Loading...
A Google Business Profile is the free Google listing that puts a vacation rental business on Google Maps and beside Search results, with photos, hours, reviews, and a link to your website. For a host it is the local-search surface that sends a guest who searches your brand, or looks for places to stay in your area, to your direct booking site rather than to an OTA listing.
The profile belongs to the business, not to each home. Google does not give profiles to individual vacation rentals, so the eligible entity is a management company with a staffed office, an inn or lodge, or a rental brand with a verifiable location, and it gets one profile at that address. It is also not Google Vacation Rentals, the comparison surface that lists rates and availability, and it is not a workaround for putting every property on the map. Completing the profile takes under an hour. Verification takes minutes by phone or email, up to five business days when Google reviews a video, and up to two weeks when a postcard has to arrive.
Looking for Google Vacation Rentals? That’s a separate comparison surface, not a Business Profile. Haven pages already publish VacationRental structured data for Google’s crawled list, and the Google Vacation Rentals integration is in progress — follow it on the Feature Board, or see SEO and Discoverability.
Do not create a Google Business Profile for each individual vacation rental, Airbnb, cabin, condo, or private home address. Standard vacation rental properties are generally not eligible for their own Google Business Profile.
You may be eligible if you have one of the following:
You should not use:
The rule itself, in Google's own wording, with the suspension risk and where to put the effort when the business does not qualify, is in Google Business Profile for Vacation Rentals: Who Qualifies. For broader SEO expectations and what Haven controls on your direct booking site, see SEO and discoverability.
Go to Google Business Profile and sign in with the Google account you want to use to manage the business.
Click Manage now or Add your business.
Use the actual name of your hosting business or property management brand.
Good examples:
Avoid keyword-stuffed names like:
Your profile name should match your website, signage, business documents, and guest-facing brand.
Pick the category that best describes the business as a whole.
Possible categories may include:
Choose the most accurate category. Do not add unrelated categories just to appear in more searches.
If you have a real office, rental office, hotel, inn, or staffed lodging location, enter that address.
If you operate as a service-area business and do not receive customers at your address, hide your address and add the cities or regions you serve.
Do not use the private address of an individual vacation rental unless it is a legitimate eligible lodging business location.
Use a phone number that guests or customers can actually reach.
For the website, use your direct booking website or your main Haven site URL. Ideally, this should be your own branded domain, not an Airbnb or Vrbo link.
Example:
https://www.yourrentalbrand.comSee Custom domains if you want a branded booking URL on your own domain.
Google verifies by video recording, phone or text, email, a live video call, or postcard, and sometimes asks for documentation. Which methods you see depends on the business type and region; take the video option when it is offered, since Google recommends it and reviews it within five business days.
Be ready to show proof such as:
Do not try to verify a private vacation rental as though it is a storefront business.
After verification, fill out the profile carefully.
Add:
For hotels, inns, and lodging businesses, Google may treat hours differently than normal storefront businesses. If guests can contact you at specific times, list those accurately.
Keep it simple and honest. Focus on what the business does and where it operates.
Example:
"Blue Harbor Stays is a locally managed vacation rental and guest hospitality business serving Cape Cod. Guests can book directly through our website and find professionally managed stays with clear pricing, local recommendations, and responsive support."
Do not include links, promo codes, exaggerated claims, or keyword stuffing in the description.
Upload high-quality photos that help guests trust the business.
Recommended photos:
Avoid misleading photos, stock images, or photos of properties you do not manage.
After a guest completes a stay, ask them to leave an honest review.
Do not offer discounts, payments, gifts, upgrades, or incentives in exchange for reviews. Do not ask only happy guests for reviews, and do not pressure guests to leave a certain rating.
Simple message:
"Thanks again for staying with us. If you enjoyed your stay, we'd really appreciate an honest review on Google. It helps future guests feel confident booking directly with us."
Check the profile at least once a month.
Update:
Reply to all reviews professionally, especially negative ones.
Open Sites → SEO and pick your site. In your profile choose Share, copy the link, and paste it into Haven. Haven publishes it in your site's structured data, which tells Google and AI assistants the business on the map is the one behind your site.
Pasting the link also connects that business's Google reviews to the site: Haven imports the written ones, checks Google once a day for new reviews, and asks guests for a Google review in the post-stay email. See Connecting Google Reviews.
A Google Business Profile is for your real local business or eligible lodging operation. It is not a workaround for listing individual vacation rental homes on Google Maps. For most independent operators, the safest approach is to build your direct booking website, optimize it for local search, and only create a Google Business Profile if the business itself is eligible.
For indexing timelines on your Haven site, see When will my site appear on Google?.
Can I create a Google Business Profile for my vacation rental? Not for the home itself. Google's eligibility guidelines list vacation homes among the businesses that do not qualify, because a profile requires in-person contact with customers during stated hours, and a self check-in rental never meets anyone. The business behind the rentals can qualify when it has a staffed office or is itself a lodging business such as an inn. The exact wording, and what to do when you do not qualify, is in Google Business Profile for Vacation Rentals: Who Qualifies.
How long until the profile shows on Google Maps? It goes live once verification completes: minutes for a phone or email code, up to five business days for a video review, up to two weeks when a postcard has to arrive. Google allows a few more weeks for every detail to show consistently across Search and Maps after that.
Which website should the profile link to? Your direct booking site on your own domain, not an Airbnb or Vrbo listing. The profile is the one place a guest who searched your name can reach a commission-free booking, so send them there. If Google offers a separate Booking link for your category, add the same URL. See Custom domains for a branded address.
Do the profile's reviews show on my Haven site? Yes. Paste the profile link under Sites → SEO, or connect the business under Edit Listing → Space → Reviews & Testimonials, and Haven imports the written reviews, checks Google once a day for new ones, and adds a Leave a Google review button to the post-stay email. Haven shows them as text on the page; Google gives no star snippet to a site for reviews of itself, so the stars in search come from the profile.
Is this the same as Google Vacation Rentals? No. Google Vacation Rentals is a comparison surface fed by rates and availability through Hotel Center. The Business Profile is the Maps and local-search listing for the business. Haven's Google Vacation Rentals integration is in progress; see SEO and discoverability.
Use these official Google links when setting up or managing your Business Profile:
Important: Only create a Google Business Profile if your business is eligible. Do not create a profile for each individual vacation rental, Airbnb, cabin, condo, or private home address.
New to Haven?
Haven is the direct booking platform these guides are written for — a branded site, secure payments, and guest relationships you own. Build yours free.
Free to build · No credit card · Private until you publish