Lesson 2: Auditing Your Local Search Presence

Why audit before you change anything

Level 1 covered how Google ranks local results on relevance, distance and prominence. Google's own help page still names these three factors (read 20 October 2026). It also says you cannot request or pay for a better local ranking. You can only improve the factors.

Before you change anything, record where you stand today. Think of it as a before photo. In a month's time you will compare against it to see what worked.

Throughout this lesson we use one example business: Harbour Plumbing & Heating, a two-van plumber serving Bristol and the surrounding towns. Swap in your own business at every step.

You need:

• A smartphone and a laptop
• A spreadsheet with three tabs: Rankings, Listings and Competitors
• About 90 minutes

Task 1: Choose the phrases customers really use

Customers search for the problem or service. They rarely search for your name.

1. Write down 10 phrases a new customer might type or say. For Harbour Plumbing:
   • "plumber near me"
   • "emergency plumber Bristol"
   • "boiler repair Bristol"
   • "blocked drain Clifton"
   • "boiler service Keynsham"
2. Mix three types:
   • Service + "near me"
   • Service + town or district
   • Urgent problem (for example, "burst pipe" or "no hot water")
3. Check your list against real wording:
   • How do callers describe the job on the phone?
   • What does Google suggest as you type?
4. Cut the list to your best 5 to 10 phrases. Leave out your business name. Searches for your name show whether people can find you once they already know you. They don't show whether new customers find you.

Task 2: Record where you rank, from inside the service area

Google works out the searcher's location from several sources, such as the device and its settings. It uses that location to judge distance, so your ranking changes depending on where the search happens. A search from your office tells you very little about a customer five miles away.

1. Pick three test points:
   • Your base
   • A busy area you serve
   • A town near the edge of your service area
2. At each point, search on a phone with location turned on. Use a private or Incognito window. Google's help page says Incognito stops Search from using your account's stored location history. Your current location still counts.
3. For each phrase, record in the Rankings tab:
   • Whether you appear in the map pack (the map and the first few business listings), and in which position
   • Your position on Google Maps (open the Maps app and search the same phrase)
   • Your position in the ordinary web results below the map, if you appear
   • Write "Not found" if you are not in the first 20 Maps results
4. Note the date and the test point for every row.

You can't stand at the edge of your area? Ask a member of staff or a regular customer who lives there to search and send you screenshots. Paid rank-grid tools can automate this later, but you don't need one for the first audit.

Task 3: Check which Business Profiles already exist

You may already have a profile, or several, even if you never created one. Google can create a listing from public information, and a former owner or agency may have made one.

1. On Google Search, search for your business name + town. Then search Google Maps for your name, your phone number and your street address.
2. In the Listings tab, record every profile you find with:
   • The name
   • The address or service area
   • The phone number
   • The website link
3. Flag each profile:
   • Unclaimed: an "Own this business?" link (on Search) or "Claim this business" link (on Maps) means nobody manages the profile yet. Note it for now. Claiming is covered in Level 3.
   • Duplicate: two profiles for the same business, such as an old trading name or an old address. Google allows one profile per business, and a profile it treats as a duplicate won't show on Search or Maps.
   • Wrong details: an old phone number, wrong hours, a closed branch or a broken website link.
4. Don't delete or merge anything yet. Record what you found. Fixing problems you don't fully understand can lose reviews or photos.

Task 4: Build the competitor table

1. Take the top three businesses that appear most often in your Task 2 map packs. They are your real competitors on Google, even if you have never met them.
2. Open each profile and fill in the Competitors tab, with your own business as the first row:

3. Here is where to find each item:
   • Category: the label shown under the business name
   • Reviews and rating: next to the stars
   • Photos: the photo section of the profile
   • Website: follow the link and note whether it goes to a relevant page or just the homepage

Task 5: Pick your first three gaps

1. In each column, compare your row with the competitors' rows.
2. List every gap. For Harbour Plumbing:
   • About 200 fewer reviews than Competitor A
   • Very few photos
   • No pages for individual services
   • One duplicate listing at an old address
3. Score each gap:
   • Impact: does it affect relevance, distance or prominence?
   • Effort: can you fix it this month?
4. Choose the three with the highest impact for the lowest effort. Problems with the listing itself (duplicates, unclaimed profiles, wrong details) usually come first, because everything else depends on them.

Checklist

• 5 to 10 customer phrases chosen, without the business name
• Rankings recorded from 3 test points, with dates
• Every profile listed and flagged as unclaimed, duplicate or wrong
• Competitor table completed for the top 3
• First three gaps chosen and written down

Key takeaways

• Audit before you change anything, so you can measure progress.
• Rankings depend on where the search happens, so test from several points inside your area.
• Google allows one profile per business. Record duplicates, unclaimed profiles and wrong details before fixing anything.
• Your real competitors are the businesses that appear in your map packs.
• Fix the three gaps with the highest impact for the lowest effort first.