New building ownership and NAP - strategies for removing old listings with bad reviews
-
I have a question based on this scenario: An apartment building changes ownership. Previous owners were terrible and online listings have had terrible reviews. Since the apartment building now has a new brand name, new office address and phone number, the new owners want to create new online listings instead of claiming the old listings with the bad reviews. Also they want to report the old listings as "closed". They would like to remove the old listings with bad reviews from the old management and old brand name and start fresh, since they plan many improvements. Has anyone tried this strategy? How much luck has anyone had rebranding an apartment building and reporting old business listings as closed?
-
My pleasure, Robert! I liked your answer, too
-
Miriam,
Thanks for these links; they are quite helpful!
-
Hey Dragon!
Robert is offering good advice. I'll just add a few things here.
Different platforms have different policies on this. For example, look at this conversation on TripAdvisor about ownership changes and old reviews: http://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowTopic-g1-i12105-k7183031-Removing_bad_reviews_with_new_ownership-TripAdvisor_Support.html
And here's a good discussion of the details of Google's policy: https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/business/Vz8WIPI95M4;context-place=topicsearchin/business/new$20ownership$20reviews
And here's Yelp's section on what to do in a variety of scenarios surrounding a change of ownership/management:
http://www.yelp-support.com/Reporting_Business_Changes?l=en_US
So, I'm mentioning the above because it will likely be worth it to handle this on a platform-by-platform basis, researching general best practices and deciding how to proceed.
Hope this helps!
-
I think you will run into some problems with this:
** Since the apartment building now has a new brand name, new office address and phone number, the new owners want to create new online listings instead of claiming the old listings with the bad reviews. Also they want to report the old listings as "closed". **
Let's say I own an Apt complex or other business and I suck at it. I realize that all the bad reviews are killing me so I go out and change my business name and office address and then try to report all as new... This is the same thing even though your intent is different. This is one of the tactics used by "reputation management" firms of the less than notable variety. So, I do think you will run into issues and you need to tread quite softly.
Can it be done... maybe; but be prepared for issues with trying this approach. I think a danger you could face is that Google can look at it as simple reputation management play and you can then have trouble ever getting it to list. While we do not do reputation management, we do get clients who come to us due to Local problems who are now not showing up in Local from doing things that are outside terms of service. It is really hard to fix these.
Remember that in Local, the key is NAP. Name, Address, Phone. You are changing two of the three ( I realize you say there is a new office address but people will not search for the new office address and you are going to run into issues with the actual address of the apartments.) What are you going to do when someone searching for the apartment address gets the old listing. Remember there will be a ton of citation sources with old info.
With apartments, your other issue will be citation sources like Yelp or the BBB. Are they going to buy what you have to say about the management change, etc.? My guess is that is also going to be a bit tough to sell. With the new name, are you using a new URL and redirecting any value from the old? If so, you are trying to use what is helpful and jettison what is not, which again makes people question.
So, you might be better with getting new reviews showing the behaviors have changed and using a lot of under new management content, etc. Saying you are going to change is not inspiring at all. Even in your question you say the new management "...plan many improvements." That is not change, that is planned change. Show people the improvements in everything you do and make it clear it is not the same. Then even with the bad original reviews, when you start getting good reviews you will have much higher legitimacy.
Hope that helps even though there is no clear yes or no,
Robert
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
What's the best way to keep Google My Business reviews when the business changes names?
I work with an interior designer who is re-branding and changing her business name to focus specifically on windows. Can she keep her GMB reviews and just change the name of her business, then reverify with Google? She doesn't want to lose her current local pack ranking.
Reviews and Ratings | | obkommy1 -
Ups store and local listings
HI,
Reviews and Ratings | | corn2015
Does google look negatively if an address is at a UPS store? A client has their address there because they don't have a physical locaiton yet. Corn1 -
Having Yelp Reviews Removed
Since we all work with Yelp on a local basis, I believe many are aware that if a review is placed by a non customer about a company, Yelp will typically remove them if you show that it isn't valid, etc. We all know they made a show of outing those who posted fake reviews as well. Here is a question I have though: Have any of you been aware of Yelp taking down valid negative reviews for companies? I have just run into this and find it somewhat perplexing. If you know of this, I would love to hear how it happens? Thanks,
Reviews and Ratings | | RobertFisher2 -
Migrating Reviews from Old SIte
We recently changed our Website to Word Press and I would like to move the old reviews to the new site. I am concerned Google might not understand the reviews showing up all of a sudden. The old reviews were on a sub-domain (store.domain.com). I will be able to match the dates and text as well as names. Any advice or Best Practice on this? Thanks!
Reviews and Ratings | | Chris6610 -
Too many reviews too quickly?
Is there any sort of guideline on this? Right now, we have very few google reviews. However, I've cross referenced a list of our happiest clients with people who have g+ accounts. There are at least 12 clients, I feel strongly would write us g+ reviews if I asked them to. I want to just get the word out today, but I'm worried if 8-12 reviews in a week would red flag us. I've heard that getting too many reviews to quickly can be a problem, but I'm thinking that more like 100 than 10, but I have no idea. Most of my competitors don't have any reviews, and the most any of them have is 10. I don't know if that matters at all either in terms of triggering a red flag. I'd appreciate whatever insight you all could give. Thanks, Ruben
Reviews and Ratings | | KempRugeLawGroup0 -
How to display reviews from review sites on your own website?
Is there a good way to display reviews that people have left on sites like Yelp, City Search, Google, etc on your own website without triggering duplicate content issues? It's hard to get reviews, so I'd like to make the most out of the ones that I get.
Reviews and Ratings | | atstickel0 -
Best E-Mail Service For Customer Reviews
Hello Moz Community, I manage an online wallpaper store. The site is totalwallovering.com We already have a 5 star review form in place on all product pages with rich snippets. I want to set up my own system for e-mailing customers two weeks after they purchase wallpaper from us, in effect asking them leave us a review of the product. Most people are generally willing to do so if they get a reminder. So far in the past 6 months since we have added the review form we have gotten eight reviews. I got a call from Trustpilot last week and I really liked their system ALOT but I am unwilling to pay $600/month. I would rather have all of my reviews on my own website. I literally have thousands of past customers and would like to bulk upload them into the system so that I can generate hundreds of reviews quickly but if that is not possible I can just start with the customers I get today. I am open to any suggestions. Thanks
Reviews and Ratings | | Wesley-Barras0 -
Outrank Warriorforum.com review
Hi Everyone, When you search our company name we dominate the first page with site links and our social links. Recently a Warriorforum.com review jumped to the third position from a post back in Oct. Thankfully it's a good review, but I would prefer if the site wasn't #3. We recently published a Wikipedia article that was approved with the intent to get it ranked in the first page. Do you have any other thoughts on how to outrank those review sites? Right now the SERP looks like: 1. Company Website with 6 sitelinks
Reviews and Ratings | | In-House-SEO-Team
2. Company Twitter link
3. Warriorforum.com Review
4. News about our Company
5. Company Youtube
6. Company Facebook
7. Company LinkedIn
8. Third party review Thank you!0