SEO & local search
Can a business without a shop or office appear on Google Maps?
Short answer
Yes. Google lets a business that serves customers at their location, such as a plumber, a cleaner or a mobile hairdresser, set itself up as a service-area business. You verify the business with your real address, then hide it and list the towns or municipalities you serve instead, for example Sintra, Cascais and Oeiras. The profile then shows in Maps and local results for searches in those places. Distance still counts, so you appear most readily near where the business is based.
Last reviewed
How a service-area profile works
- You verify the business with a real address, often your home, which is not shown to the public.
- You list up to 20 service areas: towns, municipalities or postcodes. For a business based in Sintra that might be Sintra, Cascais, Oeiras and Amadora.
- Customers see the area you cover, your phone number, hours, photos and reviews, but no pin on a street.
What it does not do
Service areas tell customers where you work. They do not make you rank equally well everywhere in them. Google still weighs the distance between the searcher and the business, so appearing further away depends on relevance and prominence: the right category, a complete profile, reviews, and a website with pages for the places you serve.
What the website should add
- A page per service, and a page for each area you really serve where you have something specific to say.
- The same business name and phone number as the profile.
- Structured data listing the areas served, without a street address if you have hidden it on Google.
A note on the legal notice
Hiding the address on Google does not change what Portuguese law asks of the website. The legal notice still needs the business name, address, email and tax number.
People also ask this as
- Do I need a shop to be on Google Maps?
- Can I hide my home address on Google Business Profile?
- How do I set service areas on Google?