Google My Business Is Now Google Business Profile

Google is making it easier for people and business owners to manage their profiles in a single, centralized location. Google My Business (GMB) will now be known as “Google Business Profile.”

By renaming the app with this change-over process moving forward, all efforts are being put into bringing GMB management out of apps like Search or Maps so you can do everything from one place, including setting up appointments and changing business hours and/or details.

Why a New Name?

Google is finally shaking off the old name and introducing a new one: Google Business Profiles.

The company said that’s to keep things simple, though we suspect it might also be because they’re getting ready for something big- like retiring the Google My Business dashboard app in 2022.

Learn how to interpret your Google My Business insights on the business app while you can in our recent blog post.

Great, another new name!

Google is no stranger to name changes.  Now we’ll be calling the local business management product “Google Business Profile.”

• Before that, it was named Google My Business.
• Before Google My Business, it was named Google Places (again).
• Before Google Places, it was Google+ Local.
• Before Google+ Local, it was Google Places.
• Before that, it was just Google Local.

And that’s just the ones that we can think of off the top of our heads.

So, yes, it’s a new name to keep in mind. Google Business Profile.

Is Google My Business going away?

No, Google My Business is not going away. It’s just changing names to Google Business Profile – just with some new features.

Now business owners are encouraged to manage their single listings on Google Search and/or Google Maps.  They can use either the web interface or mobile apps.

There’s nothing new to learn here;  they’ve let businesses manage their listings directly in the search results and Google Maps App for a while now.

Now, they’re just saying that they prefer you use the Google Maps or Search apps if you have a single listing.

What about larger businesses with multiple locations?

Here’s a secret.  You’re the reason for the change!

Google has been encouraging multi-location businesses to make their business profiles more accurate and efficient, so this change only makes sense.

In other words, this change is to primarily support larger businesses; however, small businesses should know about the changes as well.

They will be redirecting and rebranding the GMB web interface.  There will likely be changes to the Business Profile Manager and additional tools added throughout the upcoming months.

That’s ok; we know a Google business profile manager who still uses https://google.com/places and is directed to https://google.com/business.

Old habits die hard.

GBP’s New Features

Google announced new features with this announcement.  Some of them are:

• You can claim and verify your Google Business Profile directly in Google Search and Maps
• Call history is officially launching in the US and Canada
• Searchers can message you directly from Google Search
• Profile owners can control read receipts In Google Search and Maps

How You Will Manage Your Business

To manage your business profile, all you have to do is search for your business name in Google Search or Google Maps.  Or, you can search for “my business” in Google Search to view the profile that you’ve already claimed and verified.

What the Changes Look Like

Here are some images that show how the new Google Business Profile features will look:

What it looks like. 

Here are screenshots of the web interface and mobile app interfaces for these features:

Google Search

Customers can message local businesses right there on the search results pages.  To us, it makes more sense than opening Google Maps to check out the business’ location, store hours, and other basic information.

This is especially true now that these businesses are adding contact and other business information right there on their profiles. It’s much less work for them to respond to requests since they’re all together in one place.  That should make everyone happy.

Call History

Google Business Profile managers can view call history and monitor how their customers engage with the phone number on their business listing.

Read receipts

You’ll be able to see if your messages are being read.

Why Do We Care?

Google is all about local search, and they’ve got your back. The Google My Business web interface isn’t changing as much as it’s rebranding.

For now.

Over the next few months, you can expect to see more of the old GMB web interface features working directly in Google Search, Google Maps, and their apps.

So, yeah, Google My Business is renamed Google Business Profile.  But, it’s ok,  it’s still the same thing.

For now, anyway.

Here’s what Local SEO Guru Greg Gifford had to say about the change:

If you’re interested in learning more, here’s a great article on the subject and other latest news about Google.

If you need help claiming, verifying, and optimizing your GMB (or GBP) profile, we’re here to help.   We can help you with all of your digital marketing needs, from designing and developing your business website to content creation for all of your social media properties.

Contact us today to get started.