If you want to improve your local rankings, start by getting specific with your Google Business Profile category, choosing relevant additional categories, and fully completing your Profile.
Whitespark studied 1.8 million Google Business Profiles across 4,209 categories to learn more about the impact of Google Business Profile categories on rankings, identify notable trends among businesses with specific GBP categories, and explore the curious things that happen at the intersection of different categories. (Disclosure: I’m the founder of Whitespark.)
The findings challenge some assumptions about how category selection and Profile completeness affect local rankings. Here are three of the most interesting findings from the study.
Is it better to pick a generic or specific category for rankings?
The idea that Google matches the primary GBP category to the search term shouldn’t come as a surprise to any local marketer.
For example, here are the results for a search for “hair salons”:
| Primary category | Appearances | Avg rank | % in top 10 |
| Hair salon | 7,952 | 49.9 | 11.3% |
| Hairdresser | 200 | 56.9 | 6.0% |
| Beauty salon | 2,066 | 60.0 | 3.2% |
| Barber shop | 297 | 79.5 | 1.3% |
| Nail salon | 36 | 81.3 | 0.0% |
The exact-match category, Hair salon, outperforms all other adjacent categories.
The same applies to a search for “plumbers,” where the “Plumber” category outranks all the other categories in the industry, and the pattern repeats for almost every category in our dataset. Obvious and expected.
However, there’s more to consider when choosing your primary category: specificity.
Many business owners who aren’t familiar with local SEO might be tempted to pick a generic primary category, say, Restaurant or Law Firm, to capture broader search traffic.
However, the data shows that across all industries, a specific primary category is associated with better rankings and a ~36% higher presence in the top 10 results (12.5% vs. 9.2%):
| Primary category type | Businesses | Avg rank | % in top 10 |
| Generic (Restaurant, Store, Contractor, Attorney, etc.) | 55,091 | 50 | 9.2% |
| Specific (everything modified) | 1,664,733 | 45.8 | 12.5% |
Here are three specific category examples:
Attorneys
| Primary category | Avg rank (lower is better) | % in top 10 |
| Criminal justice attorney | 44.7 | 13.4% |
| Personal injury attorney | 48.4 | 12.2% |
| Attorney (generic) | 57.1 | 12.9% |
Contractors
| Primary category | Avg rank (lower is better) | % in top 10 |
| Electrician | 48.6 | 11.2% |
| Roofing contractor | 53.1 | 12.6% |
| Plumber | 53.2 | 10.4% |
| HVAC contractor | 53.2 | 12.4% |
| Contractor (generic) | 57.7 | 8.0% |
Restaurants
| Primary category | Avg rank (lower is better) | % in top 10 |
| Tapas | 28.8 | 32.1% |
| Hawaiian | 28.4 | 27.1% |
| New American | 30.4 | 28.9% |
| French | 37.0 | 15.8% |
| Spanish | 40.1 | 18.5% |
| American | 41.8 | 17.8% |
| Restaurant (generic) | 49.7 | 10.1% |
| Mexican | 66.7 | 2.7% |
| Pizza | 74.8 | 1.6% |
| Chinese | 73.2 | 0.6% |
Specific categories rank better than generic ones every time. This is because:
- The specific categories generally have less competition. Compare the number of Hawaiian restaurants in your town to the total number of restaurants.
- Google always tries to match the primary category to the query. If you search for “plumbers,” Google wants to present the user with a list of businesses that specialize in plumbing, not general contractors.
Takeaway: If you want to rank for everything, you’ll end up ranking for nothing. Users have specific needs in mind when they search for a local business. So, choose a more specific primary category with less competition to reap those ranking benefits.
Dig deeper: The local SEO gatekeeper: How Google defines your entity
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What are the winning primary + additional category combinations for rankings?
After you pick your primary category with our advice above, the next step is to add additional categories. We’ve noticed in the data that aligning specific additional categories with your primary tends to have a positive impact on rankings.
Here are the primary + additional category combinations that rank the highest in our database:
| Primary category | Best-ranking additional | Avg rank | vs. no additional category | vs. “Service establishment” |
| Veterinarian | Emergency veterinarian service | 33.9 | 51.2 | 75.6 |
| Electrician | EV charging station contractor | 38.2 | 47.5 | 63.5 |
| Gym | Athletic club | 34.7 | 43.3 | – |
| Plumber | Drainage service | 47.3 | 54.0 | 62.3 |
| Roofing | Gutter service | 47.1 | 52.1 | 70.3 |
| Personal injury attorney | Business attorney | 40.8 | 51.4 | – |
| Dentist | Cosmetic dentist | 47.6 | 57.6 | 53.7 |
The data shows that having well-chosen, specific additional categories correlates with higher rankings (by 6-17 rank positions) when compared to businesses that only have a single primary category.
However, correlation isn’t causation. Business owners who add additional categories are more likely to take care of their local SEO in general (to optimize their GBPs, to ask for reviews, to do SEO work outside of their Google Business Profile, etc.). So, of course, their rankings reflect that.
Still, it’s noteworthy that the correlation exists.
Also, to no one’s surprise, a broad, generic category like “Service establishment” that no one ever searches for is useless. In fact, the data seems to suggest that it’s harmful to add this nothing-category to your Profile.
Has anyone ever in the history of the world gone to Google and typed “service establishment near me”? No. So, go specific.
Dig deeper: How to pick the right Google Business Profile categories
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The ‘GBP completeness index’
One of the most important questions we asked when doing this study was, “Does Profile completeness differ systematically by category and industry?” And the follow-up to that: “Does GBP completeness predict rank?”
So, we built a 0-5 GBP Completeness index, where we added one point each for the presence of:
- A website.
- A business description.
- Hours of operation.
- Photos.
- A claimed status.
And we used this index to answer the following questions.
Note: For this research, we didn’t gather all the data that Google Business Profiles contain (like business attributes, services, products, etc.). Thus, this index is based on the limited data we did gather.
Does GBP completeness vary systematically by industry?
Yes. Businesses in competitive industries where local SEO is essential for standing out have the most complete Profiles.
| Industry | Avg completeness (0-5) | % fully complete (5/5) |
| Home services | 4.4 | 55% |
| Professional services | 4.3 | 52% |
| Automotive | 4.2 | 48% |
| Beauty and personal care | 4.1 | 45% |
| Legal / Financial | 4.1 | 46% |
| Retail | 3.9 | 40% |
| Real estate | 3.8 | 38% |
| Travel and tourism | 3.6 | 33% |
| Community and organizations | 3.0 | 22% |
Meanwhile, the noncommercial/institutional industries (community and organizations categories like churches, for example) don’t put too much work into their Profiles because they don’t need to.
Does GBP completeness predict rank?
Yes, absolutely.
| Completeness index | Avg rank | % in top 10 |
| 0 | 62 | 4% |
| 1 | 58 | 5% |
| 2 | 54 | 7% |
| 3 | 50 | 9% |
| 4 | 47 | 11% |
| 5 | 43 | 13% |
Our data shows that GBP completeness goes hand in hand with better rankings. Going from a 0 to a 5 in the GBP Completeness index improves average rank by ~19 positions and triples the rate of appearing in the top 10 results.
However, it’s important to remember that correlation does not equal causation. Having a fully optimized Profile is one of the foundational steps to better rankings, but your local SEO work doesn’t end there.
A business owner with a complete GBP is more likely to publish Google Posts, request reviews, and pay attention to their website, citations, and online reputation.
Takeaway: Begin by filling out every field of your Google Business Profile. Then, maintain that Profile: request reviews continuously, upload photos and videos often, and publish Google Posts. And, of course, don’t forget about your website SEO, your presence on social media, and your AI SEO.
Dig deeper: 5-step Google Business Profile audit to improve local rankings
Your local rankings checklist
Here’s your simple local rankings checklist based on the data from our study:
- When it comes to picking a primary category, always pick a specific one.
- Don’t neglect your additional categories. Add all the additional categories that your business offers (and maybe skip “Service establishment”).
- Fully optimizing your GBP is nonnegotiable. Simply doing this one thing can be more than enough to stand out from the competition in noncrowded industries. However, most businesses have to go beyond their GBP: optimize and maintain your website, build citations, be present on social media, engage with your online community, and pay attention to AI SEO.
These are just a few of the many findings from our category research. Stay tuned for the full report (publishing soon).
Dig deeper: The new playbook for localized AI search optimization
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