Get found on Google when someone in your town searches for what you do.

The map is not the ads, and it's not your website

A Google results page has three parts. At the top are ads. You pay per click, and the day you stop paying, you're gone. Under the ads is a map with three businesses. That's the map box, and it's free. Under the map are the regular links, which is where your website lives.

Most owners hear "SEO" and think it means the website. The map box is a separate thing. It runs off your Google Business Profile, the listing with your hours, reviews, and photos, and it's where most local calls come from. You can have a great website and be invisible on the map. You can have no website at all and own the map.

If you're already paying for ads, you're paying for the top spot. This is the free one right under it.

Why you might see yourself first, and your customers don't

Google says it weighs three things for the map: how relevant a listing is, how well known it is, and how close it is to the person searching. Distance is the one that changes with where the search is made. Search your own trade from inside your shop, logged into your own account, and you'll often see yourself first. Search the same thing from the next town over, or from a customer's driveway, and you can drop out of the box entirely.

That's why we ask you to try the next town. What you see from your desk isn't what your customer sees from theirs.

What actually moves a listing

Google doesn't publish its formula, and anyone who tells you they know it is guessing. What's public, and what we see across listings in this county, is that the businesses in the box share five things. They have more reviews. Their newest review is recent. They have more photos. They're listed under the right category. And the owner replies.

Behind those five are the basics: a claimed profile, services filled in, hours right, and the same name, address, and phone number everywhere it appears online.

That's the whole list. No tricks, no secret settings. It's maintenance, done every month, that most owners don't have time for. LeadDock does that maintenance. It doesn't come back to you as a to-do list.

REVIEWS

MORE THAN COMPETITORS

NEWEST REVIEW

RECENT, NOT STALE

PHOTOS

MORE, REAL, UPDATED

CATEGORY

CLAIMED AND CORRECT

OWNER REPLIES

EVERY REVIEW, YOUR NAME

What we do each month

The first month is setup. We claim or verify the profile, fix the category, fill in your services, hours, and service area, and post your real photos. If you don't have photos worth posting, we'll tell you, and a shoot is a separate conversation.

Every month after that: a text goes to your recent customers asking for a review. Every review gets a reply, in your name, within a day. You approve the tone once. New photos and updates go on the listing each week. And you get one report: you next to the business at the top, five numbers side by side. Review count. Newest review. Photo count. Category. Owner replies.

REVIEW COUNT

HOW MANY YOU HAVE

NEWEST REVIEW

HOW RECENT

PHOTO COUNT

HOW MANY POSTED

CATEGORY

WHAT YOU'RE LISTED AS

OWNER REPLIES

HOW MANY ANSWERED

What we won't promise

Nobody can promise a spot on Google, and we don't. We won't promise a timeframe, and we won't promise a number of calls. This moves in months, not days, and shows up as more business, not a guaranteed spot.

What you'll have is the same five numbers every month, so you can see it moving or not moving before we say a word.

Where most shops start

When we score local listings out of 100 on our own checklist, two shops we looked at recently came in at 18 and 47. That's our scorecard, not a Google ranking. Most owners have never seen a number for how they show up.