It’s a question many business owners will have pondered at some point in time: how can we get more customers via Google Business?

How can we get more local customers rocking up at a local hair salon by utilising the power of Google Maps?

Well, before we go any further, we hate to break it to you, but today in 2026, it’s harder than ever.

The reasons for this are multiple: increased competition, fewer businesses displayed, and the need to have accumulated many positive reviews over a sustained period. Therefore, for brand new companies entering the fold, well, it can be hard to get your business more business via Google Business (A lot of use of the word “business” there, but you get our drift).

So what is Google Maps?

Google Maps is a brilliant and free tool. Businesses of all sizes can use it, whether you’re a sole trader or you run a company with an army of staff. Google Business helps shoppers find you.

It’s generally used on a local basis, so for example, someone is looking for, say, a men’s tailor that sells a certain brand of shoes near me.

Google will highlight where you are, say, in Bristol, and then show you local businesses, normally highlighted in a 3-pack with a short stroll normally of where your stood.

This is massively important for businesses, especially SMEs that might be located just off the main high street.

For example, imagine your men’s tailor shop is located in an arcade. It might have been there for well, donkey’s years, but not all people residing in the fantastic city of Bristol will know you are there.

So, Google Maps presents an opportunity that when someone is searching to buy goods and services locally, your business can appear high up in Google’s results (The Google Business section) . These results will be higher than the organic results and will typically be lower than the Google AdWords results, so just underearth the Adword results will normally be a map with 3 businesses mentioned to the side of the map.

How do you go about optimising your Google My Business Listing

So how can we better optimise our Google Business listing, aka “Google My Business listing”

Well, as the National Lottery say’s, you have to be in it to win it.

The first stage is therefore to run a search to see if your business has an active Google Business listing on Google?

The reason your business may already have a Google Business listing is simple: sometimes Googlebot pulls your business’s NAP (Name,

Address, and Phone Number) and creates a Google My Business account without you asking it to so, so it does this for you sometimes automatically.

 

It’s then just a matter of claiming a listing.

What should we do if we don’t see a Google Business listing mentioned for our business?

Well, do not worry, it’s a piece of cake to set up an account. Just make sure you add the following:

• Nap information
• Unique business description
• Your company’s URL
• Picture of the storefront or say a picture of your team
• Opening hours
• Keep your Google Business profile updated, just in case the NAP details change.

 

Choose the right business category

Now, this is super important: choose the right business category, as many businesses get this wrong. For example, you might choose a business category that’s too general, such as landscaping, when really your business specialises in tree surgery.

The point that we are making here is simple: take the time to choose the right Google Business category. The reason is, well, when your business does get displayed in the Google My Business results, you’re going to want to appear for the correct products and services you sell.

If, therefore, you specialise in tree surgery, make sure you choose that business category.

 

Write a good wordy business description.

A good wordy business description is needed for your Google Business profile, plus, don’t be lazy and copy it from, say, your LinkedIn company description. Instead, write something unique.

In marketing, we call this “unique copy.” It just means unique text. This basically tells Google and Googlebot that you have put a bit more effort into creating your business profile.

You’ve created a block of text that perfectly describes your business, what it offers, and that’s unique to Google Business.

Why does this matter?

Well, Google hates duplication, so if your website is a mass of duplicated text and pages, and all the business citation company descriptions are duplicated, well, this doesn’t look like the SEO agency has put much effort into it.

Keep things unique, written by you, the business, or, if you don’t have the time, hire a really good copywriter. The reason is simple: Google likes to see that you’ve put effort into describing your business, whether that’s on your website, business citations, or your Google Business description.

Keep it all updated

The key to local SEO is simple: your NAP information needs to be consistent.

This means that Google Business NAP must match your website’s NAP, which must match the business citation NAP.

Respond to customers

Whether customers are saying nice things about your business or bad, it’s a good idea to respond on Google Business to what they’re saying.

There’s a good reason for this, one, well, it helps protect your company’s reputation.

The second reason is that when you respond to business reviews, it shows Google that your business is active, that you’re trading, and that it’s still serving local customers.

How can we help grow your business

When it comes to local and organic SEO, well, we know our stuff.

Therefore, wherever you are based in the beautiful city of Bristol, we can help you to sell more. We do this using a multitude of different ways, local seo, such as building business citations, writing content marketing, improving the on-page SEO is a whole range of different ways.

If, on the other hand, you have ambitions to trade on a national level, we can help you with that too. We are rather good at organic SEO, even if we do like to blow our own trumpet a bit.

So, get on the dog and bone, and we can see how we can help your business grow.