NAP question and Google local.

[AL123al]

Hello,

My client has successfully grown one of their event venues locally (lets call it venue A) and on the back of that bought two more venues (B & C). Then created an umbrella company to manage all three.

He now wants to market the umbrella company and so redirected the original successful venue domain (A) to the new umbrella company domain. The umbrella company is located at the same address as the original venue A. So it shares the same address, phone number, website as venue A but a different name. All this done before me.

He has a Google local page for the original venue - venue A- and changed the domain on it to the new one. He also has Google local pages for the other two venue locations. But doesn't have a Google local page for the umbrella company.

Now he finds rankings are down. Looking around I can see that his citations are all based on the original successful venue name A - but he has changed the website URL on many of the citations to the new domain.So a bit of a mess as we have a mixture of addresses, same phone number for all 4 , different business names for all 4, same website for all 4.

If all the venues plus the umbrella company are in the same city, but have different names and addresses but the same phone number (for bookings) and web address, are they allowed a Google local page each?

I suggest just having a Google local page for the umbrella company and remove the others as they are not actually separate businesses although they do have different addresses. But unsure if this is correct or necessary.

Not sure how to progress with this one and any help appreciated?

[LauraSultan]

Optimize the umbrella company as a brand for organic search but NOT for local SEO. Use the 3 local venues for local search optimization and it helps to use the local landing page for Google My Business and 3rd-party citations.  For the GMB pages, you really need a separate phone number for each venue even if they forward to the main line.  You can create a Google Plus page for the umbrella company but you should not create a Google My Business listing.

[AL123al]

The three different venues are on the same website with a landing page each and they are under the umbrella company. The three venues offer the same services. The company wants to market the umbrella company but has left the Google local pages for the three venues. I guess I could change the Google local URL's to the landing pages on the website but the phone numbers are all the same - that of the umbrella company.

The problem is that the umbrella company shares the same address as venue A so not sure if I should create a new Google local page for the umbrella company or change Venue A's one?

[LauraSultan]

Yes, that is a bit of a mess.  There are a few different ways this can be approached, depending on your answers to the questions below:

• First of all, is there a business case for marketing the umbrella company instead of the individual event venues? Was the umbrella business created for legal or tax purposes rather than as a brand to be promoted?
• You mention that the 3 locations have different business names. Do they offer the same services?
• I'm not clear on whether the 3 locations are all on the same website or not. Are they?

If your marketing goals are to promote the branded event locations rather than the umbrella business, especially for Google's local business results, leave the umbrella business out of your digital marketing and relegate it to the legal disclaimers or "About Us" page.

If the 3 locations are different brands and they provide different services, it might make sense to have 3 different websites. Just treat them as separate businesses for marketing purposes. On the other hand, if the 3 locations are under the same brand with the same or similar business name and services, it might be more appropriate to have one website promoting the brand that includes a location-based landing page for each venue. The best way to do this really depends on your specific business case.

Finally, you definitely need 3 separate phone numbers for each venue if you want to optimize for local search.