How to make a bulk upload spreadsheet for Business Profiles

Known issue: You can't update hotel attributes through the spreadsheet upload. To update hotel attributes, use the API and dashboard. Learn more about Business Profile API.

You can manage an individual profile directly on Search and Maps. To manage multiple profiles in bulk at once, you can use Business Profile Manager. If you want to add another profile, on Google search, select the three-dot menu Add a new Business Profile. 

The bulk upload spreadsheet lets you collect information for multiple Business Profiles, and upload the data to verify multiple business locations at once. To create your spreadsheet:​

1. On your computer, sign in to Business Profile Manager.
2. In the top right corner, click Add profile.
3. In the dropdown menu that appears, click Import profiles.
   • To download a blank spreadsheet, click Download the template. The spreadsheet will download in the language you use for your business.
   • To find an example of a completed spreadsheet, click Download sample spreadsheet.
   • To learn what details you can use to describe your profile, click Download attributes reference spreadsheet.
4. Follow the instructions below for each field. Follow these address guidelines for uploading businesses in multiple countries or regions.
5. Add all businesses that you manage before uploading your spreadsheet. Not all fields need to be completed before uploading the spreadsheet, but you'll be asked to fill in cells that are missing required information.

If you’re only updating particular fields for existing businesses in your spreadsheet, you may include only the columns for store code and the fields you want to change, and not include other columns on the spreadsheet at all. If you include empty columns (columns with headings but no information beneath them) in your spreadsheet, existing information for those columns will be erased. If you accidentally add a new business as well, you’ll be alerted that you’re missing required column headings.You will also see errors highlighted in your account that need action. Learn more about error messages.

Please read this list of common issues to make sure that your upload can be verified as quickly as possible.

Fields

Store code Business name Address Latitude and longitude Primary phone Additional phones Website Primary category Additional categories Hours From the business Opening date Photos Labels Google Ads location extensions phone Attributes

Business code

A business code is required for each business you want to include in your spreadsheet. 

A unique ID that you assign to each of your businesses to ensure that changes are applied accurately in your account. This value will not be publicly visible anywhere on Google, but it is visible to all profile users of your location.

An easy way to generate acceptable business codes is to label your businesses with a brand identifier and a number (e.g. "GOOG1" for your first location, "GOOG2" for your second, etc.) and use Google Sheets to continue the numbering for all of your locations.

Business codes must:

• Be unique to a specific business
• Be no longer than 64 characters
• Not contain any leading or trailing spaces
• Not contain special characters (ie. <, >) or contain a URL

We recommend including your brand name in your business code to avoid confusion between spreadsheets (for separate business or personal accounts).

Examples:

G1, G2, G3
Goog101, Goog102, Goog103
GClaremont, GMainStreet, GDowntown

Don't keep an old business code when one of your businesses moves to a new address. Instead, replace the old code with a new one.

If you have not included business codes for some locations or you have used the same code for multiple businesses in your account, you will need to address this before you can import a new spreadsheet. Learn more about missing and duplicate business codes.

Business name

A business name is required for each location.

The name of your business that will appear on Google. Represent your business exactly as it appears in the offline world. Your business name must be no longer than 100 characters. You may capitalize the first letter of each word or include up to a four-letter acronym. However, entire words should not be capitalized.

If your business is located within a mall or a container store (for example, a Starbucks inside a Safeway grocery store), do not include this information in the title. Only include the name of the core business in the location name (e.g. "Starbucks"). 

Address

Follow these instructions for entering the addresses of your businesses. 

Latitude and longitude

Latitude and longitude aren’t required, but you can include them when creating a new business.

Note: If we're not able to validate the listed address, you'll need to provide a latitude and longitude.

You may provide latitude and longitude for new businesses to help us place them on the map. Latitude and longitude are only used when a business is first created in your profile and meets other criteria, and will not be considered if they’re included in subsequent spreadsheet uploads for existing businesses.

Base your latitude and longitude on the center of your location. Enter valid coordinates, including a latitude between -90 and 90 and a longitude between -180 and 180.  Make sure that your values for latitude and longitude each include at least 6 digits after the decimal point, so your business is placed accurately on the map. For example, a latitude value of 37.421998 and longitude value of -122.084059 would accurately place the Googleplex.

Latitude and longitude will only be used when there's trouble locating your address on the map. Even if you do provide them, they might not be used.

To provide latitude and longitude for new businesses:

1. Add latitude and longitude columns to your spreadsheet. (They can be placed anywhere on your spreadsheet.) The column headers depend on your language:
   • In English, use “Latitude” and “Longitude” as column headers.
   • If your dashboard uses a language other than English, download the template spreadsheet and use the same column headers as the template. Regardless of your dashboard language, you can also use “Latitude” and “Longitude” in English as your column headers.
2. Add latitude and longitude for each location in the corresponding row.

Note: In Japan, the only accepted latitude and longitude format is WGS84.

Primary phone

A primary phone number or website is required for each business. 

The best number for customers to use to reach your business. This phone number may be for a mobile device or landline (no fax numbers). Vanity numbers should be entered numerically. Provide a phone number that connects to your business as directly as possible. For example, you should provide an individual business phone number in place of a call center. Phone numbers must be valid in the country or region where your business is located.

Note: If you enter a website for a business, the Primary phone field is not required.

Additional phones

Additional phone numbers are optional. 

Up to 2 phone numbers (mobile or landline, no fax) at which your business can be called, in addition to your primary phone number.

Website

A website or primary phone number is required for each business. 

URL of the website associated with the business. Enter the complete URL, including the "http://" or "https://". Up to 256 characters will be displayed.

Make sure that:

• Googlebot isn't blocked on your site.
• You've checked Search Console for any possible penalties to your site.

Primary category

A primary category is required for each business. 

Choose the category that best represents your business using the list of common categories. This category should be consistent across all businesses. If you have multiple types of businesses (e.g. sub-brands, multiple departments, or various types of operations such as retail, distribution center, and office), this rule only applies within each of these sub-groups. Check our guidelines for more information on using categories.

Select categories that complete the statement: "this business IS a" rather than "this business HAS a." Describe your business holistically, rather than a list of the services it offers, products it sells, or amenities it features. For example, if your business is a hotel that has an ATM, do not include the category "ATM". Instead, the provider of the ATM should create a separate location and add "ATM" as one of its categories.

You can also add additional categories.

To add a primary category:

1. Visit the Add your business page in your Business Profile Manager.
2. Select your country or region from the dropdown menu.
3. Under the “Category” section, start typing the category that best describes your business. Auto-complete will suggest supported categories.
4. Click your chosen category, then copy it.
5. Paste the name of the supported category into the "Primary category" column of your spreadsheet. The primary category you set determines the icon displayed for the business on Google Maps.

If you don't see your desired category appear, select the next best option. If you think a category that primarily describes your business is missing, you can request that it be added by clicking Menu   Support  Send feedback. We will consider such requests during our periodic revision of the category list.

Your profile previously used a different set of category standards. Free-form categories and numeric codes are no longer supported.

Additional categories

Additional categories are optional and can be added to help describe your business. 

Up to 9 additional categories that represent your business. As with Primary category, select categories that complete the statement: "This business IS a" rather than "this business HAS a." To add an additional category:

1. Visit Business Profile Manager
2. Select Add a business.
3. Start typing the name of the country or region where your businesses are located, and select a supported country or region.
4. Click into the "Categories" textbox. Start typing a category that describes your business; auto-complete will bring up supported categories.
5. Copy your chosen category.
6. Paste the name of the supported category into the "Additional categories" column of your spreadsheet. Separate each category with a comma.

 

Hours

Business hours aren’t required but they’re strongly encouraged to let customers know when to visit your business. 

The opening hours of the business. Enter hours for each day of the week in their respective column. You can enter hours in 24-hour format:

HH:MM-HH:MM

Or AM/PM format:

HH:MMAM-HH:MMPM

00:00 and 24:00 are equivalent and both acceptable end times for an hours range.

See examples for different kinds of opening hours:

Standard hours

• 09:00AM-05:00PM
• 09:00-17:00

Closes at midnight

• 09:00AM-12:00AM
• 09:00-00:00

Open 24 hours

• 12:00AM-12:00AM
• 00:00-00:00 (or 00:00-24:00)

Closed all day

• X
• (Or leave the spreadsheet cell empty)

Open past midnight. Include these hours in the column for the day when the set begins.

• 06:00PM-02:00AM
• 18:00-02:00

Open for two sets of hours in one day. 

• 11:30AM-02:00PM, 05:00PM-10:00PM
• 11:30-14:00, 17:00-22:00

You can also add special hours.

From the business

This field is optional.

Enter a brief description of your business—what you offer, what sets you apart, your history, or anything else that's helpful for customers to know. Focus primarily on details about your business instead of details about promotions, prices, or sales. Do not include URLs or HTML code, or exceed 750 characters in the description field. For the full list of guidelines, read Business description guidelines.

Example: We are an independent ice cream shop located steps from the center of town, and are proud to be the favorite for locals to meet friends for a cone or call for a fresh pizza, delivered straight to their home. We serve 35 flavors of homemade, hand-churned ice creams and sorbets year-round, and the pizza oven turns out New York-style pies every day from midday until close. Come see us today! 

Opening date

This field is optional. 

Enter the date your business first opened, or will open, at its current location. If your business has multiple locations, each location can have its own opening date.

Only the year and month of your opening date are required. You can enter a date up to one year in the future, but it won't show on Google until 90 days before the date.

Use one of the following formats:

     YYYY-MM-DD
     YYYY-MM

Photos

Photos are optional. Your profile may show photos of your business on Maps and Search, even if you don’t add them yourself. 

Photos that depict your business. Photos that appear for your business on Google come from you and various other sources. All photos you add should conform to our guidelines.

Once a location is verified, add photos by including the URL to a photo’s location in the relevant photo column of your spreadsheet: "Logo", "Cover", or "Other Photos". For the "Other Photos" column, use commas to separate the URLs for your photos. Note that photo URLs for locations with the "Not published" status will be ignored. Learn more about photo types.

Tip: If you previously added photos to an account that wasn't verified, the URLs for those photos will no longer appear in your spreadsheet if you download it from your Business Profile. To add those photos, request bulk verification, then follow the instructions earlier in this section.

Labels

Labels are optional.

Labels let you organize your businesses into groups. You can search for businesses by label from the dashboard, and use labels to filter location extensions in Google Ads.

Assign up to 10 unique labels to each location. Labels can be up to 50 characters long and should not include invalid characters (i.e. < or >).

To include commas in the label name, use the string "%2c" in your spreadsheet. For example, “1%2c000+ Daily Visitors” would create the label “1,000+ Daily Visitors”.

When you search for a label in the search box, the results will include all businesses that contain that label as well as business that contain your search text in a different field. For example:

Business 1 has the label "West coast." Business 2 has the label "East Coast" and has the address line "123 West Ave." Typing “west” in the search box will return both locations.

Google Ads Business extensions phone

This field is optional.

The number used in your business extension ads through Google Ads. Your business extension ads can show different phone numbers from those you have given us to show in Google Maps. (For example, you might want to give a toll-free phone number for reservations in your ads, but need to provide a local phone number to show in local search results).

If you don’t enter a business extensions phone, Google Ads will use your primary phone. You can use a toll-free or call center number. One number can be used for multiple businesses.

This input should comply with Google Ads phone extension specifications. Note that Google Ads does not allow inclusion of premium numbers (such as 1-900 numbers in the U.S., and 871 numbers in the U.K.) for which a user must pay additional charges.

Attributes

Attributes are optional, but they’re strongly encouraged to let customers see what your business has to offer.

Attributes of your business. For example, your business might offer Wi-Fi to customers, or have outdoor seating. Certain factual attributes (like outdoor seating) are directly editable by you, while subjective attributes (like whether your business is popular with locals) rely on the opinions of Google users who’ve visited your business.

When you download your spreadsheet, you’ll see one column for each attribute that’s applicable to at least one of the locations in your account. Many attributes won’t apply to your business, based on its category or country / region. If an attribute has a column in your spreadsheet but doesn’t apply to a particular location, you’ll see “[NOT APPLICABLE]” in the corresponding cell. There’s no need to remove this value before you re-upload your spreadsheet.

If you don’t see attribute columns in your spreadsheet, download your profile from your account. Your new spreadsheet will include attribute columns.

Attributes are either yes/no attributes, URL attributes, or selection attributes:

• Yes/no attributes: “Outdoor seating” requires either a “Yes” or a “No” in your spreadsheet: your business either offers outdoor seating (“Yes”) or doesn’t (“No”). To edit an attribute for a location, enter either “Yes” or “No” in the corresponding attribute column. Even if you enter “No” for some attributes for some locations, the data you provide will help Google show customers the most accurate information about your business, and avoid showing attributes that you don’t offer.
• URL attributes: URL attributes require a URL in your spreadsheet: your business’s online menu, for instance, appears at a particular web address. To edit a URL for a location, enter the URL in the corresponding attribute column.
• Selection attributes: These attributes require selection of exactly one of several predefined choices. For example, "Kosher food" is a selection attribute with choices "No Kosher food," "Some kosher food," or "Strictly kosher food." To view all possible choices for each selection attribute, download the attributes reference spreadsheet (instructions below).

To see the list of all possible attributes and their types:

1. Sign in to Business Profile Manager.
2. If you have a single location, in the menu on the left, click Manage locations. 
3. Click Add profile.  
4. Click Import profile.  
5. Click Download attributes reference spreadsheet.

Obsolete fields

Fields supported in Business Profile sometimes change to match the information displayed to users on Search and Maps. See below for a list of fields that are no longer supported in the bulk upload tool. You should remove any such field's columns from your file before importing it into your Business Profile.

• Ad Icon URL
• Ad Landing Page URL
• Alt Phone. Alt phone is now "Additional phones."
• Categories. This field has been replaced by "Primary category" and “Additional categories.”
• City. City is now "Locality."
• Description. Use "From the business" to describe your business to customers.
• District. District is now "Sub-locality."
• Email
• Fax
• Hours. Each day of the week now has its own column for opening hours.
• Main phone. Main phone is now "Primary phone."
• Mobile phone. If a mobile phone number is the best number for your business, add it as the "Primary phone." Otherwise, add it to the new "Additional phones" field. Any numbers previously specified as mobile have been automatically re-listed in the "Additional phones" field.
• Payment Types. Payment types is now "Payments."
• Preferred photo
• Profile photo
• State. State is now "Administrative area."