Local SEO by industry
Local SEO for Restaurants
For a restaurant, the Google listing is the front door. Diners decide from the photos, the menu, the rating and whether you are open, often without visiting the website at all. Local SEO for restaurants is about controlling what that listing shows.
What customers type
- restaurants near me
- italian restaurant your city
- best brunch your neighbourhood
- vegan restaurant open now
- restaurants with outdoor seating
Example search patterns. We research the real phrases and volumes for your city before any work starts.
How customers search for restaurants
Diners search by cuisine, by occasion (brunch, date night, family dinner), by dietary need (vegan, halal, gluten-free) and by feature (outdoor seating, late night, delivery). Google matches many of these against your category, menu and attributes.
Restaurants get more profile features than most businesses: menus, reservation and ordering links, and a long list of attributes. Each one left empty is a search you might not appear for.
See how Map Pack ranking works for how Google decides which listings appear.
Google Business Profile setup for restaurants
Lead with your specific cuisine category, such as Italian restaurant or sushi restaurant, where one exists. The general restaurant category is a weaker match for cuisine searches.
Category names vary a little between countries and Google updates the list, so we check what is available for your profile and what the businesses outranking you use. Everything stays inside Google’s guidelines.
This is the core of Google Business Profile ranking service.
- Menu. Added to the profile and linked to a menu page that is real text.
- Reservation and ordering links. Set your preferred links so bookings and orders go where you want them to.
- Attributes. Dine-in, takeaway, delivery, outdoor seating, vegetarian and other dietary options, accessibility.
- Photos. Your own photos of dishes and the room, added often, so customer snapshots are not all people see.
Website pages that work for restaurants
- A menu page in text, not only a PDF or image
- A reservations page and clear ordering links
- Pages for private dining, events or catering if you offer them
- Location, parking and opening hours in plain text
Each page has one job and is written around the search it answers. The profile links to the site, and the site confirms what the profile says.
That is what we build with a website built for search, with domain, hosting, on-page SEO and schema included.
Reviews for restaurants
Restaurants receive more reviews than almost any business, good and bad. Reply to both, briefly. A calm, specific reply to a complaint is read by many future diners.
More in our guide on how reviews affect local SEO.
Mistakes we often see
Each of these is fixable, usually within the first week of work.
Using only the general restaurant category
A menu that exists only as an image
Third-party ordering links you did not choose and never checked
What it costs
One-time prices, the same for every industry. No retainer.
Profile ranking · $499
Google Business Profile optimization, keyword research, citations and review routine. 90 days of optimization.
What the ranking plan coversSEO website · $499
Custom site with domain and hosting for the first year, on-page and technical SEO. 90 days of updates.
What the website plan coversBoth · $947
Profile and website built to match, plus landing pages and a monthly report during the 90 days.
Full pricing and conditionsLocal SEO for restaurants: common questions
Which Google category should a restaurant use?
The most specific cuisine category available, with broader or related categories as secondaries.
Why does a restaurant menu need to be text?
Search engines read text, not images. A text menu lets you match searches for specific dishes and dietary options.
How can a restaurant control ordering links on Google?
In the Google Business Profile, you can review the ordering and reservation providers shown and set preferred links.
Related industries
Local SEO for Cafes
Early hours, laptop-friendly attributes and passing trade.
See the pageLocal SEO for Caterers
Event-led enquiries for a business with no dining room.
See the pageLocal SEO for Bakeries
Daily trade plus custom cake orders with lead times.
See the pageUseful guides: How to Rank for Near Me Searches · SEO Website vs Normal Website · all industries
Free local SEO audit for restaurants
Tell us your business name and city. We reply by email with where your listing shows up today, what is missing from your profile and website, and the changes we would make first. No sales call, no card.
Prefer chat? Use the Messenger button in the corner, or email rankpageonline@gmail.com.