What the profile is
Search your trade and a town and Google shows a map with three businesses on it before anything else. Each one of those is a Google Business Profile: a name, a star rating, a review count and a call button.
It's free, Google runs it, and for a new business it's the fastest thing you can put up. A website takes months to be trusted. A verified listing can be on the map in a couple of weeks.
Setting it up, step by step
Go to google.com/business and sign in with a Google account that belongs to the business rather than to a family member. Type your business name. If Google already has a listing for it, claim that one instead of making a second.
Pick one main category and make it the closest match to what you sell most: Roofing Contractor, Landscaper, HVAC Contractor. Add a couple of extra categories after that, and keep the main one honest, because it does most of the work.
Then fill in the phone number, the hours, the website and the services. Use the same business name and the same phone number your website shows, character for character. Google reads the two together, and a mismatch is the most common reason a new listing goes nowhere.
Service areas, and hiding your address
If customers come to a shop, show the address. If you drive to them, which is nearly every trade, hide it. Google calls that a service area business, and a hidden home address is normal rather than suspicious.
Then add the towns you drive to as service areas. Google caps the list at 20, so spend them on the towns you want work in. The service area list tells Google where you go; it doesn't put you on all 20 towns' maps by itself, which is what the pages on your website are for.
Verifying a brand new business
Google verifies most service area businesses by video now. You record one unbroken clip on your phone showing the business is real: your truck with the lettering, your tools, a branded invoice, and you signing into the profile at the end. It doesn't have to look good.
Have something with the business name and address on it ready, like a utility bill or your registration paperwork, in case Google asks. Reviews come after that. Ask every finished job with a link straight to the listing, and never buy any: bought reviews get a listing suspended, and a suspended listing is off every map.