Setting up Google Business Profile for a business that travels to the customer

A business that travels to customers sets up its Google Business Profile as a service-area business. Hide or limit the address and list the real areas you serve. Choose a precise main category and add photographs of finished work. Answer calls and reply to reviews. Customers searching "plumber near me" at 9 pm judge you by the profile in front of them, not by a shop front they cannot walk into.

Why the usual advice does not fit

Many Google Business Profile guides assume a shop. They talk about opening hours at the counter, a storefront photograph and parking. A plumber, a home cleaner or a landscape contractor has a van, a phone and a list of localities.

The profile has to answer different questions. Does this person come to my area? Do they do my kind of job? Does someone pick up? Does the work look good? Each section of the profile should answer one of these.

Step by step

1. Create the profile and choose "service area" if asked. Google offers options for businesses that visit customers, and the screens change over time, so follow what it shows. If you work from home, you can generally choose not to display the address.
2. Pick the main category with care. The main category tells Google and customers what you are. A specific one, such as "Plumber", describes a plumbing business better than "Home services", and "House cleaning service" is clearer than "Cleaning service" if you only do homes. Check which categories your own account offers. Add other categories only for work you really do.
3. List the areas you serve. Use localities, not the whole city. Start with the area around your base and the ones where you are happy to go at short notice.
4. Write the description plainly. Say what you do, where, and what happens on the first call. No slogans.
5. Add services. List each job: "Tap and mixer replacement", "Kitchen deep cleaning", "Lawn laying". Add short descriptions where the profile allows.
6. Set hours that you will keep. If you answer until 8 pm, say so. If emergencies are possible after hours, say how a customer can reach you, and only if you will answer.
7. Add photographs. See below.
8. Verify. Follow the prompts; methods vary. If one fails, try another and do not create a duplicate profile.

Photographs: show the work, not the van

A home service profile earns trust from photographs of finished work, a team in uniform, the tools and the van with the name on it. A customer cannot visit your shop, so the photographs are the shop.

Take them on the job, with the customer's permission, and avoid showing the family, the house number or valuables. Before-and-after pairs work well for cleaning and repair. A short caption helps: "Bathroom leak repaired, Koramangala" shows area and work in a few words.

Do not use stock photos. A customer who recognises a bathroom photograph from another firm's page will stop trusting yours.

Replies decide more than ranking

You can have a well-built profile and lose the job if the call goes unanswered. A customer who calls from a profile and gets no answer may try the next listing.

Decide who answers. If you are on a ladder, set a message that goes out on a missed call: "Sorry, I am on a job. I will ring you back at [a time you control]." Then ring back at that time. The post on taking the first call gives the words for that conversation.

Reply to reviews by name, in a sentence or two. A reply to a complaint should say what you will do, not argue. Future customers read the reply as much as the review.

An example: a plumber in Mysuru

Here is an invented case. A plumber in Mysuru works from home in one locality and travels across the city. The first profile shows the home address and the whole city as the service area. Calls come from far-off neighbourhoods and most are declined, and strangers start stopping outside the house.

The plumber fixes the profile in three changes: hides the address, narrows the service area to the six localities within a half-hour ride, and sets the main category to "Plumber". Eight photographs of finished jobs are added, taken with permission, and every customer is asked for a review as the tools are packed. Fewer calls arrive and more of them are jobs the plumber takes, but evening calls from the old far-off areas drop away and some of that work is lost. The details are illustrative; your own locality list will differ.

What a profile cannot do

A profile does not make a business appear at the top, and nobody can promise a position. How Google ranks listings depends on distance, relevance and the profile's prominence, and the weights change. What you control is accuracy, completeness and responsiveness.

Skip heavy effort on the profile if your work comes entirely from builders, housing societies or repeat clients. A neat profile helps, but those buyers find you another way, and your time may pay better in a call to the society's committee.

If you offer work that rules regulate, such as electrical or gas work, describe only what you are licensed or permitted to do. The rules differ by state and body and change, so check with your own adviser or regulator.

This evening

Search your own trade and locality on your phone, as a customer would. Note what the first three profiles show and where yours falls short: category, areas, photographs, hours, reviews. Fix the first gap tonight. For the general settings that apply to any business, see our post on how to optimise a Google Business Profile, and our home services page shows how the profile, the call and the follow-up connect. If you want a hand with the whole profile, Google Business Profile management is the related service, and you can tell us what you need.