Check whether Google already has a listing for you
Plenty of businesses are on Google Maps before the owner ever signs up, because Google builds places from public information and from Maps users who add them. Start with a search before you sign up for anything. Look up your business on Google Maps by name, then by phone number, then by street address. If a listing appears with an "Own this business?" link, claim that one. A second profile for the same business breaks Google's guidelines and splits your reviews between two listings.
Search more than one spelling of the name. Our own listing is titled "Speed 2 Leads", with spaces, while our website and domain spell it speed2leads. When we audited our own site in August, the check that matched on the website spelling reported we had no Google profile at all. The listing was there the whole time under the other spelling, and a customer typing the name the way it appears on your website can miss yours the same way.
What you need before you create the profile
Google's guidelines say the name should be your real-world name, as used on your storefront, website and stationery and as customers know you. Adding a service or a city to it ("Joe's Plumbing Denver Water Heaters") is against the rules. Put that effort into the category instead, which Google asks you to choose as specifically as possible. Our guide to the fields that decide map pack eligibility covers categories in detail.
The address rules are strict. To qualify at all, a business has to make in-person contact with customers during its stated hours. Google says a virtual office, meaning a rented mailing address you don't operate from, isn't eligible, and P.O. boxes or mailboxes at remote locations aren't acceptable either. A desk in a co-working space only counts if it has clear signage, receives customers during business hours and is staffed by your own people.
Use a phone number that someone picks up during the hours you list, and a website address that matches the name on the profile.
Storefront or service area?
If customers come to you, as they do at a salon, a shop or a clinic, list the address. If you go to them, the way a plumber or a mobile detailer does, Google's instruction is to remove the address and enter only your service area. A shop that also makes house calls can show its address and add service areas.
Google allows up to 20 service areas, which can be cities, ZIP codes or wider regions, and says the overall boundary shouldn't reach past about two hours of driving time from where the business is based. A plumber based in Sacramento who lists every city in California is outside that guideline, however far the van actually goes.
How does Google verify a business?
You don't get to pick the method. Google offers options based on your business type, region, public information and hours, and the list can differ from one business to the next. The methods are a code by phone call or text, a code by email, a recorded video, a live video call with a Google representative (only available during your listed business hours), or a postcard with a code mailed to the address.
Google's published timelines are worth knowing before you start. Verification reviews take up to five business days, and occasionally longer. Most postcards arrive within 14 days, and every code expires after 30 days, so request a postcard only when someone will be checking that mailbox. The video options ask you to show the business and that you run it, and Google explains what the video needs to include when it offers that option.
Why a verified business still might not show up
Once the profile is verified, a search for your exact business name should bring it up. A search for "electrician" or "dentist near me" works differently. Google says it ranks local results on relevance, distance and prominence, which means a new listing competes against every verified business nearby for those searches, and usually starts behind the ones with years of reviews.
If even a name search finds nothing, check the dashboard first. A profile can still be under review, it can be suspended (the dashboard says so), or a duplicate listing can be pulling the searches and reviews that should be going to yours.
How we set it up
We set profiles up so they match Google's guidelines from the first day: the real name, the most specific category, a service area configured honestly for businesses that travel, and a website whose name, address, phone number and schema agree with the listing. That groundwork is the start of our local SEO work, which then keeps the profile competitive with regular posts and a steady review flow.