Google now lets you claim a profile in Search. Here’s how founders can use it

What happened

Google’s Search profiles reached two more countries this month. On October 6, Robby Stein, Google’s vice president of product for Search, announced on X that creators and publishers in India and Canada can now claim one, with Brazil “rolling out soon.” Until then, the feature had only been open in the US, where it launched in June, as Search Engine Journal reported.

Google describes a Search profile as “a shareable, customizable page that brings together all of your social accounts, websites, posts, and links into one place.” People can find it when they search your name or handle, or through your content in Google Discover. Google also says the Knowledge Panel that may show up for your name “will also feature an AI-generated summary based on your bio.”

To qualify, Google’s help page says you need at least 10,000 followers or subscribers on one linked YouTube, Instagram, X or TikTok account, and you must be 18 or older.

What it means for you

For a founder with an audience, this is a page Google itself shows when someone looks you up. That person might be a client checking you out before a call, an investor or a journalist. Until now, what they found was a loose list of links. A profile gathers it into one place you control.

The detail I’d pay the most attention to is the AI summary. Google writes it from your bio, which means a few sentences you may have dashed off years ago now shape how Google introduces you. A vague bio like “Entrepreneur. Dreamer. Coffee lover.” gives it nothing to work with. Compare it with “I help fintech founders explain their product in one sentence. 40 launches since 2019.” The second tells Google, and every person reading the summary, who you are and why you’re worth a call. It takes five minutes to write and it may be the first thing a future client reads about you.

It’s worth being clear about what a profile won’t do. The same page says creating one “doesn’t directly affect your content’s ranking on Google Search.” It’s about being recognized, not about ranking higher. There’s one small bonus, though: if someone follows you from your profile, Google says they “may see more of your content on Discover.”

It’s also a different thing from a Google Business Profile, the listing local businesses use for Maps and local search. A Search profile is about you, or your brand, as a source people follow.

What to do this week

1. Check whether you qualify: one account with 10,000 followers on any of those four platforms, and a home base in the US, Canada or India for now.
2. If you do, rewrite your bio first. Say who you help, what you do and one result you’re proud of, in plain words. That is what the AI summary will draw from.
3. Then claim your profile at profile.google.com/claim and link every account you actively use. If Google already made an unclaimed profile for you, you get to review it before creating yours.
4. Search your own name afterward. Google notes that a Knowledge Panel may not appear when other people share a similar name, so adding your company and role to your profile helps people tell you apart.
5. If you’re not at 10,000 yet, pick the one platform where your clients spend time and build there first, rather than spreading thin across four.

Your bio is a small piece of writing that now does a lot of work. If you want a hand with it, that’s exactly the kind of thing our personal branding work covers.