Several locations: one Google profile or one for each?

One for each. Google's rule is one Business Profile per location where you serve customers, never two for the same place and never one shared by several. That does not mean one login per shop: a single Google account can own all of them and manage them from one screen. Here is which of your places count as a location, how to set them up, and the details that have to match across all of them.

Google's rule, in two sentences

Google's guidelines say: "Do not create more than one page for each location of your business, either in a single account or multiple accounts." And from the other side, its page on duplicates says that "you can have only one Business Profile for each business", and that a profile Google considers a duplicate "won't show on Google Search or Maps."

So a second storefront gets a second profile, with its own address, hours, photos and reviews. What you must not do is create two profiles for the same storefront, for example one for "Rosa's Bakery" and one for "Rosa's Bakery Downtown" at the same address, hoping to show up twice.

Which of your places count

Not every address you have is a location in Google's sense. A quick guide, based on Google's guidelines:

The service-area row is the one owners miss most. Google's wording is that if you have "different locations for your service business, with separate service areas and separate staff at each location, you're allowed one profile for each location." Two addresses that share one crew and one phone are still one business. If you work from home without a storefront, start with Google Business Profile without a storefront.

One login, many profiles

"Can I have more than one Google Business account?" is usually the wrong worry. You do not need a second account. You need one account that owns several profiles.

Google's tool for this is Business Profile Manager. Once you manage two or more profiles there, you can create a business group, which Google describes as "like a shared folder for your profiles." To set one up:

1. Sign in to Business Profile Manager.
2. Select Create group and give it a name, such as your brand.
3. Select the profiles you already have, then Actions and Transfer businesses, and choose the group.
4. Add new locations from inside the group.

A few habits save trouble later:

• Own everything from a business address, not a manager's personal Gmail. When that manager leaves, the profiles should not leave with them.
• Keep at least two owners. A profile can have several owners but only one primary owner. Managers can do almost everything an owner can, except add or remove people and delete the profile.
• Give each store manager access to their own location only, as a manager, not as an owner.

What must match, and what must be local

Google treats your locations as one brand with several addresses. Some things have to be the same everywhere, others must be specific to each place.

The same everywhere:

• The name. "All business locations within the same country must have the same name for all locations." No "Rosa's Bakery - Best Croissants Elm Street" on one of them. Google allows exceptions only for real sub-brands or a storefront that actually carries a different name.
• The main category. All locations "must share the one category that best represents the business". Extra categories can differ where one shop really does something the others do not.

Local to each location:

• The phone number. Google asks for a number "that connects to your individual business location", and a local number rather than a central call center line "whenever possible."
• The website link. Point each profile at a page about that location, with its address and hours, rather than every profile at the same home page. A page per location is also where the reviews and directions for that shop make sense.
• Hours, photos and posts. These are what make each profile useful to the person standing on that street.

If you are still working on the basics for each profile, our guide on how to rank higher on Google Maps goes through them in order.

Adding and verifying the new location

Every new location has to be verified on its own. With a handful of locations, you add each one in Business Profile Manager and go through the normal verification for each one. We describe what Google asks for in How to verify your Google Business Profile.

Bulk verification is for bigger chains. Google offers it when you have "10 or more locations of the same business", you upload a spreadsheet with every location and a unique business code for each, and Google reviews the whole list. Two exclusions matter: agencies that manage several different businesses in one account cannot use it, and neither can service-area businesses.

One more thing before you add the profile: search Google Maps for the new address first. If a profile for it already exists, for example from the previous tenant or one a customer suggested, claim or fix that one instead of creating a duplicate.

And social media for several locations?

Here there is no rule, only a choice. Our usual advice for two to five locations:

• One Instagram and one Facebook Page for the brand, with posts that name the location: "New at our Elm Street shop". Followers care about the brand, and one strong account beats three quiet ones.
• Separate accounts per location only when the places really differ: a different menu, a different team that customers follow, or towns far enough apart that news from one means nothing in the other.
• Google profiles are always separate, whichever you choose for social media, because Google's rule above does not leave a choice.

If each location wants its own posts

With us, every location is its own account, with its own photos, posts and approvals, so the manager in each shop can send pictures from their own phone. Each additional location of your business gets 20% off its plan, every month, for as long as it runs: you sign it up through the location link in your account, for up to 10 locations. If one account for the whole brand is all you need, a single plan is enough and you do not need the link at all. See the plans.