If you only have twenty minutes a month for marketing, spend them on your Google Business Profile. For most of the local businesses we work with across Hamilton, Niagara and London, the profile drives more calls than any single page of the website. It is also the first thing AI assistants read when someone asks who to hire.
Here is the routine. Put it in the calendar.
Minutes 1 to 5: check the facts
Open the profile and read it the way a stranger would. Is the phone number right? Are the hours right, including holidays? Does the service list match what you actually sell this season? Businesses change and profiles drift. A listing that still shows a service you dropped two years ago, or a Saturday you no longer open, costs you calls and makes you look careless to the person reading it.
Minutes 6 to 10: answer every review
Reply to every review from the last month, good and bad. Keep replies short, specific and human. Thank the person by name, mention the job if they did, and for a bad review, state plainly what happened and what you did about it. People read the replies more carefully than the reviews. A calm, honest reply to a one-star review earns more trust than ten unanswered five-star ones.
Minutes 11 to 15: post something
A Business Profile post is a small update that shows on your listing for a week or so. It does not need to be clever. A photo of a finished job with one sentence about where it was and what was done is perfect. "Finished a full window replacement on a century home in Dundas this week" says more to a searcher than any slogan. Add a photo every time. Profiles with recent photos get more clicks, and the photos tell AI models what you actually do.
Minutes 16 to 20: ask for reviews
Ask every customer from the month's completed jobs for a review, not only the happy ones; Google's rules prohibit cherry-picking, and a steady flow of honest reviews reads as real because it is. Make it easy: send the direct review link by text, and ask them to mention what was done. Specific reviews ("replaced our hot water tank the same afternoon") are the ones that get you recommended, by people and by machines.
Things to do once, not monthly
Make sure your primary category is right and your secondary categories cover the rest of what you do. Fill in every service with a short description. Add your service area. Upload a proper logo and a cover photo that shows real work, not a stock image. Turn on messaging only if someone will answer it.
Why this works
Google rewards profiles that look alive: recent photos, recent posts, recent reviews, replies. So does a potential customer scrolling the map pack at 9 pm trying to decide who to call in the morning. Twenty minutes a month is a small price for being the obvious choice.