Build a photo set around customer questions
Google's business-photo guidance recommends images that represent reality, without significant alteration or excessive filters or AI. It describes several useful photo types, including the business environment and work being performed.
Getting Found Local recommends beginning with questions instead of a photo quota. A visitor to a shop may need to recognize the entrance. Someone hiring a mobile service may want to understand what equipment arrives. A potential catering customer may want to see an ordinary order at its actual portion size, not only a styled promotional spread.
For a fictional furniture repair business, a useful first set might show the technician's real workbench, a repair in progress, and the completed item from a clear angle. Each image explains a different part of the service. Ten nearly identical close-ups would communicate less.
Document real work without overselling it
If you use before-and-after photographs, Getting Found Local recommends comparable angles, lighting, and distance. Write an internal note identifying what work was actually done. Do not use the “after” image from a different item or remove damage digitally to suggest a repair succeeded.
A photograph is not a guarantee that every customer will receive the same outcome. Keep any explanatory website caption specific to the pictured work and its conditions. If the result is atypical, avoid making it the only image representing the service.
Ask permission before photographing a customer's property or including identifiable people. Check the background for documents, screens, personal items, vehicle details, or residential information that do not need to be public. When permission is uncertain, photograph your own tools or workspace instead. Keep the original file and a record of permission together so a future employee can understand where the image came from.
Make simple technical improvements
Google accepts JPG and PNG photos between 10 KB and 5 MB, with a minimum dimension of 250 pixels and a recommended square resolution of 720 pixels. A selected cover photo is not guaranteed to be the first image shown.
Use daylight or even indoor lighting, clean the camera lens, and check focus before leaving the job. Crop out irrelevant space without changing the substance of the image. Our recommendation is to keep the main subject clear even when the picture is displayed small on a phone.
Do not spend the first month chasing a perfect cover image while the profile lacks basic visual evidence. Start with a few accurate, legible photographs and improve the collection as the business earns new material.
Review what a customer can actually see
After upload, inspect the public profile and the status of the media. Google reviews uploads; a pending image is not yet public. Its photo help page explains the available statuses and removal controls.
Our maintenance approach is to replace outdated representations when they would mislead a customer: a former entrance, an old vehicle brand, or a service you no longer offer. Keep a short list of missing visual questions and take a new image when the right real opportunity appears. This is more sustainable than staging an arbitrary weekly photo session.
Your practical checklist
- Choose a customer question for each image.
- Use your own real business and work.
- Check permission and background information.
- Keep edits faithful to the original scene.
- Inspect the published collection on a phone.
Written with AI-assisted research and drafting, with source checks and editorial review for this guidebook. Platform facts link to official documentation. Examples and recommendations are our own; no client results are implied. Sources reviewed October 8, 2026. About Getting Found Local