For clinics, restaurants, salons, garages, gyms and most service businesses, the Google map pack is the most valuable space in search. It sits above the regular results, shows your rating at a glance and puts a Call and Directions button one tap away.
Google decides who appears there based on three things: how relevant your profile is to the search, how close you are to the person searching, and how prominent your business looks online. You cannot change distance. You can work on everything else.
Get the basics exactly right
- Use your real business name, exactly as it appears on your trade licence and signage. Adding keywords to the name breaks Google's guidelines and can get the profile suspended.
- Choose the most specific primary category, then add secondary categories for your other main services.
- Write the address the way Dubai residents search for it, with the building or tower name, area and landmark.
- Set accurate opening hours, including Friday timings and special hours for Ramadan, Eid and public holidays.
- Add your WhatsApp number or main line, and link to the most relevant page of your website, not just the home page.
Show what you actually do
- List every service or product with a short description. These are read by Google and by customers.
- Upload real photos: the storefront from the street, the interior, the team and your work. Customers trust real photos over stock images.
- Add a few new photos every month, not fifty on the first day.
- Use the description to say who you serve and where, in plain language.
Reviews are the part most businesses neglect
Review count, recency and your replies all affect how your profile performs. A steady flow of genuine reviews beats a burst of them once a year.
- Ask every happy customer, at the moment they are happiest: after the treatment, at delivery, when the car is handed back.
- Send the review link on WhatsApp, so it is one tap away. Automated review requests after a visit or order work well here.
- Reply to every review, good or bad, briefly and by name. Future customers read your replies.
- Never buy reviews or offer rewards for them. Google removes them and can restrict your profile.
Keep it active
Profiles that are updated tend to be treated as current. Post offers, events and new services, answer questions in the Q&A section yourself, and keep your hours updated for every holiday.
Make your website back it up
Your profile and website should say the same thing. Use the same name, address and phone number on both, add a page for each main service, and if you serve several emirates, a page for each one. That consistency is a large part of what we do in local SEO.
If your business is not showing up in Google Maps for the searches that matter, send us your profile link and we will tell you what is holding it back.
Shabeeb Mohd works with Ads n' Codes on lead generation, local search and campaign performance for UAE businesses.