Why Your Google Business Profile Isn’t Generating Calls

Your Google Business Profile is probably the highest ROI digital channel you have, and it is free, so why isn't it generating calls? In this episode, Meredith and Caitlyn break down the five reasons a GBP underperforms for most replacement contractors, and the exact fixes for each.

They start with why the local map pack matters more than your website or your ads for capturing high-intent, bottom-of-funnel calls. Then they walk through the five culprits: an incomplete or outdated profile (categories, services, service areas, hours, and attributes), a weak review strategy (volume, recency, and response), stale photos and unused Google Posts, the proximity problem and how to compete in outlying markets, and the most underrated issue of all, getting GBP calls and never crediting the channel because the tracking and intake questions are not set up.

They close with a Good/Better/Best framework so you can prioritize the work, plus three things you can do Monday morning to start fixing it.

In this episode:

• Why the local map pack drives your highest-intent calls
• The five reasons your GBP isn't generating calls (and how to fix each)
• Categories, services, service areas, and attributes that actually move rankings
• The three review mistakes: volume, recency, and response
• Photos and Google Posts as a freshness signal
• How to compete in markets where you don't have an office
• Why you may be getting GBP calls and not know it, plus how to track them
• A Good/Better/Best roadmap and three Monday-morning next steps

Ready to find the gaps in your own profile? Head to fatcatstrategies.com and book a strategy call.

Want to find out how we can create a custom digital marketing game plan for your contractor business? Schedule a call with us at fatcatstrategies.com.

Transcript

Intro: Welcome to Digital Marketing for Contractors, a podcast for home improvement contractors to help you crush your lead goals and take your business to the next level. Join us each episode as we give you powerful insights and practical tips on the best digital marketing strategies to help you grow your home improvement business. Let's get started.

Meredith: Welcome back to Digital Marketing for Contractors. I'm Meredith Medlin.

Caitlyn: And I'm Caitlyn Noble. We work exclusively with home improvement contractors, windows, roofing, siding, baths, gutters, companies doing somewhere between three and 30 million in annual revenue.

Meredith: And today's topic is one that comes up in basically every onboarding call that we have with our clients. The contractor wants more calls. They claimed their Google Business profile years ago. They can't figure out why it's not working, though.

Caitlyn: So let's get into that.

Meredith: All right, so before we get into the actual

Caitlyn: Yeah

Meredith: let's set the table on why this matters, because I think some of our listeners might still be in the camp of, "Okay, yeah, GBP is fine. Like, my real lead source is PPC, so like, I'm good"

Caitlyn: Bless. Bless, bless, bless. Yeah, and let me push back on that a little. When a homeowner searches bathroom remodeler near me, or roof replacement, their city, what's the first thing you see before the organic results, before the website links?

Meredith: It's the map pack.

Caitlyn: Right. Three businesses on a map with star ratings, with phone numbers, with with a call button right there on mobile. It's the local map pack, and that's almost entirely driven by Google Business Profile. Your website doesn't put you in the local map pack. Your Google Ads don't put you in the local map pack. Your GBP does.

Meredith: And calls from the local pack are some of the highest intent calls that you can get as contractor.

Caitlyn: They're as close to the bottom of the funnel as it gets. Pause for one second. The calls... We have been getting a current moment where there have been a lot of spam calls coming through GBP.

Meredith: Okay.

Caitlyn: So I will say, yes.

Meredith: Typically, they're high intent.

Caitlyn: They're high intent, but we'll get to that. We'll get to that, for sure. And if you are getting a bunch of spam calls to your GBP, reach out to us, 'cause we've figured out a solution. But I do wanna say that.

Meredith: Oh.

Caitlyn: GBP's great.

Meredith: Yeah.

Caitlyn: If people intentionally click on your business because they read your reviews, et cetera, and they're calling you, they're gonna

Meredith: Way more qualified

Caitlyn: yeah, way more qualified. I just know recently it's been an uptick. Okay, sorry. So back to that. Let's get into, like, why, though GBP isn't working for most contractors, despite it being free.

Meredith: All right. Reason number

Caitlyn: number one, and this is the most common, the profile is incomplete, or it was set up once three years ago, and nobody's touched it since. Categories are wrong. Service areas haven't been updated. The services list is empty or generic. There's no description, or the description is one sentence.

Meredith: Yeah, and I mean, obviously things change. Google Business Profile features change all the time. So if you set it up even a year ago and haven't done anything to it, there's a ton of new stuff that you should have filled out or optimized. So let's walk through what a fully optimized profile actually looks like right now.

Caitlyn: Sure. Start with categories. You get one primary category, and you can add up to nine secondary categories. This is 2026. This always could change.

Meredith: Timestamp

Caitlyn: right now. Don't hold us to it. The primary category is the most important ranking signal in your entire profile. If you're a bath remodeler and your primary category is contractor instead of bath remodeler, you're going to lose to every competitor who picked the right specific category.

Meredith: Yeah, that's a huge one, and I think a lot of contractors set this up, you know, six years ago, and there were categories that were much less specific than they are now.

Caitlyn: Yep.

Meredith: And they just haven't taken the time to go back and

Caitlyn: literally just saw that exact instance today.

Meredith: Yeah.

Caitlyn: Google adds new categories all the time. Window installation service is a category. Roofing contractor is a category. Siding contractor a category. Get specific. Match your primary product. Then use your secondary categories for the other things you do.

Meredith: Okay, so what about services?

Caitlyn: Sure. Okay, so we've got categories. Now we've got services, which is a section most contractors completely ignore. You can list out every service you offer with a description and price range. Google uses that when matching your business to specific search queries. So if a homeowner searches tub-to-shower conversion near me, and you have tub-to-shower conversion listed as a service with a description, you have a much better chance of surfacing for that query than if you just have bathroom remodeler as your category and nothing else.

Meredith: Right. So what else? We've got service area, hours, attributes.

Caitlyn: Service area is huge. I get this question all the time for our audience. Because most replacement contractors don't have a storefront customers walk into, we call them showrooms.

Meredith: Mm-hmm.

Caitlyn: So you're a service area business, not a brick and mortar. You define the cities and zip codes you serve, and here's the part contractors get wrong. They list one zip code. They'll

Meredith: The zip code

Caitlyn: the zip code is the office that they're in.

Meredith: Mm-hmm.

Caitlyn: Thank you. You can list up to 20 service areas. Use them. If you serve 15 towns, list all 15.

Meredith: 100%, and hours, even the simple stuff like that. If your profile says you're closed Saturday, but your call center is taking Saturday

Caitlyn: Ugh

Meredith: that's a missed signal.

Caitlyn: Right. Hours,

Meredith: Oh,

Caitlyn: special hours, then attributes. Women-owned.

Meredith: Yeah.

Caitlyn: Yay, yay. Veteran-owned, free estimates, online appointments, all of these are searchable filters now. Homeowners can filter the local pack by free estimates. If you don't check the box, you don't show up in that filtered view.

Meredith: So step one for everybody listening right go ahead and pull up your profile and go through it field by field. Check it out. Don't just assume that you have it all filled out.

Caitlyn: Don'tThe number of times we audit a profile and find empty fields, wrong categories, missing services is almost universal, even with companies doing 20 million in revenue.

Meredith: Mm-hmm. Okay, so let's move along to reason number two.

Caitlyn: Reviews.

Meredith: Reviews.

Caitlyn: We've talked a lot about reviews in the past, y'all.

Meredith: Yeah.

Caitlyn: you need more we're going to give it to you.

Meredith: Yep.

Caitlyn: And there are three things contractors get wrong about reviews: volume, recency, and response.

Meredith: So let's take those one at a time. Let's start with volume.

Caitlyn: We... y'all, we love talking about this on the podcast. Volume is straightforward, but it's also the area where contractors are most often beat by their competitors. If you've got 150 reviews and the company three miles away has 600, Google sees that. Volume is a confidence signal. It's not the only signal, but it's a heavy one, and if you don't have a systematic process for asking every customer for a review, you're going to fall behind, slowly, every month, until you're just behind.

Meredith: And by systematic, you mean?

Caitlyn: I mean it's built into your post-install process. The minute the install is done and the homeowner is happy, somebody, your project manager, your installer, your office, is sending a text or an email with a direct link to your Google review page, not, "Leave us a review," with no link. A direct one-tap link, and then there's a follow-up if they don't leave a review within a few days.

Meredith: Right, and okay, recency is the one I think gets overlooked the most.

Caitlyn: Yeah, and it's important. Google looks at when reviews were posted, not just how many you have. If your most recent review is from eight months

Meredith: Mm

Caitlyn: gosh, that's a problem. Even if you have 400 reviews total, it signals to Google that maybe this business isn't active anymore. Maybe they're just not doing as much work. Maybe customers aren't as happy. The algorithm doesn't know, but it makes assumptions based on the data that it sees.

Meredith: Right, so a steady drip of reviews is better than a lot at one time.

Caitlyn: Oh, my gosh, way better. Five reviews a month every month for a year, that's better than 50 reviews in one month and then nothing.

Meredith: Okay, and responses.

Caitlyn: We're laughing because

Meredith: just did an episode on this.

Caitlyn: We just did an episode on

Meredith: Oh

Caitlyn: but I'm so glad we're just reiterating it.

Meredith: Yeah, I

Caitlyn: we,

Meredith: people might not have listened to that one.

Caitlyn: Yeah, I mean, why? Like, yeah. And it's always good to hear things 17 times. That's what we always tell our clients.

Meredith: Yeah.

Caitlyn: You know, you gotta keep reaching out.

Meredith: Mm-hmm.

Caitlyn: Seven times, they're gonna have to see your business.

Meredith: Mm-hmm.

Caitlyn: So here's the seventh time, in terms of how to respond to a review.

Meredith: Hit 'em.

Caitlyn: You have to respond to every single review, five star, one star, doesn't matter, and not with, "Thanks for your feedback." Actually respond. Reference what they said. Use their first name. If they mention the installer, mention the installer in your response. Google reads those responses. It's another piece of unique, fresh, business-specific text on your profile, and it shows the algorithm, the homeowners reading the profile, that you're an engaged business.

Meredith: Right, and even negative reviews I know that that is one that stresses contractors out a bit.

Caitlyn: Yeah. We,

Meredith: I get it.

Caitlyn: I had a client that got a one star today. It's not fun.

Meredith: Mm.

Caitlyn: But you cannot get defensive. You cannot argue. Acknowledge the issue, take it offline, offer to make it right. That's exactly what my client did.

Meredith: Mm-hmm.

Caitlyn: They called the person up directly. A thoughtful response to a one-star review actually builds more trust than a perfect five-star average, because homeowners reading the profile see how you handle problems. That matters more than you think.

Meredith: For sure. All right, reason number three.

Caitlyn: I'm so glad we're not talking about reviews anymore for reason number three.

Meredith: Yep, here we go.

Caitlyn: Photos and posts. This is where the freshness signal really comes into play. I like that, the freshness signal.

Meredith: Freshness signal.

Caitlyn: Most contractor profiles have a logo, an exterior shot of the office building, and maybe four or five project photos that were uploaded in 2021.

Meredith: Throwback. And, you know, meanwhile, the algorithm is looking for something different.

Caitlyn: Exactly. Activity, recency, real, ongoing business operations. The way you signal that on a GBP is by adding new photos regularly: job site photos, before and afters, crew photos, truck wraps, any visual content that shows you're actively doing work right now.

Meredith: Okay, but what do we mean when we say regularly?

Caitlyn: Exactly. A photo a week, at minimum.

Meredith: Okay.

Caitlyn: More is better. And these don't have to be professional shots. Of course they can't be. A clean phone camera... I love that. A clean phone camera 'cause we know, we know y'all put your fingers in those camera

Meredith: Mm-hmm

Caitlyn: of a finished bathroom remodel taken right after install, uploaded that day, that's perfect.

Meredith: Right. So okay, what about Google Posts?

Caitlyn: Yes. We're using all the words, y'all, but all of this is so important.

Meredith: reviews.

Caitlyn: Services, categories. Posts are an underused feature. They're basically little updates that show up on your profile: promotions, events, news, recent jobs. Most post types expire after seven days, so you've got to keep refreshing them. But every time you publish one, you're feeding Google a fresh piece of content tied to your profile.

Meredith: So it's fresh content. Is there, is there a ranking impact, or is it more about conversion when somebody's already on the profile?

Caitlyn: Both. But the conversion impact is bigger than the ranking impact. A homeowner who lands on your profile and sees a post about your spring promotion with photos, with clear offer, that converts better than a profile with no post. So it's both. Small ranking signal, real conversion lift.

Meredith: Okay, and I wanna call out something that ties back to the photo conversation. A lot of our clients have this problem. I get it. The project manager takes great photos for the install team, but then those photos just kind of die on the project manager's phone. They never make it to the GBP. They never make it to Instagram. They don't make it anywhere a customer can actually see them.

Caitlyn: Yeah. That is... I yawned because we see too much of it.

Meredith: Mm-hmm.

Caitlyn: That's a process problem more than a marketing problem. The photos exist. They're just not making it where they need to go. Build the workflow. Whoever's on the install sends crew, sends three... The the crew needs to send three photos per job into a shared drop somehow, and somebody on the marketing side, even part-time, can take the best ones and post it.

Meredith: Exactly. Make it easy on yourself. Number four we're gonna talk about, it's a little bit harder because there's stuff that you can't fully control.

Caitlyn: This is probably the most

Meredith: Yeah

Caitlyn: of all of them, because this is exactly what you said. Proximity. Google's local authority, and this is as of, what is it, May 2026. But as of right now, Google's local algorithm weighs how close your business is to the person searching.

Meredith: Yeah.

Caitlyn: If a homeowner is in a town 25 miles from your office, and there's a competitor right in that town, you're at a disadvantage on proximity alone, even if you serve the area, even if you have more reviews, even if your profile is better optimized.

Meredith: Yeah. And it sucks, but there's nothing you can do about that, and your office is located where it's located. That's just how GBP works.

Caitlyn: Yeah. Not without moving, no.

Meredith: No.

Caitlyn: But there are things that you can do to compete in those outlying markets. Number one, make sure those service areas are listed on your profile. Number two, build out location pages on your website for those cities, pages like roofing roof replacement in Raleigh, North Carolina, with real content, real photos of jobs in that area, real testimonials from customers in that town. That signals geographic relevance to Google, even if the office isn't physically there.

Meredith: Right, and what's number three?

Caitlyn: You won't believe it, y'all. We're get... We are going to get reviews from customers in those areas.

Meredith: Good day.

Caitlyn: When somebody leaves a review, if they have location enabled, Google associates the review with that geography. So a steady stream of reviews from a customer across your service area helps your profile show up across that whole area, not just your office.

Meredith: I feel like that is definitely one that people miss.

Caitlyn: I know, and and then I'm, like, personally thinking, is my location enabled on my... 'Cause I

Meredith: Oh

Caitlyn: leave like a good review.

Meredith: 100%.

Caitlyn: Yeah.

Meredith: I feel like I'm one of those, like, special guides or whatever.

Caitlyn: I hope you are.

Meredith: God.

Caitlyn: You know we can go look it up.

Meredith: God. So okay, what about contractors that have multiple physical locations?

Caitlyn: Each location gets its own GBP, and they should be optimized independently. Different categories if appropriate, different service areas, different review URLs, different photos. Don't try to one, run one master profile for multi-location businesses.

Meredith: And don't keyword stuff your business name either.

Caitlyn: Ugh.

Meredith: I want to call that out because we do

Caitlyn: We witnessed this

Meredith: see this. Yeah, I mean, for multiple reasons. Let's not get your GBP shut

Caitlyn: Yeah

Meredith: as well for not being accurate.

Caitlyn: ABC Roofing, best roofing in Charlotte, roof replacement, storm damage.

Meredith: Mm-hmm.

Caitlyn: That's a violation of... And that was a hypothetical title of an entire GBP business profile.

Meredith: Mm-hmm.

Caitlyn: That's a violation of Google's guidelines, and it's the kind of thing that can get your profile suspended. Your business name on GBP should match the business name on your storefront, your invoices, your trucks, period.

Meredith: Exactly. Let's have some cohesiveness to all of these listings. All right, reason number five, and this is the one that I think is the most underrated. You're getting calls from your GBP, but you don't actually know that you are.

Caitlyn: Right, and I said this whole thing at the top of the podcast about, oh, we know we're getting all these spam calls from GBP, but that's because we

Meredith: 'Cause we can track them

Caitlyn: attribution

Meredith: Mm-hmm

Caitlyn: set up. So this happens constantly. A contractor will tell us, "GBP isn't generating leads for us." We dig into their CRM, we look at their lead source attribution, and what we usually find is that calls from GBP are coming in, but they're getting tagged as phone call or unknown or word of mouth because there's no tracking number on the GBP, and the call center isn't asking the right intake questions.

Meredith: Right. So they're getting the leads, but they just don't know to credit GBP for the lead.

Caitlyn: Right, and if you don't credit it, you don't invest in it. You decide GBP doesn't work, you put your money somewhere else, and the whole time those calls were coming in.

Meredith: Okay, so what is the right way to track it?

Caitlyn: There are a few options. The simplest is using a call tracking number on the GBP that routes to your main line. There's a nuance in that Google prefers NAP, N-A-P, consistency, which is name, address, phone number consistency, meaning... I just said that. That match across your website and other listings.

Meredith: Mm-hmm.

Caitlyn: So if you're going to use a tracking number, you want to use a service that sets up the tracking in a way that doesn't break that consistency. I just talked to somebody about this yesterday. Most reputable call tracking platforms know how to do this.

Meredith: Right, and then what about on the call center side?

Caitlyn: Train your intake people to ask, "How did you hear about us?" every call, every time, and give them a specific list of options that includes Google Search as a distinct option from, "Saw your truck" and "Referral". Better yet, have them ask, "Did you find us on Google?" as a yes or no, because homeowners often don't volunteer, or they won't volunteer the source, but they will confirm if you ask them directly.

Meredith: And

Caitlyn: And then in your CRM, and actually track it because if your CRM has a generic phone call bucket and that's where everything goes, you can't tell the difference between a Google call, a referral, a Yelp call, and somebody who saw your truck. You need granular lead source fields.

Meredith: All right. So we've covered five reasons. Caitlyn has gone into great depth about all five of them.

Caitlyn: All all of the words.

Meredith: Let's give people something that they can actually do with this.

Caitlyn: I think I've got more depth coming.

Meredith: I think you do. You like to use a good, better, best framework, right?

Caitlyn: I think you're gonna start with good.

Meredith: Am I?

Caitlyn: Yeah.

Meredith: Okay.

Caitlyn: I think this is the way you need to prioritize. So if you're contractors that you're

Meredith: Mm-hmm

Caitlyn: you don't have unlimited time or budget, we're gonna stack this work in the ways that make sense. Let's start with good.

Meredith: Okay. So good is what you can do in the next 30 days, mostly with internal resources, so there's no agency required. Audit your profile field by field, fix the categories, fill in the services, write a real description, update your service areas, update your hours, check every attribute box that applies to you, and then go ahead and upload 20 photos. They can be recent jobs, your team, your trucks, your office. Respond to every unanswered review. That's the good tier. That's you doing the basics right.

Caitlyn: And how big a difference can that make on its own?

Meredith: I mean, for a contractor's profile who was currently a mess, which is a lot of them the basics alone can move them from showing up sporadically to consistently appearing in the local pack. So all of your main service categories you'll start showing up for, and that's not a guarantee of the top spot, but it's a real lift. So you know, we've seen contractors get a meaningful jump in profile views just from that good tier work.

Caitlyn: Gorgeous. Okay, Meredith. Let's

Meredith: Hit 'em with the better

Caitlyn: let's do better.

Meredith: Better is when you start treating it as an ongoing channel. It's not set it and forget it. You know, quarterly cadence. You've got a systematic review generation process running where a text is going out after every install and you have a follow-up sequence in place. You're posting photos at least weekly.

Caitlyn: That sounds like the best.

Meredith: I hey. You're publishing Google posts for better promotions and seasonal content. You've added your call tracking number that routes to your main line, and you're auditing your profile every month for Google's changes, 'cause they make them and roll them out all the time. So don't sleep on new changes happening constantly.

Caitlyn: And you honestly can't sleep on a real review response strategy either.

Meredith: Don't ever sleep on reviews. Every review needs to be responded to within a couple of days and in a way that is specific and human. That is gonna be better.

Caitlyn: Okay, bring it home, sis. Best.

Meredith: Best. So best is when your GBP is fully integrated into your broader digital marketing strategy. Your local pages on your website are reinforcing what you have in your GBP as your service areas. Your review velocity is consistently outpacing your competitors. You're building location-specific landing pages for your top service area cities. You've even got monthly reporting that shows you GBP performance against in, against everything else, so Google Ads, organic search, paid social, Yelp. You are truly managing that profile and measuring it against your business goals, not just by keeping it clean and tidy.

Caitlyn: And what does monthly reporting on GBP actually look like? What are the metrics?

Meredith: Okay, so you're gonna wanna look at profile views, search impressions broken down by direct versus discovery searches, calls, we just talked about that actual calls with a number attributable to

Caitlyn: Mm-hmm

Meredith: direction requests, website clicks, photo views, message volume if you have your messaging on. You should do that if you are able. I think we talked about that on another podcast though.

Caitlyn: Sure did. did.

Meredith: And then the conversion side, leads from GBP, appointments that were set, and sales that were closed, the whole funnel attributed back to the channel.

Caitlyn: Whoo. That was a lot.

Meredith: It was a lot. Let's make sure that we send people off with a clear next step, 'cause a lot of words were said. If somebody is listening to this on a Friday, what are they doing Monday? First thing.

Caitlyn: First thing, you're gonna pull up your Google Business profile and audit it field by field and look at it honestly. Are categories right? Is... Are the services filled in? Are photos recent? Are reviews being responded to? Make a list of every gap.

Meredith: Okay, what's next?

Caitlyn: Sit down with your call center manager or whoever does the intake and look at your lead source attribution for how the last 90 days... Like, just look at your lead source attribution for the last 90 days from calls. How many calls are tagged Google or GBP? If that number looks low, the question is, are you actually not getting calls, or are you getting them and not crediting them?

Meredith: And third.

Caitlyn: Check your most recent review date. If it's older than two weeks, you have a review generation process problem. That's the biggest leading indicator that this channel is going to keep underperforming. Fix the problem before you do anything else because reviews are the compounding asset.

Meredith: Oh, Caitlyn, thank you for walking us through this. Is there anything else before we wrap up?

Caitlyn: Just this. Your Google Business profile is probably the highest ROI channel, digital channel, that you have access to, and it's free.

Meredith: Oh, oh.

Caitlyn: Every dollar you're spending on Google Ads is competing for the same audience the local pack reaches organically. So if your GBP isn't optimized, you're paying for clicks you could have gotten for free. Treat it as the channel that it is.

Meredith: And if you want help with this, the auditing your profile thing, the building out the systems, getting the tracking right, we can help. That's exactly what we do.

Caitlyn: Yes.

Meredith: So head to fatcatstrategies.com and book a strategy call. We'll take a look at your profile, and we will tell you exactly where the gaps are and what they're costing you.

Caitlyn: And if you listen to the last episode, you also know the questions to ask us.

Meredith: Yes, you do.

Caitlyn: Thank you guys as always for listening to Digital Marketing for Contractors. I'm going to play Mahjong. I don't know about you, Meredith.

Meredith: I am not gonna play Mahjong. But that sounds pretty sick, honestly. She's gonna go play Mahjong. I'm gonna go do something else, and we will see you next time.

Caitlyn: See y'all. Bye

Outro: Digital marketing for contractors is created by Fat Cat Strategies. For more information, visit fatcatstrategies.com.