The easiest way to rank on Google Business Profile

Google Business Profile is the listing that appears when someone searches for a mortgage broker in your area. It shows up before organic search results, before your website, and before any paid ads.

If your profile is incomplete or inconsistent, you lose leads to brokers who took the time to set theirs up properly. If it's optimised, it becomes the simplest source of local enquiries you'll ever build.

How Google decides which profiles to show first

Google ranks profiles based on three factors: relevance, distance, and prominence. Relevance is how well your profile matches what someone searched for. Distance is how close your business is to the searcher. Prominence is how well-known and active your business appears online.

You can't control distance. You can control the other two.

Relevance comes from your business description, services list, and the categories you select. Prominence comes from reviews, how often you post updates, how many photos you upload, and how consistently your business details appear across the web.

Consider a broker operating from a home office in the western suburbs. They claimed their profile but never added a description, uploaded one photo, and left the services section blank. When someone searches for "mortgage broker near me," Google has almost nothing to work with. The profile exists, but it doesn't rank.

That same broker adds a 200-word description that mentions first home buyers, refinancing, and investment loans. They list eight services, upload ten photos, and ask five recent clients to leave reviews. Within a month, the profile starts appearing in the top three local results for relevant searches. Nothing else about the business changed. The work took three hours.

Setting up your profile so it actually ranks

Claim your profile if you haven't already. Go to google.com/business and follow the verification process. Google will either call you, send a postcard, or verify instantly depending on your business type.

Once verified, fill in every field. Business name, address, phone number, website, hours, and service area all matter. Use the same details everywhere online. If your website says "Broker Studio" and your profile says "Broker Studio Pty Ltd," Google treats those as different signals.

Choose your primary category carefully. "Mortgage Broker" is the obvious choice. You can add secondary categories like "Financial Consultant" or "Loan Agency," but the primary category carries the most weight.

Write a business description that mentions the services you offer and the areas you cover. Don't keyword-stuff. Write for people, but include the terms they actually search for. "We help first home buyers, investors, and refinancers across the Inner West" is better than "We provide holistic finance solutions."

List your services. Google lets you add individual service items with descriptions. Use this. List "First Home Buyer Loans," "Investment Property Loans," "Refinancing," "Construction Loans," and any other services you offer. Each service can include a short description and a price range if applicable.

Upload photos. Google profiles with photos get more engagement than those without. Include a headshot, office photos if you have them, and even stock images that represent your services if needed. Avoid low-quality or blurry images.

Why reviews matter more than you think

Google uses reviews as a prominence signal. More reviews, especially recent ones, tell Google your business is active and trusted.

You don't need fifty reviews to rank. You need more than your competitors in the same area. If the top-ranking broker near you has twelve reviews, getting fifteen puts you in the running.

Ask clients directly after settlement. Send a follow-up email with a link to your profile. Make it easy. Most clients are happy to leave a review if you ask at the right time.

Respond to every review, even the positive ones. A simple "Thanks for the feedback" works. It shows Google your profile is managed and signals to potential clients that you're responsive. If you're capturing reviews already, this becomes part of your routine. If you're not, capturing more reviews should be the first thing you fix.

Posting updates keeps your profile active

Google favours profiles that post updates regularly. These are short posts that appear on your profile and in local search results. They can be as simple as "Interest rates dropped this week. If you're thinking about refinancing, now's a good time to review your loan."

Post once a week if you can. Once a fortnight at minimum. Each post can include text, an image, and a call to action button.

Updates expire after seven days, but Google tracks how often you post. A profile that hasn't posted in six months looks inactive. A profile that posts weekly looks engaged.

Use posts to highlight services, share updates, or answer common questions. "What deposit do I need as a first home buyer?" or "How refinancing works" are both topics that take five minutes to write and give Google more content to index.

Common mistakes that kill your ranking

Using a PO Box instead of a physical address. Google prioritises businesses with real locations. If you work from home, you can hide your address and still verify your service area.

Leaving your profile unverified. Unverified profiles don't appear in local search results.

Ignoring questions. Google lets users ask questions on your profile. If someone asks "Do you help with construction loans?" and you never respond, it signals low engagement.

Inconsistent business information. If your phone number is different on your website, your profile, and your email signature, Google doesn't know which one to trust. Pick one version of your business name, address, and phone number and use it everywhere.

Not linking your profile to your website. Make sure your website links to your Google Business Profile and your profile links back to your website. This two-way connection strengthens both. If your website is already optimised for search, the connection works even harder. If it's not, improving your ranking on Google should be the next step after your profile is live.

How long it takes to see results

Google doesn't update rankings instantly. After you optimise your profile, expect to see movement within two to four weeks.

You'll know it's working when your profile starts appearing in the map pack for local searches. The map pack is the box with three business listings that appears at the top of Google search results.

You can check your performance in the Google Business Profile dashboard. It shows how many people viewed your profile, how many clicked through to your website, and how many called you directly from the listing.

If you're not seeing results after a month, the issue is usually competition or consistency. Either other brokers in your area have stronger profiles, or your business information is inconsistent across the web.

Your Google Business Profile is the fastest way to generate local leads without paying for ads. It takes a few hours to set up properly and less than an hour a week to maintain. If you're not ranking yet, you're leaving enquiries on the table for brokers who are.

Call one of our team or book an appointment at a time that works for you. We'll walk through your profile, show you what's missing, and help you set it up so it ranks.

Frequently Asked Questions