To rank higher on Google Maps, make sure your Google Business Profile is complete, keep your business information consistent, and keep earning new customer reviews. Your website should also make it clear where you’re located and what services you offer. Location matters too, so rankings can change depending on where someone is searching from.
Start with your Google Business Profile
Your Google Business Profile is a big part of whether you show up on Google Maps. It tells Google what your business does, where you’re located, when you’re open, and how customers can reach you.
Start by making sure the basics are filled out correctly:
- Business name, street address, and main phone line
- Business hours
- Primary and secondary categories
- Website
- Services
- Photos of your business, team, or work
Don’t overthink this part. The goal is simply to give Google accurate information about your business.
One thing you don’t want to do is add keywords to your business name or choose unrelated categories because you think they’ll help you rank. Keep the profile accurate to the actual business.
Keep getting new Google reviews
Reviews matter for Google Maps, and they also matter to the people looking at your listing.
Think about how you use Google yourself. If you’re choosing between two nearby businesses and one has 150 good reviews while the other has 12, that’s probably going to affect which one you look at first.
Make asking for reviews part of your normal process. After a good experience with a customer, send them your review link and ask if they’d be willing to share how it went.
You should respond to reviews too, but there’s no need to write an essay. A quick, genuine response is plenty.
Make your location obvious on your website
Google shouldn’t have to hunt around your website to figure out where you’re located.
If you have an office, include the address where it makes sense, especially your footer and contact page. You can also embed your Google Business Profile map on important pages.
If you have more than one office, create a page for each location. Those pages can include the address, services available there, directions, and the embedded map.
Most importantly, make sure your business name, address, and phone number match what’s listed on your Google Business Profile.
Create pages for other cities you serve
Having an office in one city doesn’t mean that’s the only place you do business.
Say you’re based in Lake Mary but regularly work in Sanford, Longwood, and Winter Springs. You can build a separate page for those areas to help your website show up when people there search for what you do.
Just don’t create 30 copies of the same page and swap out the city name. Give each page unique content that a reader in that town would actually value.
Smaller nearby cities can be especially useful because there may be less competition than in your main market.
Keep your information consistent around the web
Google also learns about your business from sites beyond your own website and profile.
Your business may also appear on directories, industry websites, social profiles, and other sites. Make sure your basic information matches across them, especially your:
- Business name
- Address
- Phone number
- Website
You don’t need to sign up for hundreds of directories. Focus on established business directories and the ones that make sense for your industry.
Give your main services their own pages
If you offer several services, don’t squeeze everything onto one services page.
A landscaping company, for example, could have separate pages for lawn care, irrigation repair, tree trimming, and other major services.
This gives Google more information about what you actually do. It’s also better for potential customers. Someone searching for irrigation repair can land on a page about irrigation repair instead of digging through a general list.
Your location still matters
This is one part of Google Maps you can’t completely control.
Google considers where the person searching is located. You might show up near the top for someone a couple of miles from your office and much lower for someone on the other side of town.
That doesn’t necessarily mean anything is wrong with your SEO. Google Maps results are local, so they can change a lot depending on where the search happens.