Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Changing the business name in citations and GMB
-
In Australia, some businesses are Pty Ltd (Proprietary Limited) hence, their business name ends with xxx Pty Ltd. How accurate do we have to be when building citations or updating citations that Pty Ltd is included in the business name? We've got clients who have left out Pty Ltd in their previously built citations and we're wondering if it's worth the time to actually update them to include Pty Ltd.
Also, does changing a business name affect its rankings? This is more than just "Pty Ltd", it's changing from XYZ to ABC. We've previously had to change a client's address on their GMB and this had a negative effect on the client's rankings. Will changing the business name have an adverse effect?
Thank you in advance for your advices!
-
Thanks heaps, Miriam, your advice is always appreciated!!
-
Thanks heaps for your response, Alick, and a good reference link!
-
Hi Gavo!
Alick300 has provided a good link for the 2nd part of your question. For the first part, we just had a good discussion on this right here: https://moz.com/community/q/local-search-can-i-use-a-shortened-company-name
Hope it helps, but if you have any further questions after reading that, please feel free to ask!
-
Hi Gavo,
Please check below thread in Google my business community regarding affect on ranking after changing business name.
Hope this helps.
Thanks
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
-
Way to see clicks on GMB Products
Hey! I just added products to my Google My Business page. The company I work for does experiential entertainment so you cant actually buy the products but you can buy tickets to them on the website so I added them as a product with a Learn More button. Is there a way for me to see how many people clicked "Learn More"??
Local Listings | | danieldaher0 -
Google My Business: Company listing is showing in search instead of division address - similar names/same city
Hi! I have a client whose company name is very similar to one if their company divisions. This division has multiple locations but its main location is in the same city as the parent company. The problem is that when you search for the division, the parent company shows up. The parent company has a physical address, but most users searching need to be going to the division address which takes customers. They are having problems with customers coming to the parent company address instead. I have made the Google My Business parent company page to show service areas instead of their business address. Yet, their listing still comes up first when searching for the division location. This is because of part of the parent company name is in the division name. My client wants users to be able to find the division more so than the parent company. Anyone had this issue before? Any tips would be great!
Local Listings | | agrier0 -
How to change your location for local search results?
Hi Everybody Back in december 2015 I came across this article https://gofishdigital.com/google-results-change-location/ explaining how to change location for local search results using the google emulation tool by setting up new coordinates. This was also picked up by mikeblumenthals' blog as being one of the best way of doing this. I tried it at the time and it worked very well. I tried using it last week and again this week but my location no longer seems to update. I have tried it on fifferent computers located in different locations and still it doesn't work. Does anyone know if this feature is no longer available and if not what else they'd recommend to verify local search results. Thanks
Local Listings | | coolhandluc0 -
How can I submit Baidu business listings if I live outside of China?
A client of our wants to manage business listings for three locations in China. We wanted to submit to Baidu but from what I've learned this is highly regulated (you live in China, pay a fee and call them to confirm). This is the only article I could find about submitting to Baidu: http://www.nanjingmarketinggroup.com/blog/baidu/how-can-baidu-maps-help-my-business Are there any conduit or 3rd party services available that can handle this? Thanks
Local Listings | | RosemaryB0 -
Why are my citations not showing up?
We're managing a website for a client and decided to use Yext to build citations. We've gone through and manually verified that they are live. Moz Local cannot find this website or the citations, nor could Ahrefs, or Majestic. Google has indexed 154 pages of the website, Bing has indexed 10. This dealer has two websites (I know that's a faux pas, it's by client request), so that they can "test" our website before giving up their old one. They're tied to the same NAP, but have different web addresses. We got permission to claim the listings for the website we sent live and put them up about two months ago. I can't figure out for the life of me why none of my tools will verify the existence of this website and the citations. I checked for a no index and no follow command in the HTML (which shouldn't be a problem because Google has indexed the site) and it was clean. The only thing I can think of is that the old site is getting credit for the citations even though we've listed a different website address. Can anyone verify this?
Local Listings | | jtaylormoon0 -
What To Do With Two Business Having The Same Name?
Hi friends, We have a client who is in a peculiar predicament... essentially his business and his biggest competitor share the same name. Officially on their business licenses they are differentiated by the year they were each established, but in all their marketing, on their website, and in the community they are both known by the exact same name. When the company name is searched for, the competitor shows up #1 organically with the map pin as well as in the knowledge graph, and our site shows up number 2 without any any map pin or Google+ page site link or anything. We thought we could differentiate ourselves by changing his Google+ page name to his official business name (with the date) and building a bunch of really good citations with that official business name, but we still haven't made a dent for his branded keyword, and our Google+ page site links aren't even showing up. Has anyone run into a situation like this and any suggestions?
Local Listings | | localtrifecta_im0 -
How To Change Image Used In Business Knowledge Graph...
How can one change the image that Google shows in a business' knowledge graph in the SERPs? And the image I am referring to is the one that typically appears to the left of the map within the knowledge graph box, above the business' name. The current image that is being used in my client's case is an image that was uploaded in their Google+ My Business profile, but there doesn't appear to be any particular reason why that one was chosen (it wasn't the first or last image uploaded, nor is it selected as the profile picture). As user-interaction increasingly becomes important in rankings, I would like to change this to something more attractive. Thank you for any help and guidance!
Local Listings | | gbkevin1 -
How to remove a former business location from Google Places?
I've received a strange response from Google Places on local listings for a home builder. Google's rep suggested that we not list the new home sales center (a model home) since at some point it will change from being a business listing to a residential listing. That is just wrong. It will be a place of business for the next 3 years and then will flip to being a private residence. These days it is uncommon, but not that rare to turn over ownership from public to private or vice versa (A residence becoming a law or other commercial establishment. Or a whole office building becoming condos.) The issue is, when it does happen, how do we get Google and others to recognize that a business is no longer a business location? I've had trouble bringing down the address of former former model home sales centers on Google Places much to the chagrin of the residents.
Local Listings | | BlairKuhnen0