Get your business on Google Maps
The listing with your name, phone number, hours, photos and reviews that appears when someone searches for what you sell nearby. It is free to run, and for most Kampala businesses it brings calls faster than anything else.
Why this comes before everything else
Someone in Bugolobi searches "hardware shop near me". Google shows a map with three businesses, their star ratings and a call button. Most people tap one of those three. They never scroll to the websites below.
That box is the Business Profile, and getting into it does not require a website at all. It requires a verified listing with the right category, complete information, real photos and reviews. If you do nothing else this month, do this.
Doing it badly is common: wrong category, no photos, a phone number nobody answers, hours that were right in 2022. Those listings sit below the ones that are done properly.
You may already have one you do not control
Google sometimes creates a listing for a business from other sources, and customers can suggest edits to it. We check whether one already exists for you, claim it, and correct whatever is wrong before anyone else does.
What we set up
- Claim or create the listing in your Google account
- Verification, including the postcard or video method if Google asks
- The right primary category, plus secondary ones that matter
- Services and products listed with prices where sensible
- Correct pin location, so the directions do not send people to a swamp
- Opening hours, including holidays
- Photos loaded properly - shopfront, inside, team, work
- WhatsApp and call buttons where the profile allows
- A short review link for you to send customers
- A 15 minute session on posting updates and replying to reviews
UGX 100,000 as a one-off, or included free with any website package.
What decides who appears in that box
Google weighs three things. Two of them you control completely.
How close you are
Distance from the person searching. You cannot change where your shop is, but you can make sure your pin is in the right place and your service area is set correctly, which many listings get wrong.
How complete you are
Category, description, services, hours, photos, and whether the listing matches the details on your website and everywhere else online. A complete listing beats a half-filled one at the same distance, every time.
How trusted you are
Reviews - how many, how recent, how good, and whether you reply. This is the lever most Ugandan businesses never pull, which is exactly why pulling it works so well.
After we hand it over
The listing keeps working only if you feed it. It takes about ten minutes a week.
- Ask for a review after every job. Same day, using the link we give you. Five a month changes your position within a season.
- Reply to every review, good or bad. Google notices, and so do the customers reading them.
- Post a photo every week or two. New stock, finished work, the team. It signals the business is alive.
- Update hours before holidays. Nothing annoys a customer like a closed door at 10am on a Tuesday.
If you would rather not do it, our Standard care plan includes keeping the profile current.
Not on Google Maps yet?
It costs UGX 100,000 as a one-off, or nothing at all if we are building your website. Either way it is the fastest way to start getting calls.