Google Business Profile for online and home-based sellers — who qualifies, and how to set it up

TL;DR

• • Free: creating and running the profile costs nothing.
• • Eligibility: you need in-person contact with customers. Pure courier-only online sellers generally don’t qualify.
• • Home address private: choose “service-area business” and Google hides it.
• • Verification: Google chooses the method, often a short video of your business.
• • Website: link your store so people who find you can buy, with COD and a returns page.
• • Reviews: ask everyone the same way; never offer rewards for reviews.

What the profile is, and what it isn’t

When someone searches “cake shop near me” or your business name, Google can show a box or map pin with your details. That is your Business Profile. It holds your name, category, hours, phone, the area you serve or your address, photos, a short description, a website button, and customer reviews. For businesses in the right categories, it can also show products and short updates.

What it can’t do is sell. There is no cart, no cash on delivery, no size chart, no returns page. So think of it as a signboard on Google that points to your shop, and your website as the shop.

Do you qualify? Storefront vs service-area

At the time of writing, Google’s guidelines say a business must make in-person contact with customers during its stated hours, and they list online-only businesses as not eligible. Within that, there are two ways to set up:

• • Storefront: customers come to your address (a shop, a studio, your home for pickups or trials). The address is shown on the map.
• • Service-area business: you go to customers or deliver to them within areas you list, like a few neighbourhoods or a whole city. Your address stays hidden. This is the usual choice for home bakers and home-based sellers who deliver.

This is our reading of Google’s guidelines as of September 2026, not Google’s decision. Google applies its rules case by case and updates them; read the current guidelines in the Business Profile help pages before you apply. Don’t use a virtual office or someone else’s address to get around them: profiles set up that way can be suspended.

Setting it up, step by step

1. Use a Google account you will keep. Create the profile from your own business Gmail, not a helper’s or a freelancer’s. If someone helps you, add them as a manager later instead of letting them own it.
2. Use your real business name. Exactly as customers see it on your packaging or Instagram. Don’t add keywords like “Best Cakes Pune”; Google’s rules don’t allow it, and it can get the profile suspended.
3. Pick the closest category. “Bakery”, “Clothing store”, “Jewellery store” and so on. You can add a few secondary ones, but the main category matters most.
4. Choose storefront or service area. If you pick service area, list the neighbourhoods or city you actually cover.
5. Add your phone and website. Use the number you answer, and your online store’s address (more on that below).
6. Verify. Google chooses the method. Often it is a short video: show your products, where you make or pack them, any signboard or labelled packaging with your business name, and something that shows you run it, like your order book or tools. Some businesses get a phone, text or email code, or a postcard. Review can take a few days, sometimes longer, so don’t create duplicate profiles while you wait.
7. Fill in everything. Hours you really keep, a plain description of what you sell and where, a logo, a cover photo, and real photos of your products and your work.

Linking your website, and why it matters

The website button is where a curious searcher becomes a buyer. Point it at your online store’s home page. If your category lets you add products to the profile, link each one to its exact product page, not the home page.

Keep your details the same everywhere: the same business name, phone number and city on your profile, your store’s contact page and your Instagram bio. It helps customers feel sure they have found the same business, and it avoids confusion if someone checks.

On SitesPlaced, a free store lives at an address like yourbrand.sitesplaced.site, and that works as a website link. Your own domain (yourbrand.com) looks more established next to your name on Google, and comes with the Starter plan at ₹199/month, along with removing the SitesPlaced badge.

People tapping through from Google Maps are usually on their phone, often on mobile data. On Starter and up, a store’s pages answer about 4× faster than on the free plan: measured on 28 September 2026 on live paid stores, a page answered in about 75 ms instead of about 330 ms. “Answer” means how quickly the page starts arriving, before the photos load. Your edits, prices and stock changes still show at once.

Posting products and updates

Depending on your category and region, the profile may let you add products (a photo, name, price, short description and a link) and post updates. Use them lightly but regularly:

• • Products: add your five to ten best-known items, each linked to its page on your store. Keep prices in step with your store.
• • Updates: new stock, a festive collection, a change in delivery days, a holiday closure. One photo, two lines, a link.
• • Photos: add new ones now and then. Real photos of real orders say more than banners.

You don’t need to post daily. A profile with correct hours and a recent photo beats a busy one with wrong information.

Collecting Google reviews

Your profile gives you a link that opens the review box directly. Save it, and send it on WhatsApp a day or two after each delivery or pickup, with one friendly line: “Hope you loved the cake! If you have a minute, a Google review helps us a lot.” Ask everyone the same way.

• • Don’t reward reviews. Google’s policies don’t allow discounts or gifts in exchange for reviews.
• • Don’t pick only happy customers to ask, and don’t write reviews for yourself or ask family to.
• • Reply to every review, briefly and by name. For a bad one, say what happened and what you changed; the next customer reads your reply as closely as the review. Our guide to responding to negative reviews has examples.

Google reviews vs product reviews on your store

These get mixed up, but they are two different things, and they help in different places.

If you qualify for a profile, do both. If you don’t, product reviews on your store are how you earn stars on Google. See how to get Google star ratings for your products.

How the profile and your website work together

A typical path looks like this: someone nearby searches for what you sell, sees your profile with a few good reviews and real photos, taps Website, lands on your product, sees the price, delivery cost and whether you offer cash on delivery, and orders. The profile earned the tap; the store earned the order.

That only works if the store finishes the job. Make sure it answers the questions a stranger has: who you are, how to reach you, what delivery costs, what happens if something is wrong. Our checklist in how to make customers trust your online store covers each one.

If you run a café, salon, bakery or any shop with a counter, our page for local businesses shows how a free website, WhatsApp orders and a loyalty QR stand fit together. For home sellers, read how to get more customers for a home business.

Mistakes that get profiles suspended or ignored

• • Keywords stuffed into the business name.
• • A virtual office, a friend’s shop or a made-up address used to qualify.
• • Two profiles for the same business, often created while waiting for verification.
• • Showing a home address you didn’t want public, instead of choosing service area.
• • Old hours and a dead phone number, so people who find you can’t reach you.
• • A freelancer who set it up still owning it after they have gone.
• • Bought or swapped reviews.

Frequently asked questions