hours that were right two years ago, a handful of photos and reviews nobody has answered. Filling those gaps is often the cheapest improvement a local business can make.

How Google decides what to show

Google says local results are mainly based on three things. Relevance is how well a profile matches what someone searched for. Distance is how far the business is from the person searching. Prominence is how well known the business is, which Google judges partly from links to it on other websites and from how many reviews it has.

The same help page is blunt about money: "There's no way to request or pay for a better local ranking on Google." Ads appear in places of their own and are marked as ads, and Google's explanation of its advertising says nobody can buy a better place in the unpaid results.

Distance you cannot change. Relevance and prominence are almost entirely in the owner's hands, and a complete profile is where both start. Google puts it simply: businesses with complete and accurate information are more likely to show up in local search results.

What a finished profile has

The right primary category

Google says the categories you choose affect your local ranking, and asks for as few as possible. Its guidelines offer a good test: the category should finish the sentence "this business is a", not "this business has a". A restaurant with a bar is a restaurant.

Hours that are true this week

Regular hours, and special hours for public holidays. Google suggests confirming holiday hours even when they match the usual ones, so a customer never has to wonder whether you are open.

Photos of the real place and the real work

Google's advice is that photos help complete a profile and show customers what you offer. They only appear once the profile is verified, which is one more reason to finish verification first.

Replies to reviews, good and bad

Google notes that helpful replies show customers you are responsive. A calm, specific answer to a bad review often does more for the next person reading it than the review itself did harm.

One thing to avoid is offering discounts or gifts in exchange for reviews. Google treats incentivised reviews as fake content and prohibits them.

Where ads still fit

Ads are useful for a launch, a seasonal offer or a service people do not yet search for by name. They buy extra attention on top of a presence that already works. Paying for clicks that land on a profile with the wrong hours and unanswered reviews means paying to show people the weakest version of the business.

A short checklist

• Claim the profile and verify it.
• Choose one primary category that finishes the sentence "this business is a".
• Check the address, the phone number and the link to your website.
• Set regular hours, and special hours before every public holiday.
• Add photos of the premises, the team and the work, and keep adding new ones.
• Reply to every new review within a few days.
• Ask happy customers for a review, without offering anything in return.

None of this needs a budget. Done properly once and kept up for an hour a month, it means the money you later spend on ads sends people to a profile that is ready for them.