Start here. Everything else asks for these.
Every signup below will ask for a website and an email address on your own domain. Doing these four first saves redoing the rest.
- Domain. Register the business name at a registrar such as GoDaddy. Buy the exact business name if it is available, and keep the registration in your own account.
- Business email. Google Workspace gives you an address on the domain, billed per user per month. Open this before any other account.
- Website. Customers check before they call. It does not have to be big, but it has to load, say what you do, and show the phone number.
- Hosting. Wherever the site lives, keep the login in your own name. Access to the domain and the hosting is the one thing you should never hand over permanently.
Pick the exact spelling, suite number, and phone format you will use, then copy that identical text into every profile on this page. Google reads differences between listings as different businesses, and inconsistent details are a common reason a new profile struggles to rank.
Claim the Google surfaces next.
These are the ones that put you on the map, literally. Do them before anything in the sections below.
- Google Business Profile. The map listing. Open it at business.google.com and complete verification, which may mean a video walkthrough. We have a separate guide for that video.
- Local Services Ads. The ads above the map with the green checkmark. Passing the background and license checks earns the Google Guaranteed badge, which is a strong trust signal for a company nobody has heard of yet.
- Bing Places. Fewer searches than Google, and it takes ten minutes. Claim it at bingplaces.com.
- YouTube channel. Open it even if you have nothing to post yet. It secures the name, and job footage is the easiest content a trade business already has.
List where customers compare contractors.
These are where someone checks you against two other companies. A thin profile loses that comparison, so fill each one out properly or leave it for later.
- Yelp. Claim the free profile, add photos and service areas, and respond to every review. Strong for home services in most metros.
- Houzz. Worth real effort for remodeling, design, and anything where the customer wants to see finished work.
- BuildZoom. Builds profiles from public license records, so claiming yours and adding your own photos beats the version it generated for you.
- Angi. Formerly Angie's List. HomeAdvisor belongs to the same company, so expect overlap rather than two separate lead sources.
- Networx. Paid lead service. Worth testing, not worth building a business on.
- Yellow Pages. Low effort, and it still carries a citation that supports local rankings.
- Nextdoor. Neighborhood recommendations turn into calls in residential trades. Claim the business page and stay out of arguments.
- BBB. Optional, and accreditation is paid. Useful in trades where a customer is handing over a large deposit.
Decide how you get paid before the first job.
QuickBooks Online. Set it up in month one. Reconstructing a year of receipts in April costs more than the subscription.
PandaDoc or DocuSign. A signed digital contract settles scope disputes that a handshake will not.
Zoho Invoice. Fast estimates win jobs, particularly when the other two bidders take three days.
Start in Google Sheets. Move to Monday.com or Insightly when you stop remembering who called last week.
CallRail. Tells you which listing or ad produced each call, which is the difference between guessing and knowing what to cut.
Keep your real business number on the Google Business Profile and the directory listings. Tracking numbers belong on ads and landing pages. Swapping the number on public listings undoes the consistency you set up in section one.
Let the work advertise itself.
Printed assets are the cheapest marketing a trade business owns, because the job you are already doing pays for the exposure.
- Yard signs. Put one out on every job you are proud of, with permission. Neighbors are your warmest possible audience.
- Car magnets or a vehicle wrap. The cheapest billboard you will ever park in a customer's driveway.
- Business cards. Still the thing a customer hands to their neighbor.
- Shirts and hats. A crew in branded shirts reads as a company rather than a guy with a truck, and that changes what you can charge.
- Banners. For larger commercial sites and any event or home show you attend.
- Flyers and door hangers. Work the streets around a finished job while the truck is still parked out front.
Common questions.
Do I need all of these on day one?
No. Section one and section two are the ones that earn money. The directories, social profiles, and printed assets can be added over the following weeks without losing anything.
Should I use my personal Gmail to sign up?
No. Open the domain email first and use it for every account. Profiles opened under a personal address are painful to transfer later, and some platforms will not move ownership at all.
Is it worth paying for the paid directory leads?
Open the free profiles first and see what the listing alone brings in. Paid lead services sell the same lead to several contractors, so treat them as a supplement rather than the plan.
Can I run ads before all of this is done?
You can, but a Google Business Profile and a working phone number do more for a new business than early ad spend. Ads amplify whatever is already there, including the gaps.
Claim the names, post when you can.
Open all of these to secure the business name, then put your effort into the one or two your customers actually use. An idle account is not a problem; a competitor holding your name is.