Understanding Google My Business & Local Search
List of Google Maps categories
Update 02/11/10: These Google LBC categories have now been placed in a searchable database too located on the Google LBC Categories page of my website.
Update 12/20/09: I have a new list of current categories at Google Local Business Center Categories – The Complete List
Update 10/13/2009: If you have found this old post then you are a motivated searcher. I am now developing a searchable database of Google’s current categories. If you think that easy access to Google’s category information would be helpful to you, contact me at mike@blumenthals.com and let me know that you are interested in testing the beta.
The categories that Google uses in Maps have always been confusing. They have their own very limited list and then they integrate categories from their other providers in a non-transparent way that causes confusion.
In a first step to making this more tranparent, Reuben Yau has created the first full summary of Google’s own Local Business Center categories.
Previously Reuben wrote: The other thing I noticed is that the category for that site is Gazebo Builder which is taken from Acxiom’s database, but that category is not present within GLBC. FYI Acxiom is the database behind yellowpages etc.
It would be of interest to gain a complete list of these categories and attempt to map them to Google’s.
© Copyright 2024 - MIKE BLUMENTHAL, ALL RIGHT RESERVED.
Comments
4 Comments
[…] the Local Business Center was first released Google only offered a choice 450 categories and no custom categories. At the time if you used any of the limited categories offered in the LBC, […]
Mike, there are actually 12 top level categories and 512 sub-categories. Although they don’t ask for it with new data files, these are still supported for bulk publishers. For reference, this GLBC Legacy category list also shows the category-ids.
I have just found this when looking for a list of the google local listing business categories. As far as I can tell we are able to type a category and if it exists then it will suggest it to you but there is no way to identify an explicit list of what exists and is popular.
Ill drop you an email on that beta test shortly from my home account, I sent one from work earlier but am interested on a personal and professional level
Google maps change my business category automatically to Alternative Medical Practitioner if I type in Complementary Health Professional. The is a huge difference between the two.
“Alternative” means “in stead of” and “Complementary” means “in addition to”. Can Alternative Health Professional be added to the list?
Comments for this post are closed.