For a lot of patients, your Google Business Profile is the first thing they see about your practice. It appears when someone nearby searches for a chiropractor, a med spa, or a dentist with Saturday hours, and it puts your hours, reviews, photos, and booking link in front of them before they open your website. In this Google Business Profile guide for medical practices and wellness clinics, we'll cover how to set up your profile correctly and keep it working for you.
Healthcare practices have a few extra things to think about. Google has specific rules for practices with more than one provider, patient privacy affects how you reply to reviews, and some office setups don't qualify for a profile.
Does Your Practice Qualify for a Google Business Profile?
If patients come to your office, your practice can have a Google Business Profile. The address on your profile should lead patients somewhere they can actually be seen, so a few common setups need a little more care:
- Suite in a medical building: This qualifies as long as your practice name is on permanent signage and you see patients there.
- Co-working space: The office needs clear signage, your own staff on site during business hours, and patients coming in during those hours.
- Virtual office: A mailing address you rent but don't work from isn't eligible for a profile.
- Telehealth only: Without a location patients can visit, a video-only practice can't have a profile.
- Mobile services: If your team travels to patients for in-home physical therapy, IV therapy, or blood draws, a service-area profile hides your address and shows the areas you serve, generally within about 2 hours of driving from your base.
- Clinic plus mobile care: You can show your clinic's address and add a service area, as long as the clinic is staffed during its posted hours.
Who Should Own Your Practice's Profile?
Whoever owns your profile controls who else can change it, so that control should stay with the practice, ideally on a Google account tied to a shared office email. Google gives profiles 3 levels of access:
- A primary owner, the only person who can transfer primary ownership. Each profile has just one.
- Owners, who can add and remove other users. A profile can have several.
- Managers, who have mostly the same access as owners and suit staff or outside partners handling day-to-day updates.
This usually comes up when someone moves on. A former employee or vendor who still holds the profile can add you as an owner and transfer primary ownership. If they don't respond, request ownership through Google. The current owner has 3 days to reply, and after that, Google may let you claim the profile yourself, though not always. Service-area businesses need to contact Google support instead. Once you have access, remove anyone who no longer works with the practice.
Verification confirms your practice is real and located where your profile says it is. Google chooses the method, and a short video of your location is one current option. If your practice already has an unclaimed profile, you can claim and verify it the same way.
How Should You List Each Provider?
Patients often search for a provider by name, so Google lets doctors, dentists, and other providers with their own patients have their own profiles, as long as they can be reached at the practice during its posted hours. In a group practice, the practice keeps its profile, and each provider's profile uses their name, which can include credentials like Dr. or MD, without the practice name. For a solo provider, Google recommends sharing one profile with the practice, named like "Practice Name: Dr. Jane Smith."
Provider profiles also spread your reviews across more profiles, and someone has to handle each one when a provider leaves, so set them up for the providers patients ask for by name. Support staff shouldn't have profiles, and each provider needs only one, even with several specialties.
What Should Your Profile Tell Patients?
Your profile should tell patients what kind of practice you are, what you offer, and how to book. Google ranks local results mainly on relevance, distance, and prominence. You can't change how far patients are from your office, so focus on describing your practice clearly and building its reputation. Your profile is a core part of local SEO for medical practices. GBP optimization starts with the fields that help Google match you to the right searches.
Start with your name and primary category. Use the name on your sign, without services or a city added. A name like "Smith Chiropractic Back Pain Relief Austin" goes against Google's guidelines and can get the profile suspended. For your category, choose the one that describes what the practice is, such as a medical spa, chiropractor, or physical therapy clinic.
List each service on its own with a short description, from injectables to prenatal adjustments, and use the business description to explain your practice in plain language. Google doesn't allow links in the description, and it shouldn't focus on promotions or prices.
The rest of a Google Business Profile for healthcare helps patients decide whether to book:
- Hours: If your front desk keeps regular hours, list them and update them before holidays. Google's guidelines say appointment-only businesses shouldn't list hours, so those providers can leave them off.
- Appointment link: Point it straight to your scheduling page so patients can book without hunting for it.
- Attributes: The options depend on your category. Fill in the ones that are true for your practice, such as accessibility details, and turn on virtual visits if your category offers that option and you provide them.
- Photos: Current photos of your space and team show patients what to expect.
If a photo shows a patient, get written permission first. For practices covered by HIPAA, that means a valid HIPAA authorization, which includes specific parts like an expiration date and the patient's right to revoke it. A general photo release may not qualify, so have your compliance contact review the form.
In some areas, you can also add a text or WhatsApp option to the profile. Patients may use it to share symptoms or insurance details, so decide who answers and when to move the conversation to a phone call or your patient portal. The same care applies to the pages your booking link leads to, especially ones with intake forms or ad tracking. Our HIPAA compliant hosting page explains how forms, analytics, and hosting fit into HIPAA.
What's the Best Way to Handle Patient Reviews?
Ask every patient for a review the same way, and keep your replies general. Reviews affect where you show up, since Google counts both how many reviews you have and your rating. They also appear next to your profile in Search and Maps, so patients see them while comparing practices.
A quick mention at checkout, followed by a text with a direct review link or QR code, makes the ask easy. Google doesn't allow any kind of incentive for reviews, so skip discounts, gift cards, and drawings. The FTC's rule on consumer reviews, in effect since October 21, 2024, also bans fake reviews and the use of threats or intimidation to stop negative ones.
Replying is where healthcare is different. Google's general advice is to address reviewers by name and respond to their specific feedback. For a practice covered by HIPAA, a reply like that can end up disclosing protected health information. A California dental practice paid $23,000 to settle with HHS after sharing patient information in its replies to online reviews.
A safe reply thanks the person and stays general. Leave out:
- Anything that confirms the person visited your practice
- Treatments, appointments, or costs
- Details the reviewer shared about their own care
For a negative review, invite them to call so the conversation can happen privately. A reply can be as simple as this:
"Thank you for sharing your feedback. We'd like to learn more and see how we can help. Please call our office and ask for our practice manager."
If you draft replies with AI tools, including Gemini, which is rolling out to some profile owners, check each draft against these rules before posting. If a review looks fake, or someone threatens negative reviews unless they're paid, report it to Google instead of replying.
How Do You Keep a Profile Accurate Over Time?
Respond to suggested edits as soon as Google notifies you, and check the profile once a month. Your profile can change even when no one at your practice touches it. Google fills in details from your website and other sources, and anyone can suggest an edit. If Google notifies you about a suggested edit, you have 4 days to accept or reject it before Google may publish it. Your monthly check is also a good time to update the profile:
- Set holiday hours ahead of time.
- Add new providers and services when they start.
- Remove services you no longer offer.
- Use posts to share news, like a new service or extended hours.
Following Google's guidelines also protects the profile. Keywords in the business name, duplicate profiles, an address that doesn't qualify, and categories used as keywords can all lead to a suspension, and getting a suspended profile back means going through an appeal.
Accurate details help beyond Google Maps, too. AI tools that recommend local providers can draw on your profile, reviews, and website, and keeping those details consistent is the idea behind AI search optimization.
To see what the profile is doing for you, check the Performance section. Depending on your business, it can show calls, website clicks, direction requests, and the search terms people used to find you. Bookings data comes from scheduling providers connected to Google, so if your appointment link goes to your own scheduling page, track those appointments in your scheduling software. Compare it all with your booked appointments each month.
Common Questions About Google Business Profiles
Does Each Office Need Its Own Profile?
Yes. Each location patients visit should have its own profile with its own address, phone number, and hours. If your locations share a brand, Google asks that they use the same name and main category across every office.
Can a Practice Remove a Negative Review?
You can't delete reviews yourself, but you can flag one that breaks Google's content policies, such as a fake review, for Google to evaluate. A negative review based on a real visit generally stays up, so a short, general reply is a good way to respond.
Is a Google Business Profile Free?
Yes. Creating and managing a profile is free, and there's no way to pay Google for a better local ranking.
Ready to Put Your Profile to Work?
When someone nearby needs care, your profile is often how they decide who to call, so keeping it accurate helps the right patients find you.
If you'd rather not manage your profile alone, Blackhawk can help. As a digital marketing agency for the wellness spectrum, we work with practices on their Google Business Profiles and local search. Get in touch to start the conversation.
