One dental practice, several dentists: Google profiles for practitioners, and when a second listing breaks the rules

Google's guidelines let a dentist at a practice have a Business Profile of their own if they are public-facing and can be contacted directly at the practice during the hours the profile states. Where several dentists work at one address, the practice keeps its own profile and each dentist's profile carries only the dentist's name; a dentist who is the only public-facing practitioner at a branded practice shares one profile with it, named "[Practice]: [Dentist]". A second listing breaks the rules when it duplicates the practice, splits one dentist by treatment, is made for support staff, or puts services or a place in the name.

What Google's guidelines say, line by line

Google's Guidelines for representing your business on Google have a short section on individual practitioners, and dentists are named in its second sentence. The table quotes it, with what each line means at a practice.

Should every dentist at the practice have one?

Not automatically. A dentist's profile answers the search a patient makes after a recommendation, which is usually the dentist's name, and puts the practice's address and booking link in front of them. For a principal, or an associate patients ask for by name, that is worth having.

The costs are less obvious. A review left on a dentist's profile stays on that profile and does not count towards the practice's own. And when the dentist leaves, the profile does not leave with the paperwork. Google's help page on removing a profile says the business might still show up on Search and Maps after it is removed from your account, and that reviews remain; marking it permanently closed shows it as closed, and Google says it will not disappear from Maps right away. A practice whose associates change every year or two can end up with a row of closed profiles at its own address.

Our view: profiles for the principal and for long-standing associates whom patients search for by name; none for locums or short contracts; and the review link reception sends always pointing at the practice profile, so the practice's own rating grows whoever did the treatment.

Who should own a dentist's profile

Decide this in writing when the profile is made, not when someone leaves. Google's help on owners and managers says a profile can have multiple owners but only one primary owner. An owner has full control, including adding and removing users and deleting the profile; a manager can do nearly everything else but cannot add or remove users or delete it.

The arrangement we would suggest is the dentist as primary owner of the profile with their name on it, with the practice as an owner or manager while they work there, and the practice as primary owner of the practice profile. The opposite arrangement can work too, provided both sides know it before the profile goes live. What causes trouble is nobody knowing until the day a contract ends.

Naming: where Google's rules and the GDC's meet

Google allows a practitioner's profile name to include a title or degree, giving "Dr." and "MD" among its examples, and its name rules forbid service, product or location information in any business name. The General Dental Council says a dentist may use "Dr" as a courtesy title but must not imply they are a medical doctor unless registered with the GMC, and suggests making it clear, for example "Dr A Smith, Dentist".

The two fit together when each detail goes in the right field. The name is "Dr A Smith", with a degree if you want one shown. The primary category is Dentist, because Google says categories inform customers about what the business does, and the category is what tells a patient this is a dentist and not a GP. The description opens with the role and the practice, then the qualification, the country it was gained in and the GDC number, the same details the GDC expects wherever a dentist is named on a website. Adding ", Dentist" to the name field looks like the GDC's example, but on our reading Google's name rules would count it as service information, so leave it to the category and the description.

The specialist rule needs the same care. The GDC says a dentist who is not on a specialist list must not use titles that may imply specialist status, such as Orthodontist, Periodontist or Endodontist. Google's advice is to choose categories that are as specific as possible, which pulls the other way. For a general dentist with an interest in aligners, the GDC wins: no category or name that reads as a specialist title, and the GDC's own permitted phrases, "special interest in", "experienced in" or "practice limited to", in the description instead.

Second listings that break the rules

• An "implant centre" or "aligner clinic" profile at the practice's address, with the same reception and the same phone number. Google allows separate profiles for public-facing departments that operate as distinct entities, with a name different from the main business; on our reading, a treatment the practice itself provides is not a distinct entity, so this is a second page for one location.
• Two or three profiles for one dentist, one per treatment. The guidelines say a practitioner shouldn't have multiple profiles to cover their specialisations.
• Profiles for dental nurses, reception or the practice manager, who are support staff in Google's terms.
• A practitioner name that carries a place or a treatment, such as "Dr A Smith Dentist Southampton", or the practice name in front where several dentists work.
• A duplicate practice profile at the same address, however it came to exist.
• A dentist's profile left open with practice hours after they have gone. It no longer meets the condition that they can be contacted at the location during stated hours, and patients try to book with someone who is not there.

A twenty-minute check for a practice

1. Search the practice name and each dentist's name on Google Maps, and list every profile that shows your address.
2. For each dentist's profile: do they still work here, and do the hours match their sessions?
3. Check the names: only the dentist's name where several dentists work, "[Practice]: [Dentist]" for a single-handed practice.
4. Check the categories against the GDC specialist lists: nothing specialist-sounding for a dentist who is not on one.
5. Find out who owns each profile, and agree in writing who will own it from now on.
6. Read where the reviews are going. If patients are reviewing dentists rather than the practice, check which link reception and the reminder messages send.
7. Write each dentist's description: role, practice, qualification and country, GDC number.
8. For each dentist who has left, agree with them what happens to the profile with their name on it, and record the decision.

Practitioner profiles are one part of the local work we do for dental practices, alongside the practice profile, the treatment pages and the GDC checks, and the dental SEO page sets it out. If you would like the twenty-minute check done for you, send the practice name through our quote form.

This guide quotes Google's Business Profile guidelines and help pages and the GDC's guidance, read on 3 November 2026. The linked pages are the authority, and they change, so check them again before acting on a borderline case.

Sources

1. Google Business Profile Help: Guidelines for representing your business on Google
2. Google Business Profile Help: Manage your business category
3. Google Business Profile Help: Manage your Business Profile owners and managers
4. Google Business Profile Help: Remove a Business Profile from your Google Account
5. General Dental Council: Guidance on advertising (effective 30 September 2013)
6. General Dental Council: Standards, principle 1 FAQ (use of the courtesy title 'Dr')