Planning Google offer and event posts: a monthly calendar for UK businesses

Short answer: plan one useful offer or event each month, confirm its dates and terms, and prepare it for publication about a week before it starts. Use the remaining weeks for genuine business updates. For a United Kingdom business, check bank holiday hours, regional holiday dates and booking availability before anything goes live.

A good Google Business Profile calendar starts with what your business can actually deliver, not a list of seasonal slogans. A garage in Manchester, a salon in Birmingham and a café in Glasgow will have different busy periods, staffing arrangements and reasons for posting. Your calendar should reflect those differences.

Google supports update, offer and event posts. Offers and events include date fields, making them useful for time-sensitive information. They also need careful checking: a clear post is still misleading if its booking page shows different conditions or staff cannot honour it.

Start with your trading calendar, not the copy

Before drafting next month's posts, gather the information that affects customers' decisions:

• Confirmed opening times, including bank holiday hours.
• Available appointments, event capacity or stock limits.
• The actual start and end dates of any promotion.
• Who qualifies, what is included and any exclusions.
• The booking page or other action customers should use.
• Who will approve the post and answer questions about it.

Check the relevant national calendar on GOV.UK. England and Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland do not share every bank holiday. St Andrew's Day is a Scottish bank holiday, for example, so a Glasgow business should not simply copy a London calendar. School holiday dates also vary locally; check the relevant council rather than assuming a single UK half-term week.

A public holiday is a planning prompt, not a reason to manufacture an offer. If your team is fully booked or closed, a straightforward availability update may serve customers better.

Turn those decisions into a four-week posting plan

Keep the monthly plan small enough to maintain. One well-defined offer or event is a sensible starting point, not a Google requirement or a promise of better rankings.

The following calendar is illustrative and does not describe an actual business or its results.

Preparing a post a week ahead gives staff time to check it. The best publication date still depends on the activity: an event requiring advance travel may need more notice than a short appointment offer.

Match seasonal themes to the part of the UK you serve

Build seasonal relevance around genuine customer needs. The following are illustrative planning ideas, not claims about demand or likely performance:

• January and February: explain booking arrangements, maintenance services or winter opening times rather than inventing a sale.
• March and April: check Good Friday and Easter Monday dates before promoting Easter availability. Easter Monday is not a bank holiday throughout the UK.
• May and June: review the Early May bank holiday and Spring bank holiday alongside staff leave and supplier availability.
• July and August: confirm local school holidays and the relevant Summer bank holiday date; Scotland's date differs from England and Wales.
• September and October: consider useful preparation advice, demonstrations or services that genuinely fit your trade.
• November and December: publish clear Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year's Day arrangements, checking substitute bank holiday dates where relevant.

For multi-location businesses, keep a separate approval line for each branch. An event at one premises must not appear to be available at every location.

Write offer posts around the full customer decision

An offer should answer four questions quickly: what do I receive, when is it available, do I qualify, and how do I claim it?

Use a plain headline, the correct date fields and concise conditions. If the booking window differs from the dates when the service is delivered, explain both. Include material restrictions such as selected services, minimum spend, limited appointments or a requirement to book in advance.

Do not advertise a discount against a reference price you never genuinely charged. Avoid unsupported claims such as “best in the county”, artificial countdowns or scarcity messages that your booking records cannot substantiate.

Where you quote a consumer price, make the total payable clear, including unavoidable charges. For VAT-inclusive prices, use the wording VAT included and check that the booking page agrees. Do not leave essential pricing information until checkout.

For service-area businesses, explain coverage using real places or postcode areas you actually serve. Do not invent a local address to make the offer appear closer to customers.

Make event posts practical rather than promotional

An event post needs the name, date, start and finish times, location and booking requirements. Explain whether it is free or paid, who it suits, and any relevant accessibility or attendance conditions.

Use a genuine photograph of the venue or a previous event, with permission where necessary. If using an illustration instead, do not present it as evidence that a previous session took place.

Check the destination page on mobile. Visitors should be able to find the postcode, booking instructions and any cancellation information without searching through unrelated pages.

If plans change, update the post and the booking page promptly. Contact existing attendees through your normal booking process where appropriate; editing a Google post alone is not a reliable way to notify everyone.

Worked example: an illustrative Manchester garage

This example is illustrative. It describes a fictional planning scenario, not a client, testimonial or measured result.

Consider an independent garage in Manchester preparing an October winter vehicle-care demonstration. It wants to explain simple checks and answer questions, rather than advertise an unverified discount or promise an outcome.

First, confirm the operational details. The manager agrees the date, session length, staff cover and maximum attendance. The team decides whether visitors need to book and whether customers may bring vehicles. No public post is approved until those decisions are recorded.

Second, draft the event information. An illustrative headline is “Winter vehicle-care demonstration in Manchester”. The description explains the confirmed topics and booking process. Staff add the actual event times and genuine venue details to the appropriate fields. They do not use an invented address or imply that attendance includes a service that has not been agreed.

Third, prepare supporting updates. One update could show a real photograph of the demonstration area. Another could answer a common preparation question, checked by a suitably knowledgeable member of staff. A final reminder is published only if booking is still open.

Fourth, align the customer journey. The garage checks that the same date, postcode and attendance conditions appear on its website and booking page. If the session affects normal customer access, it updates the relevant opening information and briefs reception.

Finally, review the process. After the event, the team records any recurring questions and whether the published information remained accurate. It does not assume that posting caused changes in rankings or bookings. For broader location planning, see local SEO services in Manchester.

Keep hours, directories and reviews consistent

A post about holiday opening does not replace the opening-hours fields on your Business Profile. Set special hours separately when needed, and check them against your website. Our guide to Google Business Profile special hours covers that separate task.

Review relevant directory listings too. Yell and Thomson Local are established UK directories; a suitable trade-specific directory may also matter to your customers. Prioritise accurate listings over submitting to every directory you can find. Keep your business name, telephone number and genuine address or service area consistent.

Use the correct postcode. Include the county where it is useful or requested by a directory, but do not force county names into every headline. For a mobile business, distinguish the area you travel to from premises customers can visit.

Treat review requests as a separate, honest process. The Competition and Markets Authority is the UK's principal competition and consumer authority. The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 includes rules addressing fake reviews. Never make a promotion conditional on a positive review, commission fabricated feedback or use AI to write supposed customer experiences. Review management should support genuine feedback, not manufacture it.

Use Local SEO AI with a human approval step

Google posts provides an approval calendar with scheduled publishing, while AI content can draft copy from your own confirmed details. Publishing to Google is awaiting Google's connection approval; do not treat a scheduled item as proof that it has appeared on your profile.

Give the drafting tool verified dates, eligibility rules, service coverage and booking instructions. Ask it to flag missing information rather than fill gaps with plausible details. A staff member should compare the draft with the booking page before approving it.

Your final monthly check should cover dates, terms, photographs, mobile usability, bank holiday hours and staff awareness. After publication, verify that the live information is correct. AI can help organise the work, but it cannot confirm your stock, staffing or event arrangements without accurate input.

Frequently asked questions

Which UK rules should we consider when using reviews alongside an offer?

The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 addresses fake reviews, and the Competition and Markets Authority provides guidance on consumer protection. Do not create fictional reviews, commission them or make a benefit dependent on positive feedback. If you publish reviews yourself, check the rules and guidance relevant to review publishers. Keep promotional claims truthful and material offer conditions clear.

Should we update Yell and Thomson Local every time we publish a Google post?

You do not need to duplicate every Google post across Yell and Thomson Local. Focus first on accurate core information, including your telephone number, genuine address or service area, website and opening times where supported. If you advertise the same offer in a directory, keep its dates and conditions consistent. Choose directories relevant to your trade and customers.

How should we plan posts around UK bank holidays?

Check GOV.UK's bank holiday calendar for the nation where each branch operates. Dates and recognised holidays differ, particularly in Scotland and Northern Ireland. Confirm staffing before advertising availability, then set bank holiday hours in your Business Profile's special-hours fields. A post can explain the arrangements, but it should not be the only place customers can find them.

Should local posts include a postcode, county and mobile number?

Include a postcode when it helps customers find a genuine event venue or understand service coverage. Add the county where useful, rather than repeating it for keywords. A mobile number is appropriate if it is your established business contact. Mobile businesses should describe real coverage accurately and avoid implying that customers can visit an address that is not open to them.