Opening a Second Location? The Marketing to Set Up First

If you're opening a second location for your business, start the marketing with the Google listing, months before the doors open. Google lets a business that hasn't opened add an opening date up to a year ahead, and once the listing is verified, it shows on Google 90 days before that date. If you'll hide your address, check that part first. Then build the new market's page, collect its first reviews once it opens, run its ads as a separate market, and compare it with your first.

Most guides to opening a second location are written for a shop or a restaurant: the lease, the build-out, the grand opening. A home service business has a different problem. Your customers never see the building. They find you on Google, and in the new metro your new listing starts with no reviews. Here's the order we'd set things up in, and why.

What the usual advice covers, and what it leaves to you

The general guides come from banks, payment-system companies, payroll software and lenders, and they're good on the money, the lease, the hiring and the permits. On marketing, they're written for people who walk in. Patriot Software's launch plan, one of the more complete ones, gives it a single line: "Pre-open marketing: announce, test soft opens, gather feedback."

Yours don't walk in. Someone in the new metro searches, finds a listing and a phone number, and calls. For a business that goes to the customer, that listing is the storefront.

The order, and why it runs this way

Most steps need something from an earlier one. The listing settles the name, phone number and service area that every other step repeats. The market page is what the listing links to and what ads send people to. Reviews can't start until you open. Ads need the page and the market's own number. And comparing markets only works if each one's numbers were kept apart from the first day.

One step can move. Ads don't need reviews, so if the new market needs calls on opening day, run steps 3 and 4 together.

Listing and verificationopening date up to a year aheadMarket pagewhat the listing links to and ads land onFirst reviewsfrom the new market's own jobsAds by marketown campaign, targeting and budgetCompare marketsnew against itself, then the first

Step 1: the Google listing, months before you open

A Business Profile is Google's name for your listing, the one on the map with your reviews and the Call button. Verification is Google checking that the business is real and yours.

Decide whether the new market gets its own listing

Under Google's rules, a business that goes to the customer "should have one profile for the central office or location with a designated service area," and "If you have different locations for your service business, with separate service areas and separate staff at each location, you're allowed one profile for each location." A branch with its own crew, its own service area and a real base there qualifies; Google adds that a service business "can't list a 'virtual' office unless that office is staffed during business hours." The same crew covering one more city doesn't. That's a wider service area on the listing you already have, and Google says a service area "shouldn't extend farther than about 2 hours of driving time from where your business is based."

What Google lets you do before opening

If the new market qualifies, you don't have to wait until opening day. Google's help says "If your business hasn't opened yet, you can create a Business Profile on Google to let your community know when your business will open at the given address." You can set the date "up to one year in the future," and "After you enter the date and verify your business, your profile shows up on Google 90 days prior to your opening date." Opening April 1? Verified early, the listing can show from around January 1.

What customers can add waits: Google doesn't let people "post content, such as reviews or photos, on your Business Profile until your business is officially open." Once you open, the listing carries a "Recently opened" tag for 90 days.

One caution. Google's page describes a business opening "at the given address," and doesn't say how the opening date works if you hide your address, as most businesses that go to the customer do. If you'll hide yours, ask Google's support before you count on the 90 days.

Start the listing once you have the keys

Google checks that the location is real, and it picks the method: the options "depend on your business type, public info, region, or business hours." One of them, a live video call, asks you to "Make sure you're at your business and can show your location and ownership." So we'd start the listing once you have the keys, not when the plan is approved. Google says verification reviews usually take up to 5 business days, though "On rare occasions, reviews may take longer."

Settle the facts every other step repeats

• Name. Google says "All business locations within the same country must have the same name for all locations," with narrow exceptions.
• Phone and website. Google asks you to "Provide a phone number that connects to your individual business location, or provide a website that represents your individual business location," and to "Use a local phone number instead of a central call center helpline number whenever possible." Give it both. Get the new market's local number before anything prints it, and make it a number you can track.
• Service area. The new location's own, separate from the first. The page the listing links to is step 2.

Step 2: the market page

We'd make the listing's website link a page on the website you already have, not a second website. It's also where the new market's ads will send people, so it has to exist before they do.

Before opening, the page can only say what's true already: who runs the location, the area it covers, its number and hours, the services it offers. After opening, it earns the rest: jobs done there and reviews from customers there. What it should never be is your first market's page with the city name swapped in. Google's spam policies call that doorway abuse: pages "created to rank for specific, similar search queries." Here's how to write a market page that isn't a copy.

Step 3: the first reviews, from opening day

Google says local results depend partly on distance, "how far each business is from the customer who's searching," and on how well known the business is, including "how many websites link to your business and how many reviews you have." Your first market's reviews stay on your first market's listing. The new one opens with none.

So have the review request ready before opening day: the new listing's own link and QR code, sent to every customer in the new market the same way, happy or not. Google doesn't allow businesses to "selectively solicit positive reviews from customers," and says offering incentives for reviews "is strictly prohibited."

One thing not to do: ask loyal customers from your first market to review the new location. Google prohibits "Content that is not based on a real experience or does not accurately represent the location." The new listing's reviews have to come from the new market's jobs.

Step 4: ads, run as their own market

The fast way to advertise a new market is to add the new metro to the campaign you already run. It's also the way to lose track of it. One campaign means one budget and one headline cost per lead, what you pay the ad platform for each call or form, for both markets together. You can't fund the new market on its own, and its slow start blurs into your first market's history.

Give the new market its own campaign, its own location targeting and its own budget, sending people to its own page and its own number. Google Ads location targeting "allows your ads to appear in the geographic locations that you select," down to cities, postal codes or a radius. For the basics, start with Google Ads for one market.

Step 5: compare the markets, fairly

Once the new market has a few months of its own numbers, put the two side by side: how often each shows up on Google, the calls and forms each brings in, what each lead costs where ads run, and how many became booked jobs, leads that turned into scheduled work.

Compare the new market with itself first. Month three against month one tells you whether it's moving. Month three against a market you've run for years mostly tells you it's new. What you're watching for is the thing one blended number hides: a market that isn't turning visibility into calls. Here's what to compare, market by market, once both are running.

If you're buying a competitor instead

Buying a company in the next metro changes step one. There's already a verified listing, often with years of reviews, and you keep it. Google says "You can have only one Business Profile for each business," and "If a profile is considered a duplicate, it won't show on Google Search or Maps." If the seller has two listings for the same business, ask Google to merge them: "their reviews are combined, but replies to reviews may be lost."

Move ownership before the seller walks away

Put it on the purchase checklist. Google says "Only the primary owner can transfer primary ownership," and "The new owner or manager of a Business Profile must wait 7 days before they can manage all the features." So we'd have the seller add you as an owner at least a week before closing, then transfer primary ownership to you once those 7 days have passed, while they're still easy to reach.

Decide the name before you touch the listing

Keeping the acquired name is allowed while it's still the name on its trucks and invoices: locations can differ when "the business's real world representation consistently varies from location to location." To rename, Google allows "rebranding (defined as an eligible name change without creating a new Business Profile)" for a minor change, and "You may also be eligible for rebranding if you have multiple locations and the business name changes." A change that doesn't qualify makes it a new business: "You must mark the existing Business Profile as closed and then create a new Business Profile with your new business name." Google's page doesn't say what happens to the reviews on a listing marked closed, and the reviews are most of what you paid for. Even an allowed rename can mean re-verifying: "If you change your business name after it's verified, you might need to verify your business again." Ask Google's support before you rename.

Keep what customers already use

Keep its phone number on the listing; past customers have it saved. Redirect each of its old website's pages to its closest match on yours: its home and city pages to your new market page, its service pages to your matching ones. Google recommends "server side permanent redirects from the old URLs to the new URLs," to "Keep the redirects for as long as possible, generally at least 1 year," and warns: "Don't redirect many old URLs to one irrelevant single URL destination." Then run steps 2 to 5, starting further along.

Opening new, or buying one that's open: what changes

Opening newBuying one that's openListing: create it, add the opening dateListing: keep it; have ownership transferredReviews: start at zero on opening dayReviews: keep them by keeping the listing; a second listing won't showName: the same as your other locationsName: keep it, or check the rebranding rule before renamingWebsite: build the market pageWebsite: redirect each page to its match, for at least a yearPhone: a new local numberPhone: keep the one customers saved

Opening new or buying in, the goal is the same: two markets you can read separately, run as one business. If you'd rather have both markets run and compared for you, that's what Enterprise is built for.