Google Business Profile setup for solar installers, category by category
The category trap in solar, services to list, photos that prove local work, Q&A that answers the objections, posts, and the fields most installers leave blank.
Solar has a category problem no other trade has. Your competitors are listed as solar energy companies, electricians, roofing contractors, solar equipment suppliers and even electric utility companies. In our dataset of 32,440 listings, the second and third most common primary categories behind solar energy company are electrician and roofing contractor. That means the local results a homeowner sees are assembled from several different category pools, and picking the wrong primary category can remove you from the one that matters.
This guide fixes that and everything else on the profile. Budget three hours once, then twenty minutes a month.
Get the primary category right
Primary category is the single highest-leverage field on the profile. For a company whose main business is designing and installing residential PV, the primary should be Solar energy company. Not electrician, even if your license is electrical. Not roofing contractor, even if you reroof half your jobs.
Add secondary categories for what you genuinely do: Solar energy equipment supplier if you sell equipment, Electrician if you run electrical work independent of solar, Roofing contractor if you take standalone roofing jobs, Solar energy system service if you do repair and maintenance on other companies' systems. That last one deserves attention. Service and repair searches carry very little competition and bring in homeowners whose original installer went out of business, which is a large and growing pool.
Do not stuff categories you do not perform. Google removes them and it dilutes what the profile is understood to be.
Fill the services list properly
The services section is a set of free-text entries most installers leave at the defaults. Each entry is an indexed line that helps you appear for a specific query. Write fifteen to twenty:
- Residential solar panel installation
- Battery storage installation
- Solar plus battery system design
- Solar panel repair and troubleshooting
- Solar panel removal and reinstall for roofing
- Inverter replacement
- System monitoring setup
- EV charger installation
- Commercial solar installation
- Solar consultation and site assessment
Each gets a short description. Write for a homeowner, not for a crawler: "We remove and reinstall existing solar arrays so your roofer can work, then recommission the system and verify production." Two sentences each.
Photos that prove you are local
96.5% of solar companies have at least one photo, so having images does not distinguish you. Having the right images does.
Upload monthly, ten to fifteen at a time, and prioritize:
- Completed arrays where the neighborhood is recognizable. A tile roof in a subdivision a local person will recognize does more than a stock aerial.
- Your crew on site, faces visible, in branded shirts. Homeowners are deciding whether to let these people on their roof.
- The electrical work. Clean conduit runs and a tidy combiner panel are the photos an engineer-minded buyer zooms into.
- Battery installations in a garage. Storage buyers want to see how much wall it takes.
- Your truck with the wrap, parked at a job, plate visible or not, your choice.
Name the files before uploading, something like 8kw-array-tile-roof-gilbert.jpg. Shoot on a phone, in daylight, no filters. Avoid manufacturer marketing images entirely. Homeowners can tell, and it reads as a sales office rather than an installer.
Answer the objections yourself in Q&A
The Q&A section is the most underused field on the profile. Anyone can ask, anyone can answer, and if you leave it empty a competitor or a confused stranger will fill it in for you. You are allowed to post questions and answer them yourself.
Seed eight to ten. Use the objections you hear at every kitchen table:
- Do you install the panels yourselves or subcontract? (Answer honestly. If you subcontract, say who and why.)
- What happens if a panel underperforms in year eight?
- Which brands do you install and why those?
- Do you offer financing, and do you also sell cash systems?
- How long is your permitting and interconnection timeline in this county right now?
- Do you do the roof work if my roof needs replacing first?
- What happens to the warranty if I sell the house?
- Do you knock doors? (If your answer is no, say so plainly. It is a differentiator in this trade.)
Keep every answer under 60 words and put a real number in where you can.
Hours, and the Saturday problem
24.8% of solar companies list no hours at all. Only 33.3% list Saturday hours and 18.9% list Sunday.
Solar research happens on the weekend, at the kitchen table, with the utility bill in front of the homeowner. If you or a coordinator will take a Saturday call, list Saturday hours. If you will not, list your real weekday hours and make sure missed-call text-back covers the weekend. What you must not do is leave hours blank, which shows a homeowner nothing at the exact moment they are deciding who to call. 12.1% claim 24 hours, which for a consultative sale reads as a call center rather than a local shop.
The fields most installers skip
Description. 750 characters. Lead with what you install, where, and how long you have been doing it here. "We have installed residential solar in Maricopa County since 2014" beats every adjective you could use. Mention storage and service explicitly.
Opening date. Put in the real year you started. Longevity is the single strongest trust signal in an industry with visible bankruptcies.
Service area. List the counties or cities you actually install in, not a 200-mile radius. Over-broad service areas dilute the local relevance signal and bring you leads three hours away.
Products. Underused in solar. Add entries for the panel and inverter lines you carry and for your storage options.
Booking link. Point it at your consultation scheduler, not your home page.
Public email. Only 24.5% of solar companies publish one. Some homeowners will never make a first call on a purchase this size and will email instead. Publish one that a human reads.
Posts, monthly and low-effort
Post twice a month. Not company news. Post the things a shopper would want:
- A finished install with the system size, town and one line about what the homeowner wanted solved.
- A short factual note when your utility publishes a rate or export change, with a link to the utility's own page.
- A note when your permitting timeline changes materially.
Posts do not carry big ranking weight. They keep the profile looking staffed, and a profile whose last activity was fourteen months ago reads as a company that may not exist any more.
Frequently asked
Should I create separate profiles for each city I serve? No, unless you have a real staffed office with its own address in that city. Fake locations are the fastest way to get a solar profile suspended, and appeals in this category are slow.
What if a competitor's listing is at a virtual office in my town? Report it through the redressal form with the evidence. Do not create one of your own in response.
Do I need a physical address shown? If customers do not visit you, hide the address and set a service area. Hiding the address does not hurt you. Having a warehouse address you actually operate from and showing it helps, because it is verifiable.
Once the profile is done, the next gap is the site it points at. See the website essentials guide, check where your review count sits in the benchmark report, and if you would rather have it built for you, profile work is one of the services in the free 14-day trial. Text or call (385) 832-6175.