A mobile dog groomer in Norwich works out of a van and covers the villages around it. She searches "dog groomer norwich" and sees a map pack of three salons with shopfronts. The van isn't the problem. Google has a specific setup for businesses that go to customers, and her profile is set up as if she were a shop. Get the setup right, then build presence in the places you can't physically be.
The profile Google asks a service-area business to have
Google's guidelines for representing your business define a service-area business as one that serves customers at their locations, and they spell out the setup: one profile for the central office or base, with a designated service area, and the business address hidden from customers. Showing an address you don't serve customers at is a breach, so hiding it is the correct setting.
Two variations cover most cases. A hybrid business serves customers at its premises and at theirs. The guidelines' example is a garage that also does roadside repair, and it can show the address and set a service area. A service business with genuinely separate locations, each with its own staff and its own area, is allowed one profile per location. You can't create extra profiles for towns where you have no base, or use a mailbox or an unstaffed virtual office as an address. The suspension lesson covers what happens when people try.
You set the service area by naming places. Google's Business Profile help on managing service areas lets you add up to 20 areas by city, postcode or region, and the guidelines say the whole area shouldn't extend much beyond about two hours of driving time from where you're based. Pick the places you actually work. A long list of towns you'd take a job in once raises the same fit-and-evidence question as the keyword grid, applied to the profile.
Distance still counts, even with the address hidden
Google describes local ranking as relevance, distance and prominence, and hiding your address doesn't remove the distance input. Google doesn't document how it measures distance for a hidden address. Treat this as the pattern experienced local SEOs see rather than a published rule: a service-area business tends to rank strongest near its base and fade outward across its declared area.
A single rank check misleads for exactly this reason. You search from home, see yourself in the pack, and assume the whole area is covered. The groomer's customer in a village on the far edge sees a different pack. A grid check runs the same search from many points across the area. It shows the real shape: strong at home, weak at the edges, sometimes missing in a town where you work every week.
Your website has to do what a shopfront would
A shop has a building Google can see and customers who walk in. A service-area business has a website, and it has to carry more weight.
Start with the homepage. Its first screen says what you do and where you're based, and names the area you cover in a sentence: "Mobile dog grooming across Norwich, Wymondham and the villages in between". The next lesson covers the rest.
Then add location pages, but only where the previous lesson's tests pass. For a service-area business these stand in for a premises in each town: jobs you've done there, photos, reviews from customers who live there. The grid tells you which to build first, the towns where you work regularly and rank badly.
Your name and phone number on the site must match the profile exactly. With the address hidden on the profile, the name and number are what Google has left to match. Your contact page can say "we come to you" and list the service area instead of a street. If you'd rather keep your home address off the web entirely, the LocalBusiness schema lesson covers what to mark up and what to leave out.
Proof that you've been there
A service-area business earns prominence through evidence of work in the places it claims. Three kinds count.
Reviews that mention the place come first. Google doesn't document whether the words inside reviews affect ranking, so don't treat this as a keyword tactic. What a review from a customer in Wymondham certainly does is give you a quote for the Wymondham page and show the next searcher there that you've done the job. The reviews chapter gives you the routine for asking.
Photos with a place come second. Think of the van outside a job, the before-and-after, the team at work. Put them on the profile and on the location page for that town.
Local mentions come third: the village newsletter, the local pet shop's website, the sports club you sponsor. For a business with no building, a link from an organisation in that town is the nearest thing to a sign above a door, and local link building covers how to earn them.
Frequently asked questions
What does "service area" mean in the context of business?
It's the list of places where you go to the customer. On Google you declare it by city, postcode or region on the profile for your base. Pick towns where you genuinely work, because the list should match your real jobs.
What is the best address to use for an LLC?
Use the real base your business works from, and hide it on the profile if customers don't visit you there. Google's guidelines rule out a mailbox or an unstaffed virtual office as the address. Keep the same name and phone number on your website so Google still has something to match.
What are the five factors of a business location?
Google doesn't publish five. It names three for local ranking: relevance, distance and prominence. Distance still applies when your address is hidden, so you tend to rank strongest near your base and weaker toward the edge of your area.
What to take away
- Google's guidelines give a service-area business one profile at its base with a hidden address and a declared service area, which Google's Business Profile help caps at 20 places within about two hours' drive.
- Hiding the address doesn't remove distance from ranking; you still rank strongest near your base, and a grid check shows the real shape of your visibility.
- Your website replaces the shopfront: a homepage that says what and where, and honest location pages for the towns where you work often and rank badly.
- Prominence across the area comes from proof of work there: reviews naming the place, photos with a place, and mentions from local organisations.
Next
Your homepage carries your biggest local search, whether you have a shopfront or a van. Your homepage for local search covers what it must say in its first screen.