Local SEO - two businesses at same address - best course of action?
-
Hi Mozzers - I'm working with 2 businesses at the moment, at the same address - the only difference between the two is the phone number.
I could ask to split the business addresses apart, so that NAP(name, address, phone number) is different for each businesses (only the postcode will be the same).
Or simply carry on at the moment, with the N and Ps different, yet with the As the same - the same addresses for both businesses.
I've never experienced this issue before, so I'd value your input.
Many thanks, Luke
-
Thanks Miriam - that makes good sense - many thanks for your feedback Luke
-
Hi Luke!
Excellent additional details. This definitely should pass muster as two distinct businesses. And I do advise using the distinct addresses for each business as they genuinely do each have their own address. You want customers (and bots) to associate the right address with the right business. So you'll have a unique name, address, phone number and categories for these 2 businesses and should be a-okay!
-
Hi Miriam and I'm very grateful for your input, as ever.
Here's some clarification:
One business is a cookery school offering educational services - the other business is a restaurant open to the public, run by the students of the cookery school (both are owned by the same company).
The company in question has been using the same address for both - 24-27 Castle Mews - t**he business names and phone numbers are different. **
So all seems OK at the moment. I could keep their shared address as it is, which is accurate.
However, it is also clear that each business actually has a distinct address within Castle Mews, so if I wish to differentiate/split the addresses, so each business has a distinct address, I can:
The restaurant is at 24-26 Castle Mews - the cookery school is at 27 Castle Mews, so does it make sense to split the addresses along these lines, or doesn't it really matter?
Look forward to hearing from you, Luke
-
Hey Luke!
Good conversation going on here. I'm going to respectfully disagree with the advice of adding a fictitious suite element to the address, as using your real-world address only is one of the guidelines about which Google is very clear. Using suite addresses in this scenario has, indeed, been something people have experimented with in the past, prompted by Google's past fiasco with large numbers of listings merging due to shared partial details. However, Google seems to have gotten much better at not merging listings, and, in fact, seems quite capable of discerning one business from another despite a shared address. However, I will make these provisos:
-
Luke, I want to be sure I understand what you're saying about only the phone number being different? Aren't the names of the 2 businesses different? If not, and this is actually just one business, then they are only eligible for a single GMB listing - not two of them.
-
Yes, the phone numbers must be unique.
-
There can be trouble if the two businesses are in the same industry. In other words, if one business is Bill's Garage and the other business is Frank's Garage, you'll want to regularly monitor for any signs of merging.
-
It's a good idea not to share Google categories between the two businesses, if it can be helped.
-
Always make sure (as the Local SEO) that you really are marketing two separate businesses that adhere to Google's definition of that. For example, you may encounter clients who want to market their air conditioning repairs as a separate business from their heater repairs, when in fact this is actually just a single business. You'll do more harm than good by helping the client try to market themselves as though they were two. Point to the guidelines and explain the disaster that can come from getting on Google's bad side and you'll be doing the client a world of good
Hope this helps!
-
-
There are tons of businesses that share a street address with others (like at a shopping mall). I've never seen a problem where having 2 addresses the same affected anything. The suite A/B thing is fine though, even if it's only a placebo effect.
-
Ah, so varying all elements - the Name, Address and Phone number - that seems logical - thanks for your feedback.
-
Hi Luke,
I've had many clients in the same situation. The approach I typically take is to split up the street address between a Suite A and Suite B (or some similar variation of that). Google is still able to pinpoint the geographic location of the business, but also recognizes that they're not identical.
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
-
SEO Best eCommerce Practice - Same Product Different Keywords
I want to target different keywords for the same e-commerce product. What's the best SEO practice? I'm aware of the pitfalls to keyword stuffing. The product example is the GoPro Hero 5 Action Camera. The same action camera can be used in many different activities, e.g. surfing, auto racing, mountain biking, sky diving, search & rescue, law enforcement etc. These activities target completely different markets, so naturally the keywords are different. I have three strategies to tackle the issue. Please let me know which one you think is best. 1) Create different keyword landing pages with a call-to-action to the same conversion page Each landing page will be optimized for the targeted keywords e.g. surfing, auto racing, mountain biking, sky diving, search & rescue etc. Obviously this will be a big task because there will be numerous landing pages. Each page will show how the product can be used in these activities. For Surfing, the content would include surfing images with the GoPro Hero 5, instructions on how to mount the camera to a surfboard, waterproof tests, surfing testimonials and surfing owner reviews, etc. The call-to-action leads to a generic product conversion page displaying product information such as specs, weight, video formats, price, shipping, warranty etc. The same product page will be the call-to-action for all keyword landing pages. Positives Vast number of targeting long-tail keywords, numerous landing pages Good specific user experience who may be looking for "underwater action camera" (specific mounting instructions related to surfboards etc.) Less duplicate content as there is only one product page showing the same information Negatives Challenging to come up with each page for the vast amount of activities. Inbound Link Considerations
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ChrisCK
Inbound links from publications can link directly to the product page or the keyword landing page Surf Magazine may link to:
"Surfing Action Camera | GoPro Hero 5 | GoPro.com" - gopro.com/hero5/underwater-surf-camera
"GoPro Hero 5 Action Camera | GoPro.com" - gopro.com/hero5 2) Create different keyword landing pages with call-to-action to directly add product to cart Similar to the first option, but the call-to-action on the landing page is to Add Hero 5 to Cart. The user experience will be similar, the content creation challenges will be similar, but the techy product info e.g. specs, price, video format, etc. will be displayed on the same landing page. Positives Same benefit to long-tail keywords targeting Same benefit to a good, specific user experience Negatives Same challenges to create each long-tail keyword landing page Since there is no aggregate "product page", inbound links will be split between the landing pages Splitting of Page Authority to each landing conversion page Surf Magazine will link to:
"Surfing Action Camera | GoPro Hero 5 | GoPro.com" - gopro.com/hero5/underwater-surf-camera
Cycling Magazine will link to:
"Cycling Action Camera | GoPro Hero 5 | GoPro.com" - gopro.com/hero5/cycling-camera 3) Create conversion-focused product page with casual blog about keywords This is currently what GoPro has chosen - GoPro Hero 5. The product page displays the many different types of activities on the same page. The page is focused on the user experience with images of the action camera being used in different cool activities, showing its versatility. Note, very little long-tail keyword targeting on this page, instead they could use a broad keyword "action camera". To target long-tails, maybe a blog can be used brand ambassadors displaying the product being used in the various activities. Positives User experience focused Higher conversion rate Less content creation work Inbound links go to the same product page, building Page Authority Negatives Poor ranking with short-tail keyword (GoPro is not even in Top 10 SERP for "action camera") Poor ranking with long-tail keywords, (GoPro doesn't rank for "diving camera, cycling camera, surf camera") For blogging the long-tail keywords, who really converts from landing on a blog of the actual seller?! I hope those three strategies were explained clear enough and have enough of a differentiator. Please let me know what you think!0 -
SEO impact of 301 redirects based on IP addresses from a specific state
Hello Moz Community! We are facing an issue that may or may not be unique, but need some advice and/or clarification on the best way to address the issue. We recently rebranded and launched a new site under a new domain and things have been progressing well. However, despite all the up front legwork on trademarks and licensing, we have recently encountered a hiccup that forces us to revert to the old URL/branding for one specific state. This may be a temporary issue that lasts a couple of months or it could potentially be in the court system for a couple of years. One potential solution we have discussed is to redirect the new site to the old site based on IP addresses for the state in question. Looking for any guidance on what type of impact this may have on SEO. Also open to any other suggestions or guidance on dealing with this situation. Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | VeteransFirstMarketing0 -
Few question about SEO
HI guys, I have few questions and I always find good answer here. I tried many SEO companies some very expensive and well known some with medium prices and some from India. I’m not an SEO expert but I always get the same things from SEO companies. They're saying you have to stay with us for few months before you’ll see any results. I completely understand however I don’t see the result on the end.1. What exactly Do I need SEO company for, after I do on page optimisation if they don’t work on proper backlinks. Just letting you know I’m getting content from other people.2. Is there something else which is really important after your page is optimised than backlinks? Or we should fully focus on get backlinks from customers, guest post, sharing on social media etc. to increase our DA and PA?3. Any advice about some individual or company who is good in backlink services?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Lukas-ST
Thank youLukasThanks a lot.Lukas0 -
International SEO Question
_The company I work for has a website www.example.com that ranks very well in English speaking countries - US, UK, CA. For legal reasons, we now need to create www.example.co.uk to be accessible and rank in google.co.uk. Obviously we want this change to be as smooth as possible with little effect on rankings in the UK. We have two options that we're talking through at the moment - Use the hreflang tag on both the .com and the .co.uk to tell Google which site to rank in each country. My worry with this is that we might lose our rankings in the UK as it will be a brand new site with little to no links pointing to it. 301 redirect to the .co.uk based on UK IP addresses. I'm skeptical about this. As a 301 passes most of the link juice, I'm not sure how Google would treat this type of thing - would the .com lose ranking? So my questions are - would we lose ranking in the UK if we use option 1? Would option 2 work? What would you do? Any help is appreciated._
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | awestwood0 -
Website Migration and SEO
Recently I migrated three websites from www.product.com to www.brandname.com/product. Two of these site are performing as normal when it comes to SEO but one of them lost half of its traffic and dropped in rankings significantly. All pages have been properly redirected, onsite SEO is intact and optimized, and all pages are indexed by Search engines. Has anyone had experience with this type of migration that could give some input on what a possible solution could be? Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | AlexVelazquez0 -
Glossary SEO Tactics
A B2B client has a glossary of about 300 terms on its Website. It was done to enhance SEO value. The pages are rarely viewed and the text is often short. What are the best (and wackiest!) ideas to leverage this content for SEO. Here are some: Add videos, images Cross link to content pages Open up comments and get students in this sector to review terms and add their own What else do you suggest?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | HarrAuto0 -
What Questions to Ask in SEO Interview
Tomorrow morning I have a call with an SEO company interested in doing some work with our company. Its a larger company who do a lot of SEO work, and seem to have good feedback around the place. But we have been very very white hat in our all our our SEO work so far, and some of their wording on their site talks about "Negotiations and acquisitions of link partners".. which gives me the feel they might be a little grey hat.. What are some good questions we should ask these guys to make sure what they are doing is legit, and not going to get us stung for anything? And what sort of work should we get them to do, if we are happy to take care of content creation, on page optimisation and social media activities? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | timscullin0 -
Local Search without the user typing local?
Hi, I'm a somewhat regionally based voip provider for businesses. So I'm not interested in getting the #1 ranking for voip, but I'd like to get the top for my region. So in this case asheville voip and related searches. However, I know that alot of users in Asheville are not typing in Asheville voip when they google. They're just typing in voip or free voip, or cisco voip. Here's my Google Insight Search: http://www.google.com/insights/search/#q=voip&geo=US-NC&date=today%2012-m&cmpt=q So what I was thinking about doing was in addition to my main site. Building several smaller 'educational based sites' about the benefits of VOIP. Based on google insights something like ashevillevoipphone.com. And use it to capture leads and link to my main site. So my question is this: Is this a good strategy? If people in Asheville are just typing in voip phone, will ashevillevoipphone.com automatically have a better chance at a higher ranking? Thanksd David
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | StraightRazorDesigns0