Who this is for
Owners of local and service businesses who get found before they get called: shops, trades, studios, practices, and anyone whose customers start with a search or a map.
Business BasicsPDF · 4 pages · Updated October 2026
Get Your Business Found Online
When someone searches for what you do, what they find is your business profiles: Google, Bing, Apple, Yelp, Facebook. If those profiles are missing, stale, or disagree with each other, customers call someone else. This guide walks you through claiming them, in the right order, with the same details everywhere.
Free. No email required. The download is the complete guide, not a sample.
What is inside.
Four pages, in the order to do them. Google first, because it drives most searches, then the rest of the places customers look.
Google Business Profile
Claim or create it, verify it, and fill it in completely. For most businesses, this is the listing that matters most.
Bing Places
The same details for Microsoft search and maps, often importable straight from your Google profile.
Apple Business Connect
How your business appears in Apple Maps, with hours, photos, and details you control.
Yelp
Claim the page that probably already exists, correct it, and answer what is there honestly.
Your Facebook business Page
A real business Page, separate from your personal profile, carrying the same details as everywhere else.
Industry and local directories
The directories worth your time, and how to recognize the ones that are not.
Keep profiles current
A small routine for hours, holidays, and changes, so the listings stay true after the first pass.
The core idea.
One business, one set of details. A customer who finds three different phone numbers or two sets of hours does not pick the right one; they pick another business. So the guide starts by gathering your details once, carefully, and then uses that same set on every profile.
Accuracy beats volume. Five profiles that agree with each other will do more for you than twenty that do not.
Before you begin.
The guide opens with a short checklist. Gather these once, and every profile after that is mostly pasting.
The details that must match everywhere
- Business name, exactly as customers know it
- Street address and phone number
- Regular hours, and how holidays change them
- Website address
- Your main services, in the words customers use
- A few good, recent photos
Take the whole guide.
Every profile, in the order to claim it, with what to check on each one.