Google Business Profile for a hair salon: the complete UK guide

Before a new client ever looks at your window, she looks at your Google profile. She types "hairdresser" plus your town, or your salon's name, and lands on the panel with your photos, your opening hours, your rating and your reviews. In a few seconds she decides whether to book you or the salon two streets away. That panel is your Business Profile (many owners still call it "Google My Business", its old name), it is free, and for a UK high-street salon it is almost certainly your most profitable piece of marketing.

The problem: most hair salon profiles are half empty. One category, a phone number, two dated photos, no services, no way to book. This guide goes through the profile section by section, in order, with what actually matters for showing up on Google Maps and turning profile views into appointments. Everything described here was verified on Google's official help pages, checked in October 2026; Google renames menus regularly, so if a label differs slightly on your screen, look for the function rather than the exact wording.

One thing this guide will keep coming back to: a complete profile that ends with "call us" still loses every client comparing salons at 9 pm on a Sunday. A profile that ends with a booking link converts them. With a commission-free online booking system such as ViteUneCoupe, that link points to your salon's own booking page, free, with 0 % commission on your appointments.

Why your Google profile is your salon's number one shopfront

A hair salon is a local business in the purest sense: your clients live or work minutes from your door. That is exactly the kind of search Google answers with its local pack, the map plus three businesses shown at the top of the results when someone searches "hairdresser" or "hair salon" near them.

Your profile plays three roles at once:

• being found: without a profile you exist on neither Google Maps nor the local pack;
• reassuring: photos, your average rating, recent reviews and your replies make the first impression before the first visit;
• converting: directions, one-tap calling and, above all, an online booking link turn a profile view into an appointment.

The last one is the most neglected, and it is the one with a direct line to your appointment diary.

Claiming and verifying your Business Profile

Your salon already appears on Google Maps

This is the most common case: Google creates profiles automatically from public sources, and anyone can suggest a business. Search for your salon on Google Maps, open the profile and select "Claim this business" (or "Own this business?"). You will need a Google account; use an address you intend to keep, because the profile will be tied to it.

Your salon is not on Google yet

Go to the Google Business Profile homepage and add your business: the salon's real name, category, address and phone number. Budget twenty minutes to do the first entry properly.

Verification

Either way, Google must confirm you really own the salon before you get control. According to Google's official verification help page, the methods on offer vary by business and region: a code by phone or SMS, by email, a video recording or live video call (typically filming your shopfront, your equipment and proof that you manage the salon), or a postcard, with most postcard codes arriving within 14 days. You do not pick freely: Google determines the available methods automatically and they cannot be changed. Video verifications can take up to five working days to review. Until verification is complete, your edits and photos are not published.

Choosing the right categories

The primary category is one of the most important settings on the whole profile: it tells Google which searches you should appear for.

• Primary category: "Hair salon". It is your trade and it is what your future clients type.
• Secondary categories: add only what matches a real activity in your salon. Google offers more specific options (hairdresser, hair extensions, and the list evolves); pick from it honestly, without forcing anything.

Two traps to avoid: piling up secondary categories "to cast a wide net" (a diluted profile is less relevant for its main query), and choosing a category that does not match what you do. Stay hairdressing.

Completing every section, without exception

The general rule is simple: a complete profile gives Google more material to judge your relevance, and gives the client more reasons to choose your salon. Work through every field.

Name, address, phone: consistency first

The profile name must be your salon's real name, exactly as it reads on your fascia. Google's business representation guidelines require the real-world name, with no taglines, added towns or lists of services, and warn that unnecessary additions can lead to the suspension of the profile. Use the same name, address and phone number everywhere: profile, website, Instagram, directories. Inconsistencies blur the signals, for Google and for your clients.

The description: 750 characters to introduce the salon

The description field is limited to 750 characters, with no URLs allowed, and Google asks you to focus on the business rather than promotions (official editing guidelines). Use it to say what a future client wants to know: your specialities (balayage, colour correction, curly hair, short crops), the atmosphere, your street or neighbourhood, walk-ins or appointment only. Write naturally, not as a keyword list.

Opening hours, including bank holidays

Wrong hours are the surest way to earn a furious review in front of a locked door. Enter your standard hours, then use special hours for bank holidays and your own closures. Google's hours help page even recommends confirming your hours for official holidays when they do not change, so the profile shows clients the information is reliable that day. One UK-specific detail worth knowing: bank holidays are not the same across the country, and England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland each have their own list, published on GOV.UK's bank holidays page. Put a reminder in your diary at the start of each quarter; it is a five-minute job.

Attributes

Attributes are the small factual labels that describe the experience: step-free access, Wi-Fi, payment methods, appointment required. Tick everything that is true for your salon; some subjective attributes are fed by visitors and cannot be edited directly.

Photos that make people want to push the door

Hairdressing is a visual trade, and photos carry a large share of the decision. Google's technical requirements are modest (official photo and video guidelines): JPG or PNG, sharp, well lit, no heavy filters, videos of 30 seconds at most. The real question is what to photograph in a salon:

• the shopfront, in daylight, so clients recognise the salon when they arrive;
• the interior: backwash, chairs, waiting area, natural light if you have it;
• the team: smiling faces reassure more than any text;
• your work: cuts, colours, balayages, occasion hair. These are your most persuasive photos;
• your logo and a well-chosen cover photo, which Google features on the profile.

One caution on photos of your work: a photo where your client is recognisable is personal data under UK data protection law. Get written consent before publishing (a simple message is enough, keep a record), and take the photo down if she changes her mind. The details are in our guide to client records and UK GDPR in a hair salon. Many salons sidestep the issue elegantly: shoot from behind, or crop to the colour and texture, no face.

Then keep adding a few photos a month: a living profile inspires more confidence than an album frozen three years ago.

The services section: your price list, directly on Google

Google lets you display your services on the profile, with descriptions and prices (services help page): suggested options linked to your category, plus custom services you create freely (a custom service name must not contain prices or phone numbers; those have their own fields).

Three hairdresser's tips:

• use exactly the same names and prices as your in-salon price list and your online booking page: a price that differs between Google and the till is a dispute waiting at reception;
• name services the way clients search for them: "balayage", "ladies' cut and finish", "colour and blow-dry", not your internal jargon;
• prices shown to consumers in the UK must include VAT, so enter them as the client will actually pay them, and update the section the day your price list changes.

The booking link: the section that turns views into appointments

Your profile has a links section, including a slot for a booking link. It is the highest-yield field on the whole profile: the client comparing three salons on a Sunday evening books the one where she can book now.

Paste the address of your online booking page there. With ViteUneCoupe, that page comes with the free plan, with 0 % commission on your appointments, your services and your stylists' schedules. The full step-by-step, for your Google profile but also Instagram, Facebook and a QR code at reception, is in our guide to adding online booking to your hair salon's website and Google profile.

Do not confuse this with "Reserve with Google", the native integration where the booking happens without leaving Google, available only through partner booking providers. ViteUneCoupe does not offer that integration. The simple booking link, by contrast, works today, free.

One word on marketplaces: if your booking button points to a marketplace rather than your own page, check what that means for your costs and your client list. We compare the two approaches in direct bookings versus marketplaces for your hair salon.

Google posts: showing the salon is alive

Posts are short publications displayed on your profile. Google's help page describes three formats: updates (text, photos, an action button), offers (with dates and an optional voucher code) and events (with start and end dates). Posts without a date range are archived after six months, and Google reviews each post against its content policy after you publish it.

For a salon, one or two posts a month is plenty: a free slot during the holidays, a new stylist joining, a Christmas opening-hours notice, a colour transformation you are proud of. The goal is not volume; it is showing clients, and incidentally Google, that the salon is active.

The Q&A section is gone

If you are looking for the old "Questions and answers" section, stop looking: Google withdrew the feature in late 2025 and is progressively replacing it with answers generated by its AI from existing content (checked in October 2026; the help pages that documented the feature have been removed).

The practical consequence matters: the answers Google now gives about your salon draw on your profile, your reviews and your website. In other words, everything this guide has you fill in (description, services, hours, attributes, review replies) becomes the raw material for the automatic answers. A complete profile has never counted for more.

Reviews: the lever you control most

On review volume Google is unusually explicit: its page on how local ranking works states that more reviews and positive ratings can improve your local ranking. For a salon, reviews are also the social proof a new client reads before trusting anyone with her hair.

Three habits, none of which costs money:

• Ask, simply and personally. The best moment is when a client is delighted at the till, or in the thank-you message after the appointment. Ask for an honest review, never a five-star one.
• Reply to every review, including the bad ones, briefly and professionally. A review page where the salon never replies feels abandoned; a measured reply to a harsh review often says more about you than ten glowing ones.
• Never buy, trade or fake reviews. Google's policies forbid it, and in the UK it is now explicitly against consumer law: fake reviews, and genuine-looking incentivised reviews, are banned practices under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024, in force since 6 April 2025, with official CMA guidance published on GOV.UK. That ban also protects you: if a competitor or a disgruntled ex-employee posts reviews that are plainly fake, report them through the profile's review management tools and flag the legal context if you escalate.

How Google ranks salons: relevance, distance, prominence

Google itself explains its three local ranking factors on its dedicated help page:

Google adds that there is no way to request or pay for a better local ranking. Since distance is out of your hands, your room for progress is relevance (everything above) and prominence, where a hair salon's main lever is reviews.

The mistakes that sink a salon's profile

Stuffing the name with keywords

"Sophie's Studio Hairdresser Balayage Colour Leeds": tempting, forbidden. The business name rules quoted earlier require the real salon name, and Google warns the profile can be suspended for padding it. A suspended profile vanishes from Maps overnight; the hoped-for gain is never worth that risk. Your keywords belong in the categories, the description and the services.

The other classics

• Hours never updated: bank holidays missing, Christmas closures never entered;
• A phone that rings out: if nobody can answer mid-colour, the booking link is your best receptionist, and the wider problem of missed calls in a hair salon has its own guide;
• Archive photos: a refitted salon showing pre-refurbishment photos is working against itself;
• Reviews without replies, especially the critical ones;
• Buying or faking reviews: against Google's rules and, since April 2025, against UK law, as above;
• Leaving an old duplicate profile live after a move or a takeover: have the old one corrected or closed rather than creating a second.

Your monthly 15-minute routine

A profile is maintained like a window display. Once the initial optimisation is done, this ritual is enough:

Put a recurring reminder in your diary, the same day you do the bookkeeping for example. Fifteen minutes a month maintains an asset that brings you clients all year, free.

Frequently asked questions

Is a Google Business Profile really free?

Yes, entirely: creating it, verifying it, photos, posts, services and the booking link cost nothing. Google separately sells local advertising (the results marked "Sponsored" or "Ad"), but the profile itself and its organic ranking cannot be bought.

How long before my salon appears on Google Maps?

Your profile becomes visible once verification is complete: minutes by phone, up to five working days for a video review, up to a couple of weeks by postcard. Later edits and photos can also pass through a short review before publication. Appearing in the local pack for a competitive query, though, is gradual: that is the relevance and prominence work described in this guide.

I am a mobile hairdresser. Can I have a profile without showing my home address?

Yes. Google lets you declare a business that travels to its clients and hide the address by defining a service area instead. You get the local visibility without publishing where you live.

Why is my salon not first even though my profile is complete?

Because ranking combines relevance, distance and prominence. With equal profiles, a salon closer to the searcher, or more established (more reviews, more mentions on the web), will rank above you. Keep collecting reviews and keep the profile alive: that is the part of the ranking you can work on over time.

Can I pay Google to rank my salon higher in the map results?

No. Google states plainly that there is no way to request or pay for a better local ranking. You can buy ads, which appear labelled as such above the organic results, but the local pack itself is earned through relevance and prominence, not bought.

Who can edit my profile?

The owners and managers you add from the profile, each with their own Google account. Never share your password with an agency or freelancer: give them manager access, which you can revoke. Google and members of the public can also suggest edits, which is one more reason to glance at your profile regularly and catch a change you did not make.