In October 2026 we sat down with our own Google Business Profile and went through it field by field. For a business that builds websites for a living, it was in worse shape than we'd like to admit: the wrong category, no description, no hours, no photos and no link to our website.
This is the checklist we worked through, in the order we did it, with what we found on our profile and what we changed. It's written for Central Coast businesses because that's where we're based and where most of our service areas sit, but every step applies anywhere in Australia. You don't need to pay anyone to do this. You need an hour or two and access to your profile at business.google.com.
Where our profile started
Here's what our profile looked like on 4 October 2026, before we touched it:
- Primary category: Web hosting company. Hosting is something we do, but it isn't what most people type when they need a website.
- Additional categories: none.
- Description and opening date: both empty.
- Website: empty. The profile had 285 views and nowhere for any of those people to click through to.
- Hours: set to "Open with no main hours", which shows no hours at all.
- Service area: a single entry, Central Coast NSW.
- Photos, services, products, posts and reviews: none.
The name and phone number were right, and the street address was hidden, which is correct for a business that doesn't have customers walk in. Everything else needed work.
The setup checklist
1. Use your real business name, and nothing else
Your profile name should match the name on your signage, invoices and website. Ours is Greenshoots Media, and it stayed Greenshoots Media. It's tempting to make it "Greenshoots Media Web Design Central Coast", but stuffing keywords into the name goes against Google's guidelines for representing your business and can get a profile suspended.
2. Pick the primary category people actually search for
The primary category tells Google what kind of business you are. Choose the one closest to what your customers type, not the one that sounds most impressive. We changed ours from Web hosting company to Web Designer.
One catch: category names vary by country. The "Website designer" category we planned to use doesn't exist in Australia, so we picked Google's Australian equivalent. Start typing in the category box and use what Google offers.
Then add additional categories that genuinely describe your work. Ours are Web hosting company, Internet marketing service, Software company, E-commerce service and Marketing agency. Only add categories you'd be happy to be found for.
3. Write the description for customers, not for Google
You get 750 characters. Use them to say what you do, who you do it for and where, in plain English. Leave out links and prices, which Google's rules don't allow there.
Ours came in at 746 characters. It covers websites, Shopify stores, AI chatbots, web apps, iPhone apps and automation, says what our managed hosting includes, and says we're in Bateau Bay and work with businesses across the Central Coast and the rest of Australia.
4. Add your opening date
It's a small field, but it tells customers how long you've been around. Ours is February 2019.
5. Link your website, and tag the link
An empty website field is the most expensive gap a profile can have: people find you, want to know more, and have nowhere to go. Add your homepage, and add a tracking tag (a UTM parameter) to the end of the link so clicks from your profile show up as their own source in your website analytics. Ours ends in ?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=gbp.
We did the same with the appointment link, so a "Book" click on the profile lands on our book a call page and is counted separately from everything else.
6. Set a service area, and keep your home address private
If customers don't come to you, you can hide your address and list the areas you serve instead. Google allows up to 20 service areas. We list 19: the Central Coast as a whole; suburbs from Bateau Bay, The Entrance and Long Jetty through Wyong, Toukley, Gosford, Terrigal and Woy Woy; plus Lake Macquarie, Newcastle and Sydney. Only list places you genuinely work.
7. Put in real opening hours
"Open with no main hours" sounds flexible, but it means the profile shows no hours at all, so it can't tell anyone you're open right now. Ours now reads Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm, closed on weekends, which matches our website. If your hours change over Christmas, set special hours rather than editing your normal ones.
8. List every service, with a proper description
We added all 15 of our services, each with a description under Google's 300-character limit. Two lessons from doing it:
- Be careful with the price field. A bare price with no "per month" reads like a one-off cost. For our monthly add-ons we left the price field empty and explained the monthly price in the description instead.
- Free things count. Our free SEO audit and free consultation call are listed as services marked Free. They're often the easiest first step for a new customer.
9. Upload real photos of your work
We uploaded a logo, a cover image and 21 photos of real work: client websites, online stores, a chatbot running on a client's site, apps and a factory dashboard. Real work tells a customer far more than a stock photo of a laptop, so leave stock images out.
One practical warning. Our batch upload reported an error, so we uploaded again, but the first batch had gone through. Eleven photos ended up on the profile twice. If an upload says it failed, refresh the page and check before you retry.
10. Connect your other profiles, and keep the details identical
We set up a Facebook page the same day, with the same name, phone number, hours and service area, and added it to the Google profile. Then we pointed our own website's structured data at both, so the profile, the page and the website all clearly describe the same business. Keep your name, phone number and area identical everywhere. Small differences between sites only create doubt about which one is right.
11. Turn on the attributes that apply
Attributes are the small yes-or-no facts on a profile. We switched on online appointments. Some attributes we expected, like online estimates and onsite services, simply aren't offered for our categories. That's normal: the list depends on your category, so look again whenever you change it.
The ongoing part: posts and reviews
Everything above is a one-off job. Two things are never finished.
12. Post regularly
Posts are short updates that appear on your profile: a new service, a recent job, a seasonal reminder. Pair each one with a real photo and a button that links to the right page on your website. Keep phone numbers out of the post text, as Google may reject posts that include them. The call button on your profile already does that job.
13. Ask for reviews, the right way
Reviews were the biggest single gap on our profile. The rules for asking are simple:
- Get your short review link from the profile (look for "Ask for reviews") and send it to customers personally.
- Ask the people you've worked with, not only the ones you expect to be happy.
- Never offer a discount, gift or anything else in return. Incentivised reviews break Google's rules for reviews.
- Reply to every review, good or bad, within a few days.
If Greenshoots has built or looked after something for you, here's our review link. A sentence about what we did is perfect.
The whole checklist in one place
- Real business name, no extra keywords
- Primary category that matches what customers search, plus honest additional categories
- A plain-English description, no links or prices
- Opening date
- Website and booking links, each with a UTM tag
- Service areas you genuinely work in, home address hidden
- Real opening hours, with special hours for holidays
- Every service listed and described, careful with price fields
- Logo, cover and real photos of your work (check before re-uploading)
- Facebook and other profiles linked, details identical everywhere
- Attributes that apply to your category
- A regular post with a photo and a button
- Reviews asked for honestly, and every one answered
When the profile isn't enough
A complete profile gives Google what it needs to show you for local searches; Google's own tips for improving your local ranking cover the same ground: complete details, accurate hours, photos and reviews. It works best when the website it links to backs it up: pages that say clearly what you do and where, load quickly on a phone, and make it easy to call or book.
If you're not sure how your site stacks up, run our free SEO audit on your website for a plain-English report. If your profile looks fine but your site still isn't turning up, our guide to why a website doesn't show on Google walks through the checks we ran on our own site. If you'd rather hand it over, our local SEO and Google Business Profile management looks after the profile and the website together. And if the website itself is the problem, see how we approach web design on the Central Coast.