Why your business is not showing on Google Maps, and what moves it up.

Find out which problem you have

Open Google Maps on your phone, switch on Incognito mode so your own history does not help, and search for the business name exactly as it is on your sign, with your town. What you see tells you which half of this guide you need:

• Nothing comes up, or only an old listing: the profile is missing, unverified, suspended, marked closed or hidden as a duplicate. Start with the next section.
• It comes up for the name, but not when you search for what you do, such as "physio" or "emergency plumber": the profile exists and ranks below others. Go to how Google decides who shows first.
• It comes up with the wrong name, pin, hours or phone number: the profile is visible and wrong. Fix the details before anything else, because a customer who rings a dead number is worse off than one who never found you.

One search is not enough for the second case, because results change with where the searcher stands. Google says the results for a search vary with time, location, device and search history. The section on checking from your customers' streets shows how to test fairly.

When the profile does not appear at all

Work through these causes in order. Each has a different fix.

• Nobody ever created or claimed the profile. Google may still hold a listing built from public information, unclaimed and incomplete. Claim it, or create one, as our setup guide describes.
• The profile was created but never verified. Google's own tips for local ranking start with verification, and your photos do not show until it is done. Sign in at business.google.com and look for a Verify button.
• The profile is suspended or disabled. Google says the public cannot reach a removed profile, and the owner cannot act on it. Sign in and read the notice, then see how to get a suspended profile back.
• Google marked it as a duplicate. A profile flagged as a duplicate does not show on Search or Maps. If you made a second profile by mistake, remove the extra one. If two real listings exist for one business, suggest a merge on Google Maps: Google says merged listings keep their reviews, though replies to reviews may be lost.
• Someone marked it closed. Anyone can suggest that a place has closed, and Google reviews the suggestion. Check too that the profile was not left temporarily closed after a holiday.
• The business is not eligible. Google gives profiles to businesses that meet customers in person during their hours. Online-only businesses, lead generation companies and rental properties do not qualify.

If the business shows, but in the wrong place, the pin is wrong. Correct it in the profile's location settings, then check walking directions to your door on a phone.

How Google decides who shows first

Google's help page on local ranking names three factors. It heads them relevance, distance and prominence, and its summary line calls the last one popularity. In plain words:

• Relevance: how well your profile matches what someone searched for. Complete, detailed information is how Google learns what you do.
• Distance: how far the business is from the person searching. When the searcher has not shared a location, Google uses what it knows about where they are.
• Prominence: how well known the business is. Google says this rests partly on how many websites link to you and how many reviews you have, and that more reviews and positive ratings can help.

Google also says there is no way to request or pay for a better local ranking. The ads at the top of the map are marked as sponsored, and buying them does not move your profile.

Of the three, you control relevance almost completely, prominence slowly and distance not at all. That tells you where to spend your time.

Why results change from street to street

Distance is why a dental practice can be first for "dentist" on its own high street and missing two miles away, where a dozen practices are closer to the person searching. That is Google working as designed, and no setting changes it.

Things people try that do not work:

• Moving the pin, or the address, nearer the town centre. The pin belongs on your real door, and an address you do not trade from breaks Google's guidelines and can get the profile suspended.
• A second profile at a virtual office or a friend's premises. Google does not accept virtual offices, and it allows one profile per location.
• Adding more service areas. Listing a town tells customers you work there. It does not bring you any closer to them.

What does work for a wider area is being the most relevant and best-known option near the people searching, and having a page on your website for each main service, which people further away can find in ordinary search results.

Check from where your customers stand

A search from your own premises is the least useful test there is, because nobody is closer to the business than you. Check from where customers are instead:

• Ask three or four customers in different parts of your area to search for your main service in Google Maps and send you a screenshot.
• When you are out on a job or a delivery, run the same search from a customer's street, on your phone, in Incognito mode.
• At your desk, drag the map to a customer's neighbourhood and search there. Treat that as rough, because Google also weighs where you really are.

Write down the search, the place, the date and the businesses above you. Use the same two or three searches each month, so you compare like with like. Paid tools repeat a search across a grid of points on a map and do the same job at scale; a single-location business can manage without one.

Then open the businesses that beat you and note what they have that you lack: a more specific category, more photos, more reviews, services listed with descriptions, hours filled in for every day. That list is your plan.

The wrong primary category

Google says the categories you choose affect your local ranking, and the primary category is the one that says what the business is. A wrong one can keep a profile out of the searches that matter, and it takes minutes to fix.

Typical mistakes: a physiotherapy clinic set up under a general medical category because it was the first suggestion; a nail bar listed as a beauty salon; a family law firm listed under a general legal category when the list offers family law. Each turns up for the wrong searches, or behind businesses that picked the specific category.

To check, search for your main service and open the top three profiles. The primary category shows under each name. If they all use one you do not, and it describes your business as well, switch to it from Edit profile, next to Business category. Google warns that editing a category may mean verifying again, so change it once, for a real reason, and then leave it.

A name that does not match the sign

Two opposite problems come from the name. If the profile uses a legal name nobody knows, such as a holding company, people searching for the name on your van or shopfront may not find it. Use the name customers know, which is also what Google's rules ask for.

The other problem is a name padded with keywords, such as a town or a service. Google's guidelines forbid it and say extra words in a name can lead to suspension, so whatever it seems to bring can end with the profile gone. When a competitor does it, suggest an edit to their name on Google Maps, with a photo of their sign. Do not copy them.

Gaps Google can see

Relevance depends on what the profile tells Google. Google's tips ask for the full address, hours including special hours, the right category and the attributes that apply, and say that inaccurate information can keep a profile out of relevant searches nearby. In practice that means:

• Every service you want to be found for, each with a short description.
• Hours for every day, and special hours for each holiday.
• A description that says what you do and where, in plain words.
• Photos of the outside, the inside and real work, added through the year.
• The website link pointing to the matching page, such as the location page for a business with several.

A worked example. A tyre and brake garage wants to be found for "MOT near me". Its profile lists tyres and nothing else, its website has no MOT page, and its Saturday hours stop at noon although it tests cars until 4pm. Each gap is a small fix, and together they give Google a reason to show the garage for that search.

Reviews and links take longest

Prominence is the slow factor, and the one with no shortcuts. Google names two signals behind it: how many reviews you have, with their ratings, and how many websites link to your business.

For reviews, ask every customer the same way, soon after the visit, with a direct link. Google's rules ban rewards for reviews and asking only the customers you expect to be happy, and it removes reviews that break them. The review request rules cover what is allowed. Reply to each review too, because the next customer reads your replies.

For links, start with the organisations you already deal with: suppliers who list stockists or approved installers, your trade body, the chamber of commerce, local news, the clubs you sponsor. How a local business gets links from other websites goes through them, and through the offers to refuse.

Both take months, and nobody can promise a position at the end. Anyone who promises a top-three place on the map is selling something Google says cannot be bought.

Your website feeds the profile

Google builds its picture of a business partly from pages it crawls, including the business's own website. A site that names the business the same way, lists the same hours and phone number, and has a page for each main service gives Google more to match against searches, and gives a customer who taps through a reason to call.

Structured data on the site states your name, address and hours in a form Google reads directly; schema markup for a local business explains it. If the website itself is missing from Google, that is a separate problem with its own fixes, covered in why your website is not showing up on Google.

Read what the profile already tells you

The Performance page in your Business Profile shows how many people viewed the profile and what they did: calls, direction requests, website clicks and, with a booking partner, bookings. It also lists the search terms that showed your profile, which Google updates at the start of each month.

Read the search terms first. If nearly all of them are your business name, people find you only when they already know you, and the category, services and reviews are where to work. If service searches appear but calls do not follow, the profile is seen and not chosen: look at the photos, the reviews and the hours.

On our Growth plan, a monthly look at your Google results, reviews and enquiries comes in plain words, as the prices page lists.

The order to work through

• Search your exact name in Google Maps, in Incognito mode.
• If nothing shows, look for a missing, unverified, suspended, closed or duplicate profile, in that order.
• Correct any wrong name, pin, hours or phone number.
• Compare your primary category with the businesses that rank above you.
• Fill in services, hours, special hours, attributes and photos.
• Make the name, hours and phone number on your website match.
• Ask every customer for a review, and reply to each one.
• Check the same few searches from customers' streets once a month.

If you want a paid place at the top while this work takes effect, see Local Services Ads or Google Ads for a trade business. Ads are labelled as ads and do not change where your profile ranks.