Google Business Profile checklist for AI recommendations

Why your Google profile matters for AI

Google’s Gemini can draw on Google Maps and Business Profile information when it answers local questions. Other assistants, such as ChatGPT, use their own web searches, which often turn up the same facts through review sites, directories and your website. Either way, a complete, accurate profile that matches everything else about you is the foundation.

We cannot tell you exactly how much weight any assistant gives your profile. Nobody outside the AI companies can. But a half-finished profile is one of the most common gaps we see.

The checklist

• Verified and owned by you, not a former employee or an old agency. If you cannot get in, use Google’s process to request access.
• Your real business name, exactly as it appears on your van, sign or invoices. Do not add towns or keywords to the name: it breaks Google’s guidelines and can get a profile suspended.
• The right primary category, plus extra categories only for things you really do.
• Every service you offer listed separately, in the words customers use, with a short description each.
• A real address, or a service area that lists only the towns you genuinely cover. Virtual offices are not allowed.
• Opening hours that are right today, including Saturdays, bank holidays and any emergency or out-of-hours work.
• The attributes that apply to you, such as wheelchair access, free quotes or online appointments. People ask AI about exactly these things.
• A description that says what you do, for whom and where, in plain English. No keyword lists.
• Recent photos of your own work, premises, team or van. Not stock photos.
• The same phone number and website address as everywhere else.

Reviews: steady, real and answered

Send every happy customer a short message with your review link after the job. Reviews that mention the job and the place are the most useful to the next customer, and give an assistant specific detail.

Reply to every review, good or bad, politely and briefly. Never buy, write or swap reviews, and never offer anything in return for a good one: it breaks Google’s rules and UK consumer law.

Keep it current

Put a reminder in your diary each month: check your hours, add a few new photos, and make sure your services list still matches what you do. If you change your phone number or move, update Google first, then your website and directories, so they all agree.