Google Business Profile for builders: the service-area set-up that ranks

A builder's Google Business Profile is a service-area business: the customer's house is the workplace, so the address is hidden and the service area is set to the towns you take jobs in. Get that, the primary category, the services list and the photos right and the profile does most of the work of getting into the map pack. Get the address wrong and Google suspends it. Here is the set-up, in the order it matters.

1. Service-area business, address hidden

Unless you have a yard or office customers visit, the profile is a service-area business. The address is entered for verification and hidden from the public; the service area is the towns and districts you genuinely work in, up to Google's limit. A visible home address on a builder's profile is the most common cause of suspension we see, and a service area that covers half of England is the second.

2. Primary category, then the true additional ones

The primary category is the strongest single factor and it should be the job you want most: general contractor for most firms, or home builder, remodeler, or the specialism. Then add every additional category that is true: kitchen remodeler, bathroom remodeler, masonry contractor, excavating contractor, roofing contractor. Each one is a set of searches you can appear in. Do not add ones you do not do; the reviews and the photos have to back the categories up.

3. Services, with from-prices where you use them

Google's predefined services list moved up the ranking-factor surveys sharply this year, and almost no builder fills it in. Tick everything you do from the list, add your own in plain words (rear extensions, loft conversions, garage conversions, driveways), and add from-prices where you quote from a figure. Prices filter the price-checkers and reassure the serious.

4. Photos of jobs, not the van

Ten photos of finished jobs taken from the pavement, captioned with the job and the town, outrank one of the van. Add before-and-after pairs from the same spot; they are the best content a builder has. Add the team on a site, once. Keep adding a finished job a month; a profile with new photos looks like a firm that is working.

5. Description, hours, phone, website link

A description in plain words: what you build, where, how long you have been doing it, what you are known for. Hours that reflect when the phone is answered, not when the site is open. The number that rings on a mobile. The website link pointing at the site, tagged so Search Console shows what the profile sends; a Facebook page as the website link tells Google you have nothing better.

6. Questions and answers, seeded by you

The profile has a public Q&A that anyone can post to. Seed it with the questions every first call asks: do you do extensions, do you handle planning, how far do you travel, how long is the wait. Answer them yourself. Empty, it fills with strangers' questions or nothing.

7. Reviews: the routine, not the burst

One review at every handover, with the job and the town in it, replied to within a day. No incentives, no gating, no staff accounts. A steady flow of two or three a month, every month, is what moves the map; a burst of ten in a week gets some removed and looks like what it is.

8. Keep it right

Google changes the categories and the services list, competitors stuff keywords into their names, and a profile drifts. Once a quarter: categories and services re-checked, service area matched to where you actually worked, new photos added and old ones retired, spam profiles in your area reported. That is the upkeep part of the retainer, and the one-off build is the same work done once.