How to Perform a Google Business Profile Audit

Google Business Profiles hold utmost importance for the local SEO of your clients. You need to conduct a regular Google Business Profile (GBP) audit to improve your client's rankings.

Why is conducting this audit on a regular basis so important?

As you may already know, Google constantly makes changes to its platform. Hence, any best practices you may have put in place for your client's GBP listing may have already become irrelevant. Or, maybe, your client's contact details or hours of operation may have altered. If you notice that there is a significant amount of drop in traffic, it means it is time to perform a Google Business Profile audit.

In this post, we'll discuss in detail how to perform this audit for your clients. But before that, let's get some common questions out of the way. Let's begin:

What is Google Business Profile?

Google Business Profile, previously known as Google My Business, is a free service that allows a business to establish a profile with its contact information, location, and customer reviews.

As per the latest statistics, 64% of consumers use Google Business Profile to find contact information. For customers to find your client's business, they need a thoroughly filled-out Google Business Profile.

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Note: If your client's GBP is optimized, it will help your client outrank their competitors in local searches.

Why Should You Conduct a Google Business Profile Audit?

You should conduct a Google Business Profile audit for your client because some common errors can affect businesses of all sizes. Let's take a look at some of these errors:

A. Inaccurate Information: Your client's GBP should have the latest information of phone numbers, business hours, etc.

B. Incorrect Business Name: Ensure your client's business name is the same as their real-world business title.

C. Misleading or Fake Reviews: Fake negative reviews tarnish your client's brand reputation. Even fake positive reviews can result in the loss of trust in your client's business. Inform your clients not to review their competitors and their own business. They should also not use any review management software that doesn't follow review platform guidelines.

D. Outdated or Poor Quality Photos: Your client's profile should have accurate and high-quality photos.

E. Not Replying to Questions: Your agency needs to keep a check on Google's Q&A feature and reply to any questions. Or else, someone from the public can answer those questions and provide incorrect information.

Google Business Profile Optimization Checklist

The first step you need to take to optimize your client's GBP listing is to ensure your client's business is claimed and that their business information is accurate.

Audit your client’s GBP listing and see if your client’s business information is accurate by checking:

• Official Business Name
• City, State, Zip
• Phone Number
• Street Address
• Website Address
• Suite or Unit
• Short Business Description
• Email Address
• Business Logo
• Long Business Description
• Primary Category
• Secondary Category
• Business Hours

Tip: Another good practice you must follow is to make sure your client's address, business name, and phone number are consistent in every online mention.

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Next, follow this guide to fully audit the GBP listing of your client:

GBP Address Audit:

• Check if this is a physical location or a service area
• Check if the business is situated in the city center
• See if the address looks legitimate
• The GBP address must match the one from the citations
• Check if the city of the business location is added
• Check the zip code of the business

GBP Business Hours Audit:

• Your client’s business hours must match the ones from the citations
• The listing must display popular times (including time/day)
• The business should have up-to-date business hours (including holidays)

GBP Business Title & Website Link Audit:

• Don’t intentionally add keywords to the business name
• The business URL must match the one from the citations
• The GBP must link to a site (link to city page/root domain)
• The GBP link that links to a site should contain UTM tracking

GBP Category Audit:

• Make sure the business is using the ideal primary category
• Check which additional categories are currently in use and their order
• The GBP categories should mirror the service categories from the site
• The main site should have a page for each of the service categories

GBP Review Audit:

• The listing should display third-party reviews (such as Yelp and Facebook)
• You should reply to reviews by incorporating relevant keywords
• You’ll want customer reviews to come from Google’s Local Guides and include pictures

GBP Photos Section & FAQ Audit:

• Check the number of photos and their quality
• Photos should correctly show the business location
• There should be a good balance between photos posted by users and the business
• Make sure the content of the Q&A section has location/service keywords
• The listing should have questions and answers
• Upvote good answers that aren’t from your client

GBP Post Audit:

• Check the date of the last GBP post that shows on the listing (Ideally, one should publish once a week)
• Check the total post count
• Posts should contain content, links, and photos
• Include geo mentions in GBP posts
• Posts should link back to website pages (service pages, city pages, root domain, product pages)

GBP Sitelink Audit:

• Check if the listing has the options of booking/appointment
• Link additional profiles (Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.)
• See if you can complete a 360-degree tour for the GBP listing
• See if you can include on-site services and online appointments
• Show services/products with their prices

Local Optimization Audit

According to Google, local results are based chiefly on prominence, distance, and relevance. Audit the local listings of your client by making sure these three primary factors are up-to-date. Here’s how you can do it:

1. Relevance

Add detailed and full business information to help Google gain a better understanding of the business of your client. This will help match your client’s profile to relevant searches.

2. Distance

A good practice to follow is to have an up-to-date address and location keywords in every local listing.

3. Prominence

This refers to how famous a business is. It is also based on the data that Google possesses about a business from around the internet (taken from directories, articles, and links). So, keep this information in mind because it can also impact local results.

Note: You also need to apply SEO best practices and conduct an overall technical SEO site audit to see better results for your clients.

Competitor Comparison

Who doesn't want to move ahead of their competitors? You can help your client beat their competition by understanding the depth of their competitor listings.

When you analyze your client’s competitor listings, you get to know the changes or additions you need to make to your client’s listing to make it relevant. For instance, you may see that your client needs to increase the quality and number of reviews.

Listen Up: Check for these in your client’s competitor listings and then accordingly make changes to your client’s listing:

• Check if they have their target location in their listing title
• Check if they have a keyword in their listing title
• Check their review count
• See where their links go to

Tip: You can also check the Google Business Profile Guidelines to make any optimizations for your clients that you will think will work in their favor.

Keep Citations Consistent

You need to keep citations consistent as it’s crucial for local SEO.

Citations refer to a mention of your client’s business name across the internet. Citations include review sites, local listings, and GBP listing.

Ensure you take these final steps as a part of your audit:

• Your client’s NAP (Name, Address, Phone Number) may be correct on GBP but wrong on other directories, leading to problems with profile ranking. Ensure your client’s NAP is consistent across the web (this includes Bing, Facebook, Apple Maps, etc.).
• Open Google Maps and search for your client’s business. Check for any duplicate listings.

GBP Insights & Optimization

If you use DashClicks’ Analytics app, you will be able to integrate the Google Business Profile listing. All you have to do is go to the “Listing Manager” and click on “scan for optimizations.” After you integrate GBP, you will be able to view GBP insights such as “Google Phone Calls by the Hour” and “Google Views on Search and Maps.”

Lastly, we would also recommend that you opt for white label local listing management services from DashClicks for GBP optimization.

Wrapping It Up

If you carefully follow all these steps, you will be able to conduct a successful audit and carry out Google Business Profile optimization for your client. The audit will offer all the insights you need to get your client's ranking where it should be! So, what are you waiting for? Conduct the audit to boost your client's rankings today!