You typed "AC repair Van Nuys" into Google to see what your customers see. Three companies showed up on the map. Yours wasn't one of them.

Most of your work comes from referrals, so you've gotten by without the map. Meanwhile the guy two streets over gets the calls from people who have nobody to ask.

Here's my take, and plenty of marketers will argue with me: your Google Business Profile matters more than your website. That's the listing with your hours, reviews and phone number. Google picks who shows up on the map mostly from that.

So your website's job is to back the profile up. Most local sites fail at it in the same three ways. You can check all three in 5 minutes. Grab your phone.

1. Your name, address and phone number are missing from your site.

Open your website and scroll to the very bottom. Then open your contact page. Your business name, address and phone number belong in both places.

Now pull up your Google profile and compare them word for word. "Dave's Heating & Air" on one and "Dave's Heating and Air" on the other is a mismatch. So is a second phone number. (Hide your address on Google? List the cities you serve instead.)

Google checks your site against your profile. When the details are missing or don't match, it trusts the listing less. Someone else gets your spot on the map.

2. Your page title doesn't say what you do or where.

Search your business name on Google and read the blue headline above your website. That's your page title. It should name your main service and your area: "AC Repair in Van Nuys | Dave's Heating & Air."

Does yours say "Home"? Found one. Google reads that headline to figure out what the page is about, and "Home" tells it nothing.

"Near me" adds a little. The service and the city do the heavy lifting.

3. Your site doesn't link to your Google profile.

Check your contact page and footer for a Google map of your business or a link to your Google reviews. Click it. It should open your listing.

Nothing there? Then your site and your profile have never met, and the site can't vouch for anything. Easy fix.

And the profile is where the ranking comes from. Ike's Squeegee is a window cleaning business a friend of mine runs. It had no Google Business Profile at all. I set one up, and about 90 days later it was #5 in Google's regular search results for "best window cleaning services San Fernando Valley."

See for yourself at ikessqueegee.biz.

I'm Cole. I'm based here in the Valley, and I got into this to bring more customers to my family's video production business.

My first website for us was rough. I wrote it with no structure, so it sounded like a robot and danced around what we actually did. So I know exactly where to look on yours.

Your Google profile decides if you show up on the map. Your website has one job: back it up.

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