Why Every Hotel Restaurant Needs Its Own Google Business Profile

Too many hotel restaurants are listed without their own Google profile. This has an impact on online visibility, as non-hotel guests find it more difficult to discover the restaurant’s offerings on the internet. As a brand, the restaurant in your own hotel is simply hardly noticed from the outside. In this piece, we explain why a Google business profile is essential for a hotel restaurant and what benefits it brings to hotel operators.

Written by Max Falkenstern. This article was originally published in German and has been updated and translated for our English-speaking audience.

Many hotels and inns offer their guests an attractive gastronomic choice in addition to accommodation. Services such as a rich breakfast buffet are a decisive criterion for generating room bookings.

But while guests are still queuing at the buffet in the morning, there is too often a yawning emptiness in the hotel restaurant and at the bar in the evening. Eventually, hotel restaurants can hardly be operated economically this way—especially considering increased costs for food and staff.

Ultimately, either the red pencil is applied and the hotel gastronomy is downsized, or it is even discontinued. But there is another way to improve the occupancy rate in the hotel restaurant: making the gastronomy more attractive to non-hotel guests and marketing it specifically.

This post is about marketing, specifically about an essential component: the online visibility of the hotel restaurant.

The hotel restaurant: too often just a side note online

A core problem of many hotel restaurants compared to traditional gastronomy is the lack of awareness. In our experience, this is due to how hotel gastronomy is marketed: as a pure additional offer to the accommodation.

If the restaurant is only hidden in a side sentence of the hotel description or on an inconspicuous subpage of the hotel’s homepage, a psychological barrier is created. Potentially interested guests, especially walk-in customers, are unsure whether “externals” without a booked room are even welcome in the hotel restaurant or if it is just an exclusive offer for a closed society, as with breakfast.

At the same time, the full range of available channels is used when marketing the hotel brand—website, social media, Google, booking portals, and local business directories. The great foyer, the elegantly prepared rooms—yes, and there should probably be culinary delights for guests too. In this communication whirlwind, however, the restaurant ultimately remains just a side note.

Consequently, your first step must be to view the hotel restaurant as an autarkic, full-fledged brand separate from the hotel. Only when you give your culinary offering its own identity internally and externally can guests be reached effectively.

Searched and found—why everything starts with the restaurant search

To improve occupancy, guests first need to know that your restaurant exists. The Google Business Profile plays a key role here.

Nowadays, over 3.5 billion search queries are made for local destinations every day, a huge proportion of which specifically concern gastronomy. Google profiles are often the first thing potential guests see when searching for a restaurant.

So what happens if your restaurant is not listed in the search result lists? Right, you remain invisible—and with a lack of online presence, your potential to reach new guest groups dwindles significantly!

The proverbial elephant in the room is the question: if you don’t dedicate digital relevance to your gastronomic offer, why should a search engine like Google highlight your hotel restaurant for hungry guests?

Note: In 2026, having your own business profile is a basic requirement for hotel restaurants to be perceived as a culinary destination by local walk-in customers and modern AI assistants. If the hotel and restaurant are not represented equally online, you are voluntarily giving up sales potential.

Hotel and restaurant brand “mixed” – Disadvantages of a shared Google account

In practice, the status quo usually looks like this: the hotel and restaurant share a common Google profile. This business account understandably runs under the industry category Hotel, as room rentals have the highest sales potential. However, for the attached gastronomy, this “forced marriage” is a strategic obstacle.

The disadvantages of a shared hotel and restaurant profile on Google are:

• Invisibility: Google prefers independent profiles when searching for restaurants. If you only exist online as a hotel, guests will inevitably stay away.
• Missing “Reserve a table” feature: The coveted Google button for direct table reservations is only open to gastronomic businesses. Hotels rent rooms. Two parallel buttons are still not possible in 2026.
• Opening hours muddle: The hotel reception is mostly staffed around the clock, which is not true for the restaurant. Without separate profiles, guests have to research the relevant information themselves. This shouldn’t be the case today!
• Difficult restaurant marketing: Special offers and menus may be interesting for hotel guests, but they don’t have to be. With your own business profile for the restaurant, you can target your marketing more specifically.
• The dilemma with reviews: In the shared profile, reviews of room furnishings mix with reviews of dinner in the in-house restaurant. This dilutes the reputation.

In total, the points listed above make it difficult for you to position your restaurant in the market environment. At the same time, shared profile management also has undesirable side effects. Because opening hours and contact details for the hotel restaurant may differ, guests might call the hotel first to inquire about them—a nuisance for both guest and hotel operator, as it means additional administrative effort.

Mixed hotel and restaurant reviews in one account mean that potential guests have to laboriously filter for comments relevant to their respective interests. Even more: A shared account dilutes the hotel brand.

If the majority of comments target the fantastic restaurant experience, that may be flattering for those responsible for the gastronomic operation. However, for a guest looking for accommodation and wanting to know about room furnishings, cleanliness, and spa facilities, restaurant reviews may be less helpful in making a purchasing decision.

Not to be forgotten: the lack of bookability. With a hotel profile, guests can check room availability but cannot reserve a table. For that, a business profile for the hotel restaurant is necessarily required.

Checklist for hotel restaurants: What you should consider for the Google profile

The decision for an independent profile for your hotel restaurant has been made. Before you simply create a new account, you should make some considerations. Google allows separate accounts for hotel gastronomy but ties these to clear conditions.

Your checklist for a compliant restaurant profile:

• Independent name and category are crucial: Choose the brand of your restaurant as the business name (e.g., “The Blue Duck Restaurant” instead of “Hotel Sun Court Restaurant”). Be sure to store a precise gastro category as the primary category that reflects your concept (e.g., Fine Dining Restaurant).
• The “Located in” link (important!): So that Google knows where your restaurant is located, the optional profile attribute “Located in” is used. This way, your restaurant is displayed as a sub-item in the hotel’s Google Maps entry. This provides orientation for the guest. Please note the additional instructions below!
• Own identity through contact data: If possible, use its own phone number (e.g., direct line to kitchen service instead of hotel reception) and a URL to the restaurant website (or a specific subpage like hotel.com/restaurant). Identical data to the hotel often leads to errors in the algorithm.
• The “Reserve a table” feature: With its own restaurant profile, you can now also receive direct bookings via Google if you use online reservation software like resmio. If you registered with your hotel account, activation of the Google button usually goes nowhere. Contact your representative or our customer service for the next steps.
• Process for restaurant reviews: Create a separate workflow (e.g., displays on tables with QR codes) so that guests specifically rate the gastro profile and do not end up in the hotel profile out of habit. This process can also be automated with the Manager for Guest Reviews.
• Don’t forget the online menu: Upload the menu as a PDF. Especially for AI assistants, it is useful to store at least your signature dishes with product names, product descriptions, prices, and professional photos in the Google profile.
• Don’t forget local business directories: Your restaurant should be listed on all relevant platforms with uniform contact and location data. For existing profiles, you should adjust outdated data sets. Where you lack access, we recommend claiming ownership. Services like the Partner Network can support you with maintenance.

For more tips on an optimal Google Business Profile for gastronomy, take a look at our detailed guide.

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The “Located in” feature—how to link hotel and restaurant correctly

A recurring problem with two business profiles at the same address is proper linking. To offer guests (and Google) the best possible orientation, the optional profile attribute Located in was created. With it, you show in the restaurant profile that the hotel and restaurant physically belong together but are independent businesses.

Linking your restaurant with the hotel proves to be tricky in practice.

Often, the field provided for this is invisible in your business account settings. Fortunately, there is an alternative way where you essentially have to slip into the role of a guest.

Our step-by-step instructions for the process:

1. Search for your restaurant in Google Maps (not regular search). You must be logged in with your owner account on Google!
2. In your publicly visible profile, click on Suggest an edit and then select the address field.
3. In the next dialog, you can see the “Located in” field further down under Location details. Enter your hotel name here and select the business from the list.
4. Submit: Since you are verified as the owner, your suggestion should usually be adopted within a few hours to days.

Check both of your business profiles after a sufficient period of time. If everything worked, the notice “Located in: [your hotel name]” will now appear in your Google profile for the restaurant.

Systematic growth: Your roadmap for more online visibility

Opening a new Google account effectively means starting from zero. This brings challenges: while your restaurant has no significant reputation online, competitors in the gastronomic environment with perhaps hundreds of guest reviews have a clear lead.

This should not discourage you but rather make you aware: you need staying power. Overnight success is not to be expected.

It is important to act strategically and draw the right conclusions. To ensure your restaurant profile doesn’t just exist alongside everything else but actively contributes to acquiring guests, we must consciously concentrate on three pillars of growth.

1. Trust through automated reviews: After every online reservation, resmio sends a feedback email to your guests for you. This way, you continuously gain positive Google reviews, strengthen your online reputation, and ultimately drive visibility up.
2. Local authority and networking: Simply put, Google doesn’t just evaluate a profile but also looks at what relevant sources know about your restaurant. Ensure that your restaurant is listed in all relevant portals (Yellow Pages, TripAdvisor, local gastro guides, etc.) with identical data (NAP). Mentions in local media and by high-reach food bloggers additionally help.
3. Targeted impulses through Google Ads: If you want fast, measurable results, you can specifically place advertisements via Google Ads. For maximum success (many reservations), however, you need a modern restaurant website with an online reservation system like resmio.

There are undoubtedly other points. You could, for example, inform people about new offers and events with regular Google posts. Your own social media presence for your restaurant would also be conceivable. What’s more important is to simply start and stay on the ball.

Conclusion—Your hotel restaurant deserves its own identity

The fact that hotel restaurants often fall short of their potential is not destiny but the result of poor online presence. The restaurant brand is missing. If the culinary offer is sold exclusively as an additional service for hotel guests, sales opportunities are left on the table.

A conceivable solution is to open the hotel restaurant to all guests. In this context, having your own business profile on Google is indispensable. More and more guests research restaurants near them on the internet as a matter of course. A Google restaurant profile is the minimum requirement to be discoverable for interested parties.

At the same time, the business profile on Google opens up many advantages, such as direct bookability via the “Book a table” button and direct marketing opportunities. Through continuous guest reviews, a positive reputation can be built step by step—an important pillar for acquiring new guests in the future.

For maximum reach, your own hotel restaurant profile should be flanked by supplementary online marketing measures such as building a restaurant website.