Search for any local service in Devon and look at what Google shows first: the map, with three businesses beside it. Stars, photos, opening hours, a call button. Many customers choose from that panel without ever visiting a website.
That panel is powered by Google Business Profiles, and the difference between appearing there and not is mostly effort — the profiles that win are complete, accurate and active. Here is how to make yours one of them.
Claim and verify your profile
Search for your business name on Google. If a listing appears, claim it via “Own this business?”. If nothing appears, create a profile at business.google.com. Verification is usually by postcard, phone or video — follow whichever route Google offers.
If you work from home or serve customers at their premises — most trades, mobile services — set the profile up as a service-area business: hide your address and define the towns or postcodes you cover. That is the correct, policy-compliant setup, and it does not disadvantage you in the map results for your area.
Choose categories carefully
Your primary category is the strongest single signal you control. Be precise: “Plumber”, not “Contractor”; “Barber shop”, not “Hair salon” if you are a barber. Then add relevant secondary categories for other services you genuinely offer.
Check what categories your best-ranking competitors use — visible on their listings — and be as specific as the options allow. Wrong or vague categories are the most common self-inflicted ranking wound we see on Devon profiles.
Write a clear, natural description
You have 750 characters. Use plain language: what you do, who for, where. Mention your main services and area naturally — “family-run fish and chip shop in Teignmouth” — and skip the keyword cramming; the description is for humans, and stuffing it violates Google’s guidelines anyway.
Complete every other field while you are there: services with descriptions, opening hours (keep holiday hours current — wrong hours generate bad reviews), attributes like wheelchair access or free wifi, and a link to your website. Deep links help too: your menu page from the menu field, your booking page from the booking field.
Photos: the underrated ranking and conversion factor
Profiles with plentiful, recent, real photos earn dramatically more clicks and calls than sparse ones. Photograph what customers want to check: the outside (so they can find you), the inside (so they know what to expect), your work, your food, your team. Phone photos in good light are perfectly adequate.
Add a few new photos each month rather than fifty once. Recency signals an active business — to Google and to customers reading “is this place still going?” from a profile whose last photo is four years old.
Reviews: volume, recency and responses
Reviews influence both ranking and the customer’s choice. Build a simple routine: ask at the moment of satisfaction, make it effortless (Google provides a direct review link you can put in a text, an email or a QR code), and keep asking — steady recent reviews beat a big stale pile.
Respond to every review briefly. Thank the good ones; answer the bad ones calmly and factually — future customers read your response more carefully than the complaint. And never buy, fake or filter reviews: detection is real and the penalties outlast the shortcut.
Keep it alive: the monthly routine
- Add two or three new photos
- Post an update if you have one — an offer, a seasonal change, news
- Check and answer any new questions in the Q&A section
- Verify hours are still correct, especially around holidays
- Respond to new reviews
Fifteen minutes a month, honestly. The profiles in Devon’s map packs are rarely the best businesses — they are the best-maintained profiles. That is fixable.
The profile needs a website behind it
Google cross-references your profile against your website, and customers do the same. A complete profile pointing at a slow, thin or absent website underperforms on both counts. The two are one system: the profile wins the glance, the website wins the decision.
If the website half of your system needs work, that is what we do — web design with local search built in, and SEO services that include exactly the profile work described in this guide, done for you.
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