Profile completion — every field, no exceptions.
Google rewards profiles that are fully filled in. Most Irish SME profiles I audit are 40–60% complete. Closing that gap usually moves Map Pack rankings before you do anything else.
The Google Business Profile algorithm reads completeness as a trust signal. Empty fields don't just look unprofessional — they actively suppress your ranking. The good news: this is a one-time fix. Two hours of work and you're done forever.
The complete profile checklist
- Business name — exact legal name. No keyword stuffing ("Joe's Plumbing Dublin Best Cheap"). Google will suspend you.
- Primary category — the single closest match. This is the biggest ranking lever in the entire profile.
- Secondary categories — add 3–8 relevant ones. Each one opens rankings for new search terms.
- Service area or address — physical premises = address visible. Service-area business (SAB) = list the towns/postcodes you cover.
- Phone number — local Irish landline preferred over mobile if you have one. Match your website exactly.
- Website URL — the homepage, not the GBP-hosted page.
- Hours of operation — including special hours for bank holidays and Christmas.
- From the business / description — 750 characters, written for humans first, with your primary keyword in the first sentence.
- Services list — every individual service you offer, with a short description on each.
- Products (if you have any) — even for service businesses, "products" can be productised packages.
- Attributes — accessibility, payment types, women-owned, family-friendly, etc.
- Appointment / booking link — if you take bookings online, wire it directly.
A fully completed profile gets 7× more direction requests and 5× more enquiries than a partially completed one — same business, same reviews, just fields filled in. The 2 hours of work pay back within the first week.
Category selection — the lever most SMEs get wrong
Your primary category is the single biggest factor in which searches you appear for. Picking "Web Designer" vs "Website Designer" vs "Web Design Company" changes which queries trigger your profile. Go specific over generic. A dental practice should pick "Dentist" as primary, not "Doctor". A bathroom fitter picks "Bathroom Remodeler" not "Contractor".
For secondary categories: add anything you genuinely do. A gym might add "Personal Trainer", "Yoga Studio", "Pilates Studio", "Boxing Gym" — each one opens a new search pathway. Don't add categories you don't actually offer — Google's review and suggestion system will catch you and suppress the profile.
Reviews — the algorithm's strongest local signal.
Google's local algorithm weights reviews more heavily than any other signal outside category and proximity. Quantity, recency, average rating, and review velocity all stack. Most Irish SMEs ignore this entirely and wonder why they don't rank.
Pull up your three biggest local competitors in Google Maps right now. Count their reviews. That's the bar. If they're at 60 and you're at 8, you don't have a ranking problem — you have a review collection problem.
The 4-signal review formula Google reads
Quantity — total reviews
Match or beat the top 3 competitors in your local pack. For most Dublin SME niches that's 30–80 reviews. For central Dublin trades and restaurants, expect 100–200.
Recency — reviews this month
A profile with 50 reviews that all arrived between 2020 and 2022 ranks worse than one with 25 reviews evenly spread across the last 24 months. Google reads stale review profiles as inactive businesses.
Average rating — 4.5+ is competitive
Below 4.0 actively hurts rankings. Above 4.7 starts to look implausible to Google and may trigger spam review filtering. Sweet spot is 4.5–4.8 with a mix of 5, 4, and the occasional 3.
Velocity — steady stream, not spikes
Collecting 30 reviews in one week then nothing for 6 months is worse than 3 reviews per month for a year. Google's spam filter triggers on velocity spikes. Aim for 3–5 per month, every month.
The review request that actually converts
Most "please review us" templates get 5–10% conversion. A specific, personal request gets 25–40%. The pattern: send within 2 hours of service completion, reference what you actually did, name the customer, ask for a small thing.
"Hi [Name] — Dusan here. Thanks for letting us [redesign your homepage / fit the en-suite / handle the audit] today. If you've got 30 seconds, a quick Google review would mean a lot for the business: [your GBP short link]. No pressure either way."
Responding to reviews — the part everyone skips
Google's algorithm reads engagement. Profiles that respond to every review within 48 hours rank better than profiles with double the review count that respond to none. Set a recurring 5-minute slot in your week. Respond to every review — including 5-stars. "Thanks Sarah, delighted you're happy with the kitchen — let us know when you're ready for the en-suite" beats silence every time.
Handling negative reviews — don't panic, respond once
A 1-star or 2-star handled well is more credible than a wall of 5-stars. Respond once, factually, public-facing, polite: "Sorry this didn't go to plan. We were on-site [date] doing [work], and our notes show [fact]. We've reached out directly to put this right — please reply if anything is still unresolved." Don't argue. Don't get defensive. Don't reply twice. Move on.
Posts — the weekly signal that keeps your profile alive.
GBP posts are the most under-used feature on the platform. Two posts a week, every week, for a year separates the profiles that climb from the profiles that stall.
GBP posts appear directly in the Map Pack card when someone searches your business or your category. A fresh post with a specific offer, a project photo, or an upcoming event converts Map Pack impressions into website clicks at 2–3× the rate of a profile with no recent posts. They also signal to Google that you're an active operating business — a real ranking factor in 2026.
The 4 post types Google supports
- What's New — general updates, behind-the-scenes, recent work. The everyday post.
- Offer — discount, package deal, limited-time pricing. Includes a button and an expiry date.
- Event — workshop, open day, launch, seasonal promotion. Start/end dates, location.
- Product — for businesses with productised offers; appears in the Products tab and Map Pack carousel.
The 2-posts-per-week rotation that works
Plan one What's New post and one Offer or Event post per week. That's it. Pull from real things happening in the business — a recent project, a customer testimonial, a behind-the-scenes shot, a special this week. Don't manufacture content. Real beats polished.
Hook (first 80 characters appear in preview) → context (1–2 sentences) → specific number or detail → clear CTA + button. Example: "New kitchen finished in Ranelagh this week. Full strip-out, marble worktops, replumbed in 7 working days. Free quote on yours — link below." Photo. Button: Learn More → /services or /contact.
Posting cadence — what actually moves the needle
Minimum: 2 posts per week. Optimum: 3 posts per week. Maximum useful: 5 per week (diminishing returns above that). The single biggest cadence error is starting strong and stopping after 4 weeks. Google notices the drop. Set a recurring 15-min slot, batch the week's posts on a Monday, schedule them out via a tool or post manually as they're needed.
Photos — the trust signal that beats words.
GBP profiles with 100+ photos get 540% more searches than profiles with 0–10 photos. Photos are the cheapest trust signal in your entire marketing stack.
Google reads photo upload frequency as another freshness signal. Profiles uploading 2–4 new photos per week consistently outrank profiles that uploaded 50 photos once in 2023 and never since.
The photo categories you need to fill
- Logo — square, high-res, transparent background where possible.
- Cover photo — landscape, brand-on, the photo that appears at the top of your profile.
- Interior / exterior shots — show the premises. SABs upload van shots, on-site action.
- Team photos — the people who do the work. Builds trust faster than any testimonial.
- Work-in-progress / completed projects — before/after, on-site action, finished deliverables.
- Products and services — what people are actually buying.
- 360° photos (where applicable) — interior of premises, virtual tour. Worth doing once.
The cadence — 2 photos per week, every week
Don't dump 80 photos in one go. Upload 2 fresh photos a week from real work. Phone camera quality is fine — Google doesn't filter on quality, it filters on activity. A grainy phone shot from yesterday outranks a polished stock photo from 2023 every time.
Photos taken on a phone with location services enabled carry EXIF geo-data. Google reads this to confirm you're actually operating in the service area you claim. For SABs especially, this is one of the few ways Google verifies you actually work where you say you work. Leave location services on when taking work photos.
Q&A and messaging — the features SMEs forget exist.
Two GBP features that almost nobody uses: the public Q&A section, and direct messaging. Both move rankings and conversion. Both take 15 minutes to set up.
Q&A — seed your own questions
The Q&A section sits on your profile and lets anyone ask a public question. You can ask the questions yourself (using a personal Google account) and then answer them as the business. This is not against guidelines — Google explicitly supports owner-seeded Q&A for FAQs.
Seed 8–12 questions covering the things real customers ask you on the phone: "Do you offer free quotes?", "What areas do you serve?", "How long does a typical project take?", "Do you offer evening appointments?", "What's your minimum job size?" Each answer is a chance to include keywords naturally and to pre-handle objections before a call ever happens.
Messaging — turn it on, set expectations
GBP messaging lets customers text you directly from the Map Pack card. Turn it on. Set a realistic response-time expectation in your welcome message ("We reply within business hours, typically under 2 hours"). Google's algorithm reads response time — fast responders rank slightly higher and Google displays the response time publicly, which is a conversion signal in itself.
SMEs running all 5 pillars consistently for 6 months typically see: 3–5× increase in profile views, 2–4× increase in direction requests, 2–3× increase in calls, and a measurable jump from "buried" to Top 3 in the Map Pack on primary local terms. Zero outside spend. The full system is free — it costs only time and consistency.
The weekly 30-minute GBP routine
- 10 min — write and publish 2 GBP posts (1 What's New, 1 Offer/Event)
- 5 min — upload 2 fresh photos from the week's work
- 5 min — respond to any new reviews from the past week
- 5 min — text 3 recent customers asking for a Google review
- 5 min — answer any Q&A questions, reply to any DMs
30 minutes a week, held for 12 months, outperforms €5,000 spent on one-off "GBP optimisation" packages every single time. The Map Pack rewards consistency, not intensity.