The fields, what to put in them, how often to touch them
| Field | What to put | How often |
|---|---|---|
| Primary and secondary categories | The one category that matches what you most want to be found for, then every other category that is true for the practice | Once, then review each quarter |
| Services | Every treatment on the menu, each with a two-sentence description in plain words a patient would type | When the menu changes |
| Hours and holiday hours | The hours you keep, plus special hours for every holiday and closure for the year ahead | Monthly, and the week before any closure |
| Booking link and phone | The link that opens your calendar, and the number a person or an answering system picks up every hour you are open | Check monthly by booking and calling yourself |
| Photos | Your treatment rooms, your providers with their names, the entrance, the parking. No stock images | Two or three new photos a week |
| Posts, questions and answers, attributes, description | A post a week about one treatment; seed the questions patients ask and answer them; every attribute that is true; a description that names the treatments and the area | Weekly post, quarterly review of the rest |
The fifteen minutes a week that keep it alive
- Reply to every review from the week, by name, briefly, without confirming anyone's patient status or treatment.
- Post once: one treatment, one photo from the week, one sentence about who it is for, the booking link.
- Add two or three photos from the week: a room, a provider at work with consent, a product on the shelf.
- Answer any new question in the questions section, and add one you were asked at the desk this week.
- Check that the hours are right for next week and that the booking link still lands on an open calendar.
What moves the Maps pack
Google ranks local results on three things, and its own help pages say so. Proximity: how close the practice is to the person searching, which you cannot change. Relevance: how well the profile matches what was typed, which is the categories, the services, the description and the words in your reviews. Prominence: how well known the practice is, which is review count and recency, mentions on other sites, and a website that answers the same questions. You control two of the three, and your own profile will show whether you work on either.
What a med spa gets wrong
- A primary category chosen years ago that no longer matches the menu.
- Services left empty because the menu is on the website. The profile is what the patient sees first.
- A booking link that lands on a contact form instead of a calendar.
- Stock photos. Patients can tell.
- A phone number that rings to a voicemail at lunch and after hours. The call is the conversion; the profile only earns the call.
How to measure it from the profile's own insights
The profile reports how many people saw it and whether they found it by searching your name or a treatment. It also reports what they did next: called, tapped the booking link, asked for directions, visited the site. Write those four actions down weekly. The number to grow is treatment searches, because those are strangers. The number to protect is calls, because a call that is not answered undoes everything above it.
What to do next
NorthCore's Get found first solution runs the profile: the fields kept current, the weekly routine done, and the profile's four actions on your dashboard next to your calls and bookings. Scoped in writing and covered by the promise on this site: results in 90 days, or we keep working until you have them.
