Setting up Kerbrank takes a few minutes of your time, then the first reading runs on its own. You type in your business name and postcode, tick the searches you care about, pick an area, and we go and check Google Maps from spots all around you.
Add your business in three steps
On Your businesses, press Add your business (or Add a business if you already track one). The three steps are shown along the top, and a panel on the right fills in as you go: your business, the searches you pick, and the area on a real map.
1. Find the business
- Type the business name.
- Type the postcode or town. Postcodes are suggested as you type.
- Press Find it.
- Pick your business from the list. Each result shows its category, address, rating and number of reviews, and warns you if the listing isn't claimed.
Kerbrank fills in the rest from Google: category, address, website and phone. If the business isn't on Google yet, you can enter the details by hand instead, although the map can only show where you would appear once you have a listing.
If a result is marked Already tracked, you don't need to add it again. Press Open its report to go straight to it.
2. Searches
We suggest the searches people near you actually make, with how many times a month each one is searched. The ones that show buying intent are already in You're tracking at the top.
Press the × beside anything that isn't your work, add your own in the box underneath, and press + on anything in More ideas you want to track.
You'll notice the town name is left off every suggestion. That is on purpose: Google already knows where the searcher is, and adding the town tends to flatten the map. Five or six searches is plenty to start. Choosing which searches to track explains how to pick well.
Underneath, Which services matter most? is optional but worth a minute. Add your services, put the one you most want more of first, and mark any you offer but don't want to grow as Don't grow.
The report then puts your most valuable searches first (how often they're searched, what advertisers pay for them, and how much the service matters to you), and it never suggests searches or tasks for a service you've marked Don't grow. You can change the list later under Settings → Your services.
3. Area, then start
Choose how far your customers come from: Neighbourhood, Local, Whole town or Region. The one marked Recommended depends on your kind of business: Whole town for clinics people drive to, Local for salons and shops, Region for trades that go out to customers.
Each shows how many miles or kilometres across it is, and you can switch between miles and kilometres. A spot with no postcode nearby, usually sea, a harbour or open land, is left out automatically. If the postcode lookup is down, every spot is searched.
Under the sizes, Points across the map sets how many spots we check from edge to edge, such as 7, 9 or 11. The area stays the same size; more points just sit closer together. The panel on the right shows how many spots will be checked.
Draw your own is the fifth option. Pick it if your customers are on one side of a river, along a coast, or anywhere a circle gets wrong. After you press Create, the map opens with drawing tools and your first reading waits until you save the area you drew.
Leave Take the first reading now ticked and press Create and scan. The line underneath tells you roughly how long it will take for the searches and spots you chose.
Drawing your own area
From any business, Change the area (on the Map view or in Settings) opens the designer. The tools run down the left of the map:
- Move: drag the map to look around, the centre handle to move the area, or the amber handle to resize it.
- Circle: press where the middle should be and drag outwards.
- Square: press where the middle should be and drag outwards.
- Corners: tap each corner, then tap the first one again or press Finish shape.
- Draw: press and trace around the area, then let go.
- Paint: drag across points to switch them off. Start on a grey point to switch them back on.
White handles appear afterwards, so you can pull the shape about until it matches the area you serve. The panel on the right sets Points across and the distance between points, and keeps a running count of the points the scan will check. Press Save map when it looks right.
Confirm your email
When you sign up with an email address, we send you a one-click link to confirm it. Your first scan waits for that click. If it hasn't arrived, check your spam folder, or press Send it again on the banner at the top of your dashboard. Signing in with Google confirms your address for you.
The first reading
How long a reading takes depends on your map, your searches and how busy Google's queue is, and the app shows its estimate before it starts.
In that time we search Google Maps from every spot on your map, read the top 20 results at each one, ask ChatGPT the questions a customer would, check your website and build the report.
While it runs, your map fills in spot by spot, with a count of the spots checked and the search it is on. You can close the window; we email you when the report is ready.
If you unticked the scan on the last step, open the business and press Scan now when you're ready.
What to look at first
When the business opens, its Overview puts three things first:
- Your four figures. Visibility score, Maps top-three share, average position and how often ChatGPT names you. Top-three share, the percentage of spots on your map where you appear in Google's top three, is the headline number. Reading the map and the headline numbers explains it and the figures around it.
- The map itself. Look for blind spots, the patches where you don't show up at all. They are named by direction, such as "the north". The Map view shows each search on its own.
- Your tasks. The ones most likely to help for the time they take, each opening what we found and the steps to take. See all tasks opens the full list, ranked by how serious each one is, then by likely effect against effort.
Pick one task and do it this week. Working through your task list covers how to mark it off and how the next scan confirms it.
Your first week
Four things are worth doing in the first week:
- Take the first reading. Open the business and press Scan now if it hasn't run.
- Tick off your first task. Do one task from the list, then press Mark as done. The next scan checks it for you.
Connect Google Search Console (optional). We only read from it: it shows the searches already bringing people to your website and improves our suggestions. We never change your Business Profile on our own.
Posts go out only when you press Publish or schedule them. To see calls, direction requests and website clicks next to your map as well, link your Business Profile.
- Put your brand on client reports (Pro plan and above). Your name, colour and logo, set under Account. See sharing reports for how clients see them.
After the first week
You don't need to remember to scan. Kerbrank rescans every business automatically every 7 days, and each business shows the date of its last reading and the next one.
Changes from week to week are only compared when the searches and the map are the same, so try not to fiddle with either while you wait to see whether a job has worked.
When you do change something on your Google listing or website, note it under Settings → Change log with the date. Each later reading is shown beside it on Progress and in the report, so you can see what moved. Other things move the figures too, so give a change two or three readings before you judge it.
If you get stuck
Help is linked from every screen. It holds the guides, and a short form that sends a request straight to a person. Your account and the business you are looking at come along with it, so there is nothing to explain twice.
You get a reference number (like KR-1042) and a copy by email, and the status of every request you have sent is listed underneath.
