Most restaurants are losing orders every day because their Google Business Profile is incomplete, missing a direct ordering link, or has too few reviews. In this guide, we break down exactly what makes a high-performing GBP — and you can audit yours for free in 60 seconds below.
Why Your Google Business Profile Drives (or Loses) Orders
When someone searches for a restaurant on Google, your Business Profile is often the first thing they see — before your website, before your social media, before anything else. It’s your digital shopfront. And for most independent restaurants, it’s significantly underoptimised.
The five areas that most directly impact whether your GBP drives orders are:
- Ordering links — are you sending customers to your own channel, or straight to a marketplace?
- Profile completeness — missing descriptions, hours, or price ranges reduce how often Google surfaces you
- Reviews — rating, volume, and response rate are key Google ranking signals
- Photos — Google recommends 100+ photos for restaurants; most have far fewer
- Local SEO — how well your profile is optimised to appear in relevant local searches
Use the free audit tool below to see how you score across all five — and get a personalised priority action to improve today.
Free Google Business Profile Audit
Enter your restaurant name below. Takes 60 seconds — no sign-up required.
We only read your public Google Business Profile. Free — no sign-up needed.
What Good Looks Like: Five Areas to Focus On
1. Ordering links
The single most important thing you can add to your Google Business Profile is a direct ordering link — one that sends customers to your own website, not to Deliveroo or Uber Eats. Every order placed through a marketplace costs you commission. Every order placed directly costs you nothing.
If your only ordering link points to a marketplace, you’re effectively paying commission on every customer Google sends you.
2. Profile completeness
Google uses completeness as a ranking signal. Profiles with a full description, accurate opening hours, a price range, and a clear category consistently appear higher in local search results. Each missing field is a small penalty against your visibility.
3. Reviews
Review count, average rating, and how consistently you respond all feed into Google’s local ranking algorithm — and increasingly into AI-powered discovery tools that surface restaurant recommendations. Aim to actively request reviews from happy customers after every order.
4. Photos
Google’s own data shows that restaurants with more photos receive significantly more direction requests and website visits. They recommend 100+ photos. Most independent restaurants have fewer than 20. Food, interior, exterior, and team shots all count.
5. Local SEO signals
How your profile is described — the keywords in your business description, your category selection, and how consistently your name, address and phone number appear across the web — all influence how often you appear in relevant local searches.
Build Your Google Presence Into a Direct Revenue Channel
Your Google Business Profile isn’t just a listing — it’s a direct customer acquisition channel. The restaurants that treat it that way, keeping it updated, adding a direct ordering link, and actively building their review count, consistently drive more orders at a lower cost than those relying entirely on marketplaces.
Slerp gives you a commission-free direct ordering channel you can link directly from your Google profile — so every customer Google sends you orders from you, not from a marketplace.
Ready to take control of your ordering channel? Book a demo with Slerp today.