How Google Updates Affect your Google Maps and Website Rankings

For home improvement companies—whether you’re in roofing, HVAC, gutters, plumbing, or restoration—Google Business Profile (GBP) and website visibility play critical roles in generating leads. In recent months, Google has introduced several updates that can significantly impact your ability to attract new customers. Understanding these changes is key to staying ahead of your competitors and continuing to grow your business.

Here, we’ll break down the most important Google updates and explain how they affect home improvement businesses, including tips on how to adapt and optimize your lead-generation strategy.

Google’s Helpful Content Update: What It Means for Your Business

Google’s Helpful Content Update, first rolled out in 2022 and updated regularly, prioritizes content that genuinely helps users over content designed solely to rank in search results. This is especially relevant for businesses like gutter installation, HVAC repairs, and roofing services, where customers seek clear, actionable information.

How This Affects You:

• Quality over quantity: Google is rewarding websites with content that directly answers user questions. For instance, if you offer HVAC services, your blog about “How to Choose the Right AC Unit for Your Home” should provide in-depth, useful insights instead of superficial information.
• Local relevance: Google also favors locally relevant content. If you’re a roofing company in Denver, creating location-specific content like “How to Protect Your Roof from Colorado’s Harsh Winters” will help you rank higher in local searches.

What you should do or We should do for you:

Focus on creating high-quality, locally relevant content that answers common customer questions. For example, a plumber could write a detailed blog on “What to Do When Your Pipes Burst in the Middle of Winter,” giving customers clear, practical advice.

Changes to Google Business Profiles: Calls and Rankings

While Google still tracks calls from your GBP, they’ve limited visibility into metrics like missed calls and call duration. This change makes it more important than ever to focus on ranking higher in Google Maps, which is still a primary source of local leads for home improvement companies.

How This Affects You:

• Top 3 positions are critical: The top 3 spots in Google Maps receive up to 45% of all local service inquiries. For home improvement businesses like restoration companies that need fast response times, being in the top 3 positions can make or break your monthly lead volume.
• Review frequency matters: Google’s algorithm increasingly prioritizes not just the quantity but the frequency of reviews. If your HVAC company has 100 reviews but hasn’t received a new one in months, you may be outranked by a competitor with fewer but more recent reviews.

What you should do or We should do for you:

Encourage happy customers to leave reviews regularly, not just during peak seasons. This will keep your business visible in Google’s ranking algorithm. If you’re in the construction industry, consider sending review requests to clients after completing a project like a new home build or major renovation.

Core Web Vitals and Page Experience: Why Your Website Must Be Fast and User-Friendly



With Google’s continued emphasis on Core Web Vitals—metrics that measure the loading speed, interactivity, and stability of your website—home improvement companies can’t afford to overlook their website’s performance. If your site is slow or hard to navigate, it will not only rank lower but could also lose potential leads.

How This Affects You:

• Mobile optimization is crucial: Many customers searching for a plumber or a gutter service are doing so on their mobile devices. A site that loads slowly or is difficult to navigate will increase your bounce rate, meaning fewer potential leads.
• Conversion rates can suffer: Even if your site ranks well, a poor user experience (like slow loading times) can hurt your conversion rate. Whether you’re generating leads from roofing inspections or HVAC maintenance requests, a slow site can drive potential customers to your competitors.

What we Should do for you:

Optimize your website for mobile users and ensure it meets Core Web Vitals benchmarks. For example, if you’re a restoration company offering emergency services, make sure your site loads quickly on mobile so customers can reach you in critical situations. TIP can get your newly SEO-optimized website live in 10 days or less:

Click here for an amazing website

Original Content is King

A lot of agencies are relying too much on ChatGPT to create content that is unoriginal. Do not let this happen! Do not use 100% of AI generated content or images. Take the time to post original content with original photos of your job site to Google Business Profile, social media, and your website. Your website within 90 days should have 90% or higher original pictures of your past customers! Google and search engine will find your fake and spammy posts and your rankings and leads will disappear.

Make your Google Business Profile 100

Google continues to tweak its local search algorithm, placing more weight on proximity and relevance. This means that home improvement companies with strong local ties are more likely to show up in search results. Google’s goal is to provide users with the most relevant and nearby results, which benefits businesses that optimize for local SEO.

How This Affects You:

• Local keywords matter more than ever: Whether you’re a gutter company or an HVAC specialist, your business should target specific local keywords. Instead of optimizing for “roof repair,” try “roof repair in [your city].”
• Proximity is key: Google prioritizes businesses that are geographically close to the searcher. If you service a wide area, ensure you’ve optimized your GBP and website for all the cities you serve, not just your headquarters.

What you should or have us do it for you:

Optimize your GBP with city-specific keywords and create landing pages on your website for each service area. For instance, a plumbing company serving multiple cities could create pages for “Drain Cleaning in [City Name]” to increase visibility across different locations.

What you or your agency should be doing right now!

With these updates in mind, home improvement companies must prioritize:

1. High-quality, helpful content: Blogs, FAQs, and guides should answer common customer questions and offer useful advice. For example, roofers might focus on “How to Spot Early Signs of Roof Damage.”
2. Consistent reviews: Getting more frequent reviews helps improve your ranking on Google Maps and can boost customer trust.
3. Website performance: A fast, mobile-optimized website will not only improve your ranking but also help convert visitors into leads.
4. Local SEO: By optimizing for city-specific keywords and ensuring your GBP is updated with the right service areas, you can gain more local visibility.
   

Stay Ahead of the Competition

In an industry where competition for local leads is fierce, adapting to Google’s ongoing changes is critical. Whether you’re an HVAC company preparing for winter or a construction company taking on major projects, staying up-to-date with these updates will help you maintain your ranking and continue generating valuable leads.

At Talents Into Profits, we specialize in helping home improvement businesses navigate Google updates and optimize for lead generation. Contact us today for a free audit, and let’s ensure you stay ahead in Google Maps and organic search rankings.If you feel overwhelmed by all of this information and just want someone, a team, to handle this for you, please contact us today and we'd happily perform a FREE marketing and business development audit to ensure we can help you grow you in the next 90 days.