Your Google Business Profile is the panel that pops up on the right of Google when someone searches for your business — or on top of the map when someone searches "near me". For high-street shops, this profile is more important than your website. It's the first thing customers see, and it's the thing Google's "Local Pack" (the three map pins above the search results) is ranking.

The good news: most London shops have profiles that are 30% set up. The bad news: that's why the same five competitors keep showing up above them. Here are twelve things you can do this afternoon to fix it — all free, all in your control.

1. Claim and verify.

Half the profiles we audit aren't claimed. You can't edit anything you haven't claimed. Go to business.google.com, search for your business, and follow the verification flow (usually a postcard to your address, occasionally a video). This is the foundation — nothing else works without it.

2. Pick the right primary category.

Google ranks profiles by category as much as by name. A "Restaurant" category competes with thousands of London restaurants — but "Chicken restaurant", "Halal restaurant", "Caribbean restaurant" or "Pakistani restaurant" competes with dozens.

The trick: pick the most specific primary category that genuinely fits, then add up to nine secondary categories. So a Bangladeshi takeaway might be: Bangladeshi restaurant (primary) + Curry restaurant, Halal restaurant, Indian takeaway, Restaurant.

3. Get your name right.

The profile name should be your real business name — nothing more, nothing less. Don't stuff it ("Mo's Barbers Best Fades Bethnal Green") — Google penalises this and competitors can (and do) report it.

4. Address & service area.

If you have a shop, list the address. If you're mobile (a mobile barber, a roving photographer, a beauty therapist), hide the address and list a service area instead. Don't do both.

5. Opening hours — and special hours.

Getting opening hours right is the single biggest trust signal. Update them for:

  • Bank holidays (Easter, May Day, Late May, August, Boxing Day, New Year's Day)
  • Eid (both)
  • Christmas Eve and Christmas Day
  • Any day you close early

Customers who turn up to a closed shop because Google said you were open leave one-star reviews. They never come back.

6. Phone, website, booking link.

Add your phone number, your website (in your own name, not a Facebook page), and — if you take bookings — your booking link (Fresha, Booksy, Square, Treatwell, etc.). These three buttons on the profile are what 60% of mobile users tap.

7. Ten properly tagged photos.

Photos affect ranking. Upload:

  • Logo (square)
  • Cover image (landscape, your best exterior or interior shot)
  • Three exterior photos (different angles, daylight)
  • Three interior photos (showing your space, not just the food)
  • Three "product" photos (food, work, treatment results)

Don't use stock photos. Google can tell. So can customers.

8. Fill in Products / Services.

Most profiles skip this. Don't. Listing your menu items, your treatments, or your repair services as individual products gives Google many more keywords to match against — and your profile shows up for many more long-tail searches.

A barber listing "Skin fade", "Beard trim", "Hot towel shave", "Kids' cut", "Mid fade", "High fade" individually will rank for all of those terms. A barber who lists nothing will rank for "barber" only.

9. Set up the Q&A.

Customers can ask questions on your profile — but you can also seed the Q&A by asking and answering common ones yourself. Pre-load:

  • "Do you do halal?"
  • "Is there parking?"
  • "Do you take card?"
  • "Do I need an appointment?"
  • "Do you do walk-ins?"
  • "What's your warranty?" (for repair shops)

This stops you fielding the same five DMs all day, and it improves your ranking by adding more searchable text to your profile.

10. Post once a week.

Google's "Posts" feature is criminally underused. A post can be a special, a new menu item, an offer, an event, a "we're open Bank Holiday Monday" reminder. Each post stays live for 7 days. Posting weekly is the single biggest "active business" signal you can send to Google's ranking algorithm.

11. Reply to every review.

Every five-star: a short, specific thank you. Every one-star: a calm, professional response that addresses the issue without arguing. Reviews you ignore look like a business that doesn't care. Reviews you respond to look like a business that's still trading.

12. Build a review pipeline.

Get a QR code from your profile (Google generates one — search "review link" inside the dashboard). Print it on receipts, counter cards, takeaway bags. Make leaving a review a 5-second job. Aim for one new review per week, every week.

Quantity matters less than recency. A profile with 30 reviews from the last 12 months will outrank a profile with 200 reviews all from 2019.

The compounding effect.

None of these things, in isolation, will transform your traffic. Doing all twelve, in the same afternoon, will. Within 30–60 days you'll see your profile move up the local pack for the relevant searches in your area — sometimes a position or two, sometimes from page two to position three.

If you'd rather not spend the afternoon doing it yourself, that's exactly what our £59 Google Business Profile setup does end-to-end. And it's bundled into the £299 Launch Bundle alongside the website.