How do I get onto the map on Google?
For every local search Google shows the map first. If you're not on it you get found far less often, no matter how good the website is.
You need a Google Business Profile, filled in completely and maintained regularly. It costs nothing and does more for local businesses than almost anything else.
The other results stay deliberately unreadable — this isn't about pushing anyone out, it's about being on the map at all.
Why the map comes before the websites
Search for your own trade plus your district. At the very top there's a map section with three businesses — only below it do the websites start.
Most people click one of those three. Anyone not in there competes for whatever attention is left over.
Setting it up: the first steps
The listing is called a Google Business Profile and it's free. You create it with a Google account — use one you will keep access to, not an employee's address.
Then you have to confirm that you really exist. Depending on the trade that happens by postcard, video or phone. It takes a few days and it's the step where most people stall.
The fields that actually matter
Not every entry carries the same weight. These decide:
- The main category. It controls which searches you appear in at all — getting it wrong costs you more than anything else.
- Name, address, phone number. Written identically everywhere, including on your website and in other directories.
- Opening hours, including holidays. Wrong hours are the fastest route to a bad review.
- Services and attributes: step-free access, appointment booking, card payment. People genuinely filter by these.
Photos: which ones and how many
At least ten, none of them blurry. The outside so people can find you. The inside so they know what they're walking into. And the work itself.
Phone photos in daylight are entirely sufficient. What doesn't work: artificial light in the evening, crooked angles and pictures where nothing is recognisable.
Reviews, without begging
The most effective route is the most direct: ask satisfied customers, in the moment they're satisfied, with a link they can tap. Google provides a short link for exactly this.
To bad reviews you reply factually, briefly and without defending yourself. Not for the person who wrote it — for the twenty who read it afterwards.
What determines your position — and what doesn't
Google names three factors: distance to the searcher, relevance to the search, prominence. You can't change distance; the other two you can.
Anyone promising you a fixed position is selling air. What you control is completeness, freshness and reviews — and with most competitors that's more than enough, because they do none of it.
The most common mistake
Set it up once, never touch it again. A profile that hasn't seen a post or a new photo in two years slides down.
Ten minutes a month is enough: one photo, a short post, replies to new reviews. Nothing more is needed.
How long does verification take?
By postcard usually five to fourteen days, by video often within a few days. Until then the profile exists but isn't publicly visible.
I have two locations — do I need two profiles?
Yes, one per location with its own address and hours. Merging them makes you harder to find in both places.
Can I have a bad review removed?
Only if it breaks Google's policies, for instance insults or clearly false claims. Being negative isn't enough — and a factual reply works better than a removal anyway.
Between 300 and 3,000 € — and three things decide where you land.
For a first impression, yes. As your only home, no — and there are two solid reasons.
Written by Florenz Hardt, Berlin. If any of this stops being true, tell me — I keep these up to date.