How to get your business on Google, step by step

First, check what Google already has

Search Google for your business name and your town. You might find a profile you didn't create. Google's help covers that case: if an unverified profile for your business already exists, you can claim it from Google Maps with "Claim this business".

Then check your website. Type site: followed by your domain into Google, for example site:yourbusiness.co.za. Google's SEO starter guide suggests this test: if your pages come up, they're in Google's index. If nothing comes up, the website steps below come first.

Step 1: Set up a Google Business Profile, if you qualify

With a verified profile, customers can find your business on Search and Maps. Not every business can have a profile. Google's guidelines allow a profile if customers can visit you at a physical location, or if you travel to customers where they are. A rented mailing address you don't work from doesn't count, and nor does a P.O. box.

If you travel to customers and don't serve them at your address, Google wants your address hidden and your service area shown instead. Its own example is a plumber working from home, who should clear the home address from the profile. You set the service area by cities or postal codes, not as a circle around your base.

We don't run a profile ourselves, because we have no premises to verify: we work remotely. If that's your situation too, skip to step 2.

To create a profile, go to business.google.com/add, choose to add your business, and follow the steps on screen. Then verify it. Google chooses the verification methods for each business, depending on things like its type, region and hours, and you can't change what it offers. The options it describes include a phone call or text, email, a live video call, a video recording and a postcard.

Fill the profile in properly. Use your business name exactly as it appears on your signage and stationery, with no extra words: Google says adding unnecessary information to the name can get the profile suspended. Pick the fewest categories that describe your core business. Add your hours, phone number and website. Google's local ranking help says verified profiles with complete, accurate details are more likely to show up.

Step 2: Make sure Google can index your website

Your website is what Google shows in the ordinary results. Google's technical requirements for a page to be eligible are short: Googlebot isn't blocked from it, the page loads without an error, and it has content Google can index.

Check these at launch:

• The site isn't behind a password. Google doesn't crawl pages that need a log-in.
• No noindex rule is left on from the build. A noindex rule is how Google is told to keep a page out of its results, so a leftover rule keeps your pages out.
• Your services are written as text. Google advises putting key information in text, not graphics, so a list of your services belongs on the page as typed words, not inside a picture.
• Each service has its own page, with the words a customer would search in its title and main heading, which Google lists among its key best practices.

Step 3: Connect Google Search Console

Search Console is where Google tells you what it found on your site. Its getting started guide lists what you get: which pages are indexed and which aren't, the searches that showed your site and the clicks they brought, and an email when Google finds a new problem.

You add your site as a property and prove you own it. A Domain property covers every version of your address, with and without www, and is verified with a DNS record added at the company you bought your domain from. A URL-prefix property covers only addresses that start with the prefix you enter, and offers more ways to verify. Adding a property doesn't change anything about your site in Google Search, so there's nothing to break.

Set it up under your own Google account. If someone builds or manages the site for you, give them access rather than letting them own it.

Step 4: Submit a sitemap, and ask for your main pages

A sitemap is a file listing the pages on your site you care about. Some website platforms make the file for you. Submit its address in Search Console's Sitemaps report. Google calls a sitemap a hint: it might help Google discover your pages sooner, but there's no promise Google will use it.

For your key pages, such as the homepage and your main service pages, use the URL Inspection tool in Search Console to request indexing. Do it page by page and don't repeat it. Google limits your requests, says asking again won't get a page crawled any faster, and says a request doesn't guarantee the page will appear at all.

Step 5: Give Google reasons to show you

Google mainly finds pages by following links from pages it already knows, so tell people about your site. The starter guide suggests putting your website's address on business cards, letterhead and other materials, so add it to your quotes and invoices too. Use your business name the same way everywhere, matching your signage and stationery, as Google's guidelines ask of the profile.

Then ask your customers for reviews, and reply to them. The local ranking help says replying shows you value feedback, and that how well known a business is depends partly on the websites that link to it and the reviews it has.

How long does it take to show up on Google?

Google decides. Its guide to how Search works says Google chooses which sites to crawl and how frequently, that indexing isn't guaranteed, and that it doesn't accept payment to crawl a site more frequently or rank it higher. So there's no shortcut to buy.

What you can do is watch Search Console. A page has to be in the index before it can show in searches, and it has to show before anyone can click it. Our guide to how long SEO takes explains what decides the pace.

Where we come in

When we build a site, we set up Google Analytics and Search Console and submit the sitemap at launch, as our web design page describes. For South African businesses that can have a profile, setting up and improving the Google Business Profile is part of our local SEO work, starting with a claim or clean-up of any profile that already exists.

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