Local SEO for Restaurants

The five moments when a diner searches

Restaurant searches come in five distinct situations. Each one looks at a different part of your listing, so check each in turn.

Go through your own listing on a phone, row by row, before you change anything. Errors found this way are the cheapest to fix.

Profile basics, and the traps in them

Google ranks local results on relevance, distance and prominence. Relevance is how well your profile matches the search. Distance is how far you are from the searcher. Prominence is how well known you are, which includes review count and rating. You can improve relevance and prominence. You cannot change distance, which is why a restaurant on a quiet street needs a different strategy from one on the main road.

Three traps catch restaurants more than other businesses:

• Business name. Google says the name should match your real-world signage, without added descriptions or taglines. "Taverna Example" is right. "Taverna Example | Best Greek Food and Meze" is not.
• Categories. Choose the fewest that say what you are, and be specific. Google's own example is a pizza chain with takeout and delivery but no dining room, which should choose "Pizza Delivery" and "Pizza Takeout", not a general delivery category.
• Hours. Special hours for holidays, private events and the seasonal close matter more than the standard week.

Make the menu readable by people and machines

The menu is the page diners most expect to find, and it is often published badly. A photo of a printed menu cannot be read by a search engine, translated by a phone or enlarged by a visitor with poor eyesight. Our advice is to publish the menu as text on a web page, with prices, and offer a PDF only as an extra.

Google's help page lets you add a link that helps customers check a menu, and up to 10 links per category for reservations and food ordering. Use your own menu page as the menu link. Use your own booking page, or a booking provider's page, as the reservation link. If you use a delivery platform, check which ordering link appears, because the platform may add its own.

For the site, Google's local business markup lists menu, cuisine served and price range as recommended properties, and recommends the most specific type, such as Restaurant. It also says markup does not guarantee that any feature will appear. Mark up what is visible on the page. Do not mark up reviews of your own restaurant: Google makes pages with local business markup ineligible for review stars when the business controls the reviews about itself.

Booking and delivery platforms: keep control of the link

Third-party platforms are useful, but each one that sits between you and the diner takes a fee or a slice of the guest relationship. A platform may also add its own link to your profile, so look at what a diner actually sees rather than what you last typed in.

Apply a simple decision rule:

• If the platform brings you diners you would not otherwise get, such as a delivery area you cannot serve yourself, keep it.
• If it mainly takes bookings from people who searched for your name, point the profile's main link at your own booking page and use the platform as a second route.
• Whatever you choose, check the live links every week from a phone, as a diner would.

Photos that help a diner decide

Upload photos of the dining room, the food as served and the exterior, so a first-time visitor can recognise the door. Update them each season. Add photos of the dishes you want to sell, not a catalogue of everything. Retire pictures of a menu you no longer serve.

Reviews: ask, then reply

Google allows you to ask for reviews by sharing a link or QR code, for example on the bill or table card. It prohibits free or discounted items in exchange for reviews. Its advice on replies is to keep them short and professional, avoid the same generic thanks every time, avoid using replies to promote deals, and not share private information.

For a complaint, say what you will do and move the conversation to a phone number or email. A reply that argues with a guest is read by everyone considering you next.

Several languages for visitors

If many diners are visitors, publish the menu in the languages they read. Google recommends a separate URL for each language version and says content on each page should stay in a single language. A menu with the English and Greek text side by side on one page confuses the language signal. Link the versions to each other so a visitor can switch.

A weekly routine of 20 minutes

1. Check hours for the coming week, including holidays.
2. Reply to new reviews.
3. Add two or three new photos.
4. Test the menu, reservation and ordering links on a phone.
5. Update the menu page for any change in dishes or prices.

For the full field list, use our Google Business Profile checklist. Our guide to ranking on Google Maps explains the ranking side, and our SEO service page explains how we can help.