BigChefs, the Turkish cafe-brasserie group, opened its first restaurant in Libya in March 2023, in Tripoli’s Hay Al Andalus district. It was also the first BigChefs in Africa. BigChefs asked Globe Verifiers to look after the restaurant’s Google Business Profile, the listing that shows its address, opening hours, photos and reviews on Google Search and Google Maps. This is what that work involved.
Disclosure: BigChefs is a client of Globe Verifiers and pays us to manage its Google Business Profile. This article describes our own work for the restaurant.
From Ankara to Tripoli
BigChefs was founded in Ankara in 2007 and had grown to more than 60 restaurants by 2023. The Tripoli restaurant is the group’s only branch in Libya. It is run by Alrafahiya International Services, part of the Akida Holding Group, and it opened with a VIP ceremony on 21 March 2023, before welcoming the public from 12 April 2023.
The Libya Herald reported the launch four days after the ceremony:
“The VIP opening ceremony, in the presence of the Chairman of Akida Holding Group, Nasser Okok and Chairman of the Libyan Industry Union, Rashid Swani, included UNSMIL head Abdoulaye Bathily and the ambassadors of Turkey, Italy, Spain, Germany and the Netherlands.”
What managing the profile involved
We started with three jobs, and they are still the core of the work.
- Verifying the profile. Google asks a business to verify its profile before it can edit details such as its name or hours, or interact with customers. Verification gives the business ownership of its profile, and Google decides which verification methods a business can use.
- Completing it. The right address, opening hours and category, a clear description, and good photographs of the room. Google says businesses with complete and accurate information are more likely to show up in local search results.
- Keeping it current. Replying to reviews, updating the business information when it changes, and adding new photos and videos.
Why a restaurant’s Google listing matters
For many diners, the Google listing is their first look at a restaurant: where it is, whether it is open, what the room looks like and what other people thought. Google says local results are based mainly on relevance, distance and prominence, that more reviews and positive ratings can help a business’s local ranking, and that there is no way to request or pay for a better one. Accurate details and prompt, honest replies to reviews are the parts a restaurant controls.
The latest on BigChefs
For the latest, see BigChefs Tripoli Reaches 750 Google Reviews (September 2026) and our guide, Inside BigChefs Tripoli. Next in this series: 519 Google reviews (September 2024).
Opening details: Libya Herald, 25 March 2023, and BigChefs’ own Google Business Profile post announcing the 12 April 2023 trial opening. Group background: Dünya, April 2023. Google’s guidance: Google Business Profile Help, “Verify your business on Google” and “Tips to improve your local ranking on Google”, as read on 13 October 2026. Photograph: from the original post. Disclosure: Globe Verifiers manages BigChefs’ Google Business Profile.
Updated 13 October 2026: facts corrected. BigChefs Tripoli is the only Libyan branch of a Turkish group, not “a restaurant chain in Tripoli”; the Libya Herald article is dated 25 March 2023, not 4 October 2023, and its headline is now given correctly; Google’s own description of verification replaces the claims that we used “proprietary verification methods” and that verification adds a “verified checkmark”; the claims of higher rankings, more reviews, more website traffic and more visits, which we cannot support with figures, are removed, as are the description of Storified as “a leading provider” and the statement that we added customer reviews and keywords to the profile, which a profile manager cannot do; the work is credited to Globe Verifiers, which manages the profile (the original named Storified). First published on 2 December 2023; a near-identical copy followed on 17 September 2024, and the two are merged here.