Blog · 7 November 2026 · 8 min read

Google Business Profile vs your website: what has to match and how to check it in 15 minutes

For many small businesses the Google listing (Business Profile, formerly Google My Business) brings more phone calls than the website itself: it shows up in Maps and in “near me” results, with a Call button and Directions. The trouble is that someone set up the listing three years ago, the website has been rebuilt twice since, and the phone number changed along the way. The customer sees one thing on Google and another on the site and does not know which to trust – neither does Google. Below: ten places where both sources must say the same thing, a 15-minute test from your phone, and a table of who fixes what.

Why it matters

• Customers call the number from Google, not from your website. In local results the phone number is a button. If the old number is still in the profile, the missed calls do not show up in any statistic – they simply never happen.
• Google compares sources. The Business Profile guidelines say plainly that the name should reflect the business's real-world name, as used consistently on the storefront, website, stationery and as known to customers. In its guide to local ranking Google says businesses with complete and accurate information are more likely to show up in local results, and that “prominence” (one of the three factors, next to relevance and distance) is based on things like how many websites link to your business and how many reviews you have. Inconsistent data is a weaker signal and a longer road to the top three in Maps.
• Google fills in listings on its own. According to Google, profile information is compiled from a variety of sources: crawled web content (including the business's official website), licensed third-party data, users who contribute facts, and Google's own interactions with the business. It can also detect your category “from your website and from mentions about your business throughout the web”. If your site shows different hours or a different number than the profile, Google has two conflicting sources – and you are not the one deciding which it believes.
• Verification and suspensions. For video verification Google requires that the name shown in the recording (signage, a permanent fixture) matches the name on the Business Profile; one of the example rejection reasons in Google's help is “Business name not visible on storefront”. Profiles that break the guidelines – a name with a marketing tagline, a virtual-office address – may be suspended or disabled, and a suspended profile disappears from Maps together with its reviews.

Ten places where profile and website must match

1. Business name. One name, one spelling: in the profile, in the home page title, in the footer, in the terms. No additions like “Best Plumber London 24h” in the profile name – the guidelines explicitly forbid marketing taglines, service descriptions, location details, hours, phone numbers and URLs in the name, and warn that this can get the profile suspended.
2. Phone number. The same number in the profile and in the site header or footer, written as a clickable tel: link. Google recommends a local number instead of a central call-centre line, requires the number to be under the direct control of the business, and forbids numbers and URLs that redirect to pages or numbers other than those of the actual business. One number on the profile and on the site, identical to the digit.
3. Address. The same address, in the same format, on the contact page and in the profile. P.O. boxes and virtual offices (unstaffed during business hours) are not eligible as a profile address; a business that works at the customer's location (plumber, cleaning) sets a service area and, per the guidelines, should hide its address – and the website should then say the same (“we come to you”) rather than show an address the profile does not have.
4. Opening hours. The most common mismatch: the site has pre-pandemic hours and the profile current ones, or the other way round. One owner, one list of hours, updated in both places the same day; holidays and days off as special hours in the profile.
5. Website link. The profile should link to the website that represents this location; the guidelines forbid URLs that redirect users to landing pages other than the business's own, “including pages created on social media sites”. The link has to work: no 404, no chain of three redirects, with https and the same www/non-www version the site uses (two versions without a redirect are two websites to Google).
6. Category vs site content. The profile's primary category (“Dental clinic”, “Car repair shop”) should be reflected in the home page title and heading. Google detects the category from your site and from mentions on the web, so if the profile says “law firm” and the site greets visitors with “Accounting office and law firm”, both Google and the customer are unsure what you actually do.
7. Services and prices. The services list in the profile and the offer on the site are the same set. A service missing from the site looks like a mistake in the profile; a price in the profile that differs from the site is a complaint at the door.
8. Photos. The storefront and entrance photos in the profile should show the same place the website shows. After a move, old photos stay in the profile for years – and send people to the previous address.
9. Data in the page code. Many sites carry LocalBusiness structured data – name and address (required by Google) plus the recommended telephone with country code, website URL (“must be a working link”), opening hours, coordinates and price range. It should describe the same thing the visible page and the profile do. The SEO plugin that filled it in during the first setup does not know you changed your number since.
10. Profile links: booking, menu, ordering. A “Book” button leading to a system you no longer use, or “Menu” pointing to a PDF with last year's prices, is the same mistake as a dead number – only harder to notice, because it works on someone else's site. The guidelines add that menu links cannot be direct links to third-party ordering or delivery services.

The 15-minute test, from your phone

1. Search Google for your business name and town in an incognito window. Write down what the listing shows: name, address, phone, hours, link. That is the version customers see – not the dashboard.
2. Tap “Call”. Who answers, after how many rings, and is it definitely your business? Do the same with the number on your contact page.
3. Tap the website link. Does it open straight away, with the padlock, at the address you expect? Are the footer and contact page showing exactly the same details as the listing? Can the number be tapped, or does it have to be retyped?
4. Tap “Directions”. Is the pin on your entrance, not at the back of the building or on the next street? Compare with the map or directions on your site.
5. Compare the hours in the listing, on the site and on the door. Three sources, one truth.
6. Check the data in the code. Go to search.google.com/test/rich-results and paste your home page address. If the test finds LocalBusiness or Organization, expand it and compare name, phone and address with the listing. If it shows errors, that is a job for your developer. If it finds nothing, the site has no structured data; not a failure, but an easy point to gain.
7. Open the profile as the owner (business.google.com): are there pending updates suggested by Google or by users? Accept the right ones, reject the wrong ones – do not leave them hanging.
8. Write the result on one sheet: name, address, phone, hours, website address – the current, authoritative version. From today every change starts with that sheet and ends in both places.

Symptom → cause → who fixes it

How to keep it consistent without effort

• One source of truth. A short document with name, address, phone, hours and website address. Every change in the business starts there, then goes to the profile, the website, the data in the code and the main directories (industry portals, other map providers, Facebook).
• Two owners of the profile. A profile created on the private account of a former employee or agency is the most common reason “the hours cannot be changed”. Add a second owner on a company account today.
• Calendar: special hours for the whole year. Holidays set in January will not surprise you in December.
• After every website change, run the test above. A site rebuild is the moment the profile link most often breaks and structured data most often disappears.
• Fifteen minutes once a quarter. Repeat the test; it is quicker than one conversation with a customer who stood in front of a locked door.

What Webskan checks

Webskan looks at your website, not at your Google profile – we have no access to the profile and do not ask for it. On the website side, the in-depth audit checks the parts of this article that live on the site: whether the phone number and e-mail address are clickable, whether there is a contact form and whether it works, whether the www and non-www versions redirect to one, whether the canonical address points to the right page, whether the certificate and the https redirect are in order, and whether the site has structured data that is valid JSON (we do not judge whether its content matches your listing – that is step 6 of the test above). Do the profile-vs-site comparison yourself with the list above; it takes a quarter of an hour and no tools.

Sources and tools

• Google, Guidelines for representing your business on Google – real-world name, forbidden additions, local phone number, no redirects (including social media pages), P.O. boxes and virtual offices, service-area businesses, special hours, menu links not to third-party ordering services
• Google, Tips to improve your local ranking on Google – relevance, distance, prominence (links, reviews); complete and accurate information; verification, up-to-date hours, reviews, photos
• Google, How Google sources and uses info in Business Profiles – crawled web content (including the official website), licensed data, users, Google's interactions with the business
• Google, Video recording verification – the name in the video must match the profile name; example rejection reasons
• Google Search Central, Local business structured data (LocalBusiness) – required and recommended properties, opening-hours format
• Google, Rich Results Test – free check of structured data on a page