Google Places - Different NAP on various directories...

[PMC-312087]

My client's veterinary clinic uses a service called Localvets.com which is a division of Yext.com. This service updates listings and sponsors them across various directories. Since this is a referral service (they get paid for new clients) they use a custom phone number and custom website address for these listings.

Question: Is this hurting the SEO potential of the Google Places listing since the N.A.P. are not the same?

Thoughts?

[wparlaman]

PMC,

Absolutely!  One of the biggest ranking factors for your Google places are your citations. Anytime your clients business is mentioned online it acts as a citation. If you are using different NAP you wont get the credit from these citations.  The other issue is this can cause duplicate places page in Google. When this happens your clients best places page is pushed down and the new less optimized duplicate listing shows up. At this point you will need to claim this listing and TRY to delete the duplicate listing. This can take a lot of time. If you're going to use a different NAP for tracking purposes you'll want to do it as an image so Google bot can't read it.

I've also attached a link where you can read about duplicate listings in Google places

Hope this helps,

Bill

[blackballonline]

I would say yes this hurts. It confuses the signals that Google looks at for it's ranking factors. now with blended search becoming more prevalent, the data integrity should be consistent. See David Mihm's authoritative Local ranking factors.