{"id":6869,"date":"2025-03-12T09:13:13","date_gmt":"2025-03-12T15:13:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/?p=6869"},"modified":"2025-03-12T10:02:38","modified_gmt":"2025-03-12T16:02:38","slug":"are-home-based-businesses-eligible-for-a-google-business-profile","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/blog\/are-home-based-businesses-eligible-for-a-google-business-profile\/","title":{"rendered":"Are Home-Based Businesses Eligible for a Google Business Profile?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size\">Yes, home-based businesses are eligible for a Google Business Profile if they serve customers in person at their location or travel to customers, with the option to hide their address if privacy is a concern.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"406\" src=\"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-12-at-13.22.06-1024x406.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6871\" srcset=\"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-12-at-13.22.06-1024x406.png 1024w, https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-12-at-13.22.06-300x119.png 300w, https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-12-at-13.22.06-768x304.png 768w, https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-12-at-13.22.06-1536x609.png 1536w, https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-2025-03-12-at-13.22.06-2048x812.png 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size\">The Google Business Profile Help community is full of <a href=\"https:\/\/support.google.com\/business\/thread\/310904361?hl=en&amp;sjid=17712636656893618836-NC\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">threads like the one shown above<\/a> in which the complexity of Google\u2019s guidelines has left home-based business owners feeling confused about their eligibility. The volunteer Product Experts are kept very busy, not merely citing appropriate guidelines where they exist, but trying to interpret grey areas when official documentation falls short.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size\">I want to provide a set of general best practices here to the multitude of home-based business owners because I do not think the current guidelines go far enough towards instructing this very large group in regards to GBP eligibility. This is what I, personally, have learned about home-based businesses in Google\u2019s system:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li class=\"has-medium-font-size\">Your home-based business is typically eligible for a GBP if you either serve the public face-to-face at your location or travel to customers\u2019 locations to do so.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-medium-font-size\">You must use your home address in listing your business \u2013 do not use P.O. boxes or virtual offices.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-medium-font-size\">If privacy is a concern, you can list yourself as a service-area business and hide your address.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-medium-font-size\">It is definitely possible to run more than one business out of your home. For example, you might have a dog grooming business and a bookkeeping service in the same household. However, problems with verification can arise if you attempt to run two businesses in the same business category (like two plumbing companies) from your same home address. Each business you operate should have its own phone number and website. You do not need to create fictitious suite numbers to try to differentiate the businesses.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-medium-font-size\">Don\u2019t create more than one listing for a single home business in an attempt to represent its variety of services. For example, if you run an HVAC company out of your house, do not create one GBP for your heating services and another for your air conditioning services.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-medium-font-size\">If you want your address publicly displayed on your listing, you\u2019ll need street signage at your home-based business. If you don\u2019t have a sign and don\u2019t want your address displayed, you can still succeed at video verification with Google by offering a variety of other proofs of legitimacy. These include street signs near your house and the address number on the exterior of your house, footage of yourself unlocking and entering your home, evidence such as business cards, print marketing materials, and film of your computer\/workspace showing signs of activities related to your business such as taking bookings and accessing your company\u2019s website and social media profiles.&nbsp;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-medium-font-size\">If you serve the public in person and can build up a strong set of proofs of your business\u2019 legitimacy, you are very likely eligible for a Google Business Profile.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Yes, home-based businesses are eligible for a Google Business Profile if they serve customers in person at their location or travel to customers, with the option to hide their address if privacy is a concern. The Google Business Profile Help community is full of threads like the one shown above in which the complexity of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":6923,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"classification":[],"class_list":["post-6869","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6869","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6869"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6869\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6907,"href":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6869\/revisions\/6907"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6923"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6869"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6869"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6869"},{"taxonomy":"classification","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whitespark.ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/classification?post=6869"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}