Google Business Profile
Last updated September 2026
Google Business Profile (GBP) is the free Google listing that controls how a business appears in Google Search and Maps, its name, hours, address, photos, reviews, and posts. It is the single most influential asset in local SEO and often the first thing a searcher sees before ever reaching a website.
Google Business Profile, formerly Google My Business, is the free listing every business can claim and manage directly inside Google Search and Maps. For a local business, it is frequently the first and sometimes only touchpoint a searcher has before deciding to call or visit, which makes it disproportionately important relative to how little it costs to maintain.
01
What actually lives inside a profile
A complete profile includes accurate business categories (primary and secondary), service or product listings, hours including holiday exceptions, photos, a Q&A section, posts (short updates similar to social media), and the review stream. Each field is a ranking input as well as a trust signal to a searcher deciding whether to call.
- 01
Duplicate or conflicting listings for the same business
- 02
Wrong or overly broad primary category
- 03
Stale hours, especially around holidays
- 04
Unanswered reviews, particularly negative ones
- 05
Photos that are outdated or missing entirely
02
How Google Business Profile factors into local ranking
Local pack ranking weighs proximity, relevance (how well the profile's category and content match the query), and prominence (review signals, citation consistency, and overall reputation). A profile that is accurate, active, and well-reviewed outperforms a neglected one even when the underlying business quality is comparable, because Google is scoring the listing itself, not just the business behind it.
03
Why it matters for agencies
GBP is frequently the most neglected asset a client owns, often managed sporadically by whoever happens to be at the front desk, which makes it one of the fastest visible wins in a local SEO engagement. Conduit manages and optimizes Google Business Profiles as part of local SEO fulfillment, and ties call tracking through the profile back into the same GPS measurement foundation used across a client's other channels, so calls generated from the listing show up in the same reporting as calls from the website.
Where this applies
