How to rank in the Google Maps pack: a local SEO checklist for contractors

Search “roofer near me” and the first thing you see is a map with three businesses under it. That’s the local pack, and for most contractors it’s where the phone calls come from. Here’s how Google picks those three, and a practical checklist for getting your business in.

How Google ranks local results

Google says local results are based mainly on three things:

• Relevance

  How well your business matches what was searched.

• Distance

  How far you are from the searcher, or the location in their search.

• Prominence

  How well known and regarded you are: reviews, links and mentions across the web.

You can’t change distance. Everything on this checklist improves relevance and prominence.

Get your Google Business Profile right

Your Business Profile is the single biggest factor you control.

• Choose the right primary category. Be as specific as Google allows: “Roofing contractor”, not “Contractor”. Add secondary categories for other services you genuinely offer.
• Set your service areas if you work at customers’ locations. If you don’t serve customers at your office, hide the address.
• Use your real business name. Adding keywords or cities to your name breaks Google’s guidelines and can get the profile suspended.
• List your services, with short descriptions, and keep your hours accurate, including holidays.
• Add real photos: your team, your trucks, finished jobs. Add new ones regularly.
• Link to the right page. Point the website link at your homepage or the matching location page, with tracking so you can see the calls and visits it produces.

A complete, accurate profile with recent photos and reviews tells Google, and customers, that you’re an active, real business.

Google Business Profile checklist

0 of 8 done

• Most specific primary category chosen
• Secondary categories for services you genuinely offer
• Service areas set (address hidden if you don’t serve customers at your office)
• Real business name, with no added keywords or cities
• Services listed with short descriptions
• Hours accurate, including holidays
• Recent photos of your team, trucks and finished jobs
• Website link points to the right page, with tracking

Earn reviews steadily

Reviews influence both your ranking and whether people call.

• Ask every happy customer, at the moment the job is done, with a direct link to your review form.
• Reply to every review, good and bad. A calm, helpful reply to a complaint reassures the next person reading it.
• Don’t buy reviews or ask only happy customers. Fake reviews and selectively asking for positive ones both break Google’s rules.

A steady flow of recent reviews matters more than a big batch from years ago.

Back it up on your website

Google looks at your website to judge relevance.

• A page for each service, describing what you do in plain words.
• Service-area pages for the towns you cover, with genuinely local content (jobs you’ve done there, the area you cover), not the same page with the city name swapped.
• Your name, address and phone in the footer, matching your Business Profile exactly.
• LocalBusiness structured data, using the most specific type available, such as RoofingContractor, Plumber or Electrician.
• Click-to-call on every page, so a searcher who lands on your site can call in one tap.

Keep your details consistent everywhere

Your business name, address and phone number should match across your website, your Business Profile, and directories such as Bing Places, Apple Business Connect, Yelp, the Better Business Bureau and trade associations. Inconsistent details make Google less sure which information is right.

What not to do

• Don’t use a virtual office or mailbox as your address. It isn’t eligible and can get your profile removed.
• Don’t create several profiles for the same business.
• Don’t stuff keywords into your business name or your review replies.

Frequently asked questions

How long does it take to show up in the map pack?

It depends on your competition and where you’re starting from. Fixing your profile and website can help within weeks; building the reviews and reputation that make you prominent takes months.

Can I rank in towns where I don’t have an office?

You can appear for searches in your service area, but distance still matters: you’ll usually rank best near your business location. Service-area pages on your website help you show up in organic results for other towns.

Do I need a separate profile for each town I serve?

No. You can only have a profile for a real location where you have staff during business hours. Use service areas to cover the towns around it.