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Hi Marty,

This is definitely not okay. Please answer a couple of questions for me.

1. Does Instacare have a physical location in Sandy, UT?

2. You are referring to "instacare near me" as a search people would make looking for urgent care. Does your research indicate that people in this area actually search for "instacare" instead of "urgent care" or "ER" when they have urgent healthcare needs?

3. Is this only happening for the search "instacare near me" in Sandy, UT, or are you saying this is happening for multiple facilities in multiple cities?

4. Have you contacted Google about this? If so, how did you contact them and what did they say?

Hi Elisa,

If your law practice were my client, I would have them take these steps:

1. Get a unique phone number for each practitioner. It can be any number the lawyer is reachable at during listed business hours. It can be their cell phone, a phone at their desk, etc.

2. Diversify categories as much as possible so that the lawyers aren't competing with the practice.

3. Link each practitioner's listing to a landing page on the website for just that practitioner. Put the name, unique phone number and address as the top of each practitioner's page and then write good, useful content for the page, optimizing it for longer tail terms rather than the head terms the practice is targeting.

4. Be sure you've updated all other citations that exist for the practitioners on other sites, so that they include the new phone number, more diverse categories and appropriate landing page link.

5. Build long-tail kw focused links to these practitioner pages.

These listings can be an asset to the business in widening the number of search terms the overall practice is able to target. So, before you consider abandoning them, I would advise the client to think seriously about how the listings could benefit the practice. I'd implement all of the above tips I've given and then give it a year to see how the practice feels about the benefits coming from having these more diversified practitioner listings. Of course, be sure you are tracking this in Google Search Console for the year! And do be sure you're having the client assess whether it's actually negative if the lawyers are getting leads, regardless of how rankings are playing out. If it's income for the practice, is this a good thing or a bad thing?

If, at that point, the practice feels it really dislikes having practitioner listings, it could strip out all of their details to de-optimize them. Remove all but one category, remove photos, hours of operation, etc.

But, before doing something drastic like that, I'd really evaluate the good that could be done with the listings, in properly handled instead of being a muddle like they currently are. Good luck!

You're welcome. Good luck to you in the work ahead!

Thanks for bringing your question to the forum.

While this is a common scenario you are describing, the best I can do is offer general advice without seeing the actual client's results.

1. Are you duplicating GMB categories between the law firm and the practice? Try to avoid this, if possible.

2. Are you sharing phone numbers between the law firm and the practice? Don't do this.

3. Are there unique landing pages linked to from GMB for each practitioner? If so, are you optimizing these pages for the same terms as the overall practice is targeting? If so, diversify the practitioner pages so that they target longer tail terms while the main website pages for the practice target more head terms.

4. Are you doing anything with the brand's presence in GMB that could be causing Google to trust the practitioners more than the practice. For example, are you adhering to naming guidelines for both practice and practitioner? Have you resolved duplicate listings? Has the practice received any penalties, suspensions, or engaged in any forbidden practices like setting up listings for ineligible locations or acquiring fake reviews?

Evaluate all of the above and make any necessary adjustments. If, after a waiting period, you don't see the desired outcomes, the practice will need to determine whether:

1. It's a big deal, or not really a big deal, to have the lawyers outranking the practice for some terms.

2. If a big deal, the practice may need to decide to de-optimize the listings for the lawyers to remove as much of their ranking power as possible.

Hope this helps!

Thank you for bringing your scenario to the forum. So, as I understand it, your T-shirt page is ranking for the term you'd prefer your Embroidery page to rank for, in a city in which you're not physically located but to which you are adjacent. While it's always up to Google which page they feel is most relevant for a particular search term, here are some things I see when looking at these two pages:

1. You are duplicating content between the two pages. This speaks of a lack of effort on the part of the brand to build unique, high quality content for the customers. If you are going to create a unique page, create unique content for it.

2. I see in your menu that you have a section for "Locations".  From your Contact Page, it looks like you have just one physical location in High Wycombe. Looking at this, what appears to have been the strategy here is to create dozens of pages for locations in which the business doesn't physically exist, but would like to serve. Unfortunately, as I look at these pages, I would have to say that these pages have been created for search engine rankings rather than for human visitors. There has been little effort put into making these valuable resources for people, and if the brand's only connection to these other cities is wanting to rank for them/sell to them, that's really not good enough inspiration for publishing something worthwhile. A better approach would be to evaluate whether the brand has any actual connection to these cities. For example, let's say the the company had a large commission to embroider the work uniforms for a famous commercial pottery studio in York. You could then create a page about the job  the brand did  for this studio in York, complete with images, videos, text, and testimonials for the company. This would be a page that would have a real reason for existing, instead of the present state of these "location" pages that have been created. Google is likely viewing this entire collection of pages as being of low quality.

3)  Something odd is happening at the top of your Marlow Embroidery page. It's as if you've got a Title Tag in the text at the top of it (instead of in your code) reading: Embroidered Workwear Marlow | Embroidery Marlow | Workwear Marlow. This is not human-style language and doesn't belong in the customer-focused text on your page. To Google, this could look like an attempt to over-optimize the page in a spammy way.

Overall, the brand isn't taking an optimum approach to marketing itself to communities beyond its city borders. If this were my client, I would be advising the brand to discover if there are real relationships they can build with customers in other cities so that they have something useful and interesting to publish. The danger of continuing with the present approach is that it could easily be pushed down by a competitor who is willing to invest in higher quality content. The duplicate content issue needs to be addressed, and the Marlow Embroidery page ranking issue might be sorted out if you do this and earn a few good new links to it, but from just a quick look at the site, this brand may have greater overall needs than this, given the current state of their content strategy.

There's a very good opportunity for your agency to get this client onto a better path. Recommended reading: https://moz.com/blog/rank-beyond-location

Hope this helps and good luck!

Hello there SeedofIntention!

You're right - this thread is very old. I highly recommend that you check out the beta of Moz Local Market Analytics which is breaking ground in providing local keyword volumes:

https://moz.com/local-market-analytics-announcement

Hi Davit!

Some questions:

Are you saying that this business closed its location that services LAX, but they are still ranking for it?

Or, are you saying they still have a location open there?

Do you serve LAX?

Please, let me know. Thanks!

Hello there!

Can you please clarify for me if you are a Moz Local customer needing assistance with a bulk upload or if you are trying to do this directly with Google My Business? Thanks!

Hi Jeff,

I would recommend that you gather as many screenshots and as much other evidence as possible. Then, tweet to @GoogleMyBiz and let them know you want to DM them evidence of a concerning case of widespread review spam. Wait for them to DM you back. I don't recommend doing any of this publicly. Confine your communications to DM.

All you can do is report it and hope for the best. Google doesn't always act on these reports, regardless of how much evidence you send.

If you aren't satisfied with the outcome of your private interaction with Google, you can then make the decision about whether to go public. If an issue is so egregious that it receives a large amount of press, Google can typically be shamed into removing review spam. However, the story has to be fairly sensational to garner that kind of attention.

Good luck. Fake reviews are so prevalent and so bad for real-world communities who don't know what they are reading is fake. Hope it goes well for you.

Hi There,

Would you be able to clarify: are you asking about H1s, or could you mean title tags? If you can provide some more details, and maybe an actual example, the community should be able to offer you more customized advice.

Hi DylMar,

You are right to guess that, yes, it's up to Google to decide if they want to show a two-pack like that for a branded search. If your geographic scenario is similar, in terms of distance and terrain,  there's definitely hope that you could see this same treatment of your client. Your best shot is building up the authority of both of the locations so that Google feels confident about listing them both for users when a branded search is done.

However, it's definitely not something I would set as a client goal or make promises about. There could be reasons why Google is treating your client differently that have to do with Google's understanding of user intent in that specific region. If, for example, Google felt that users near to local A definitely want location A, a calculation could be going on just to show A instead of showing both A & B. Another scenario could be that your locations are being considered too close together by Google, and one of them is being filtered out, because of that. But, as with most things, if you can drive up the overall authority of both locations, it's your best bet to see what you can squeeze out of the SERPs.

Some things to work on:

• Earn reviews for both locations

• Be sure you've got strong landing pages for each location

• Be sure no guidelines are being violated by either location

• Earn some good local links for both locations

Likely you're already working on these things, but without being able to see your actual client, the best I can do is offer general advice. Good luck!

Hi Jeff,

I'd be surprised if it's hurting you in any way. However, it's good that you're thinking about it. Now could be a good time to modernize your approach to building relationships with (and links among) related businesses in your community. My latest post on the Moz blog is all about this, and you might find it a good read: https://moz.com/blog/2020-local-seo-success

*See particularly the Q4 strategy section.

While ownership of your listings is unlikely to impact SEO, be aware that Google is being extremely hyperactive about putting listings in a pending state right now following many kinds of changes. So, just know, if you make a change right now, it could have this effect.

Hello There,

What you are seeing is Google's hotel booking feature. Here's an article to help you better understand this feature:

https://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-redesigns-the-hotel-search-experience-on-desktop/276085/

Hi Lee!

Thanks for clarifying this. Yes, then, if your offices are staffed during stated business hours by your own staff, have unique phone numbers for each office, and are meeting face-to-face with customers you are:

• Eligible to have 2 listings

• Free to link those listings to whatever page on your website you want to.

But, now, let's get into the nuances of this. Which page/pages is it best to link to from GMB listings? This is a subject of long debate in the local SEO industry. The two schools of thought  go something like this:

1. You should link all of your listings for a multi-location business to your homepage, because homepages typically have the strongest DA and this can then boost the local pack rankings of all locations.

-or-

2. You should link each location's listing to that location's landing page on the website, because it's better Usability. UX would suggest that the local customer clicking on the GMB listing wants to be taken to the page for that listing's location - not taken to a homepage and then having to click around to find the address/phone number/other details for the location they want to visit.

Option 1 might work best for you, because if you've only got 2 locations, you can likely display their complete NAP on your homepage without it being burdensome. But, it's a decision you'll need to make based on whether you believe rankings or UX  need greatest emphasis  for your customers and your business.

Hope this helps!

Hi Lee,

I want to be sure I've understood your business model. E-commerce businesses are not typically eligible for GMB listings.

Google's guidelines state:

In order to qualify for a Google My Business listing, a business must make in-person contact with customers during its stated hours.

At your offices, are you making face-to-face contact with customers? If so, you are eligible. If not, then you aren't.

Its my pleasure! I think you are evaluating this scenario correctly.

And a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you, too! Thank you so much for being part of the Moz community.

Thank you for the further details  Mª Verónica.

It is always so hard when Google moves in on a territory where we were formerly doing well. Think of how, ten years ago, individual hotels had a chance of ranking their websites fairly well with a little work. Now, Google's hotel product + all of the other hotel rental mega sites out there are about all that ranks for queries like "hotel San Francisco".

It sounds to me like what you are witnessing with the client in Dublin is the encroachment of Google into this space, and you are right to realize you can't really beat this. Based on this, and without being able to investigate your actual client, I have a couple of things to suggest:

1. There's an old saying: If you can't beat them, join them.

The client needs to become a master at posting to Google Jobs. They need to dive deep into learning how to ensure that their jobs are the ones coming up in the Google Jobs interface. I am not familiar enough with this topic to give expert advice, but here is a start: https://jobs.google.com/about/. And, if this data is being pulled from third parties like Monster or ZipRecruiter (see https://support.google.com/hire/answer/7326138?hl=en) the client needs to master inclusion on those sites.

The thing to remember is that hotels are still getting leads. It's just that less of them are likely coming from the website. They are coming through Google now. Your client may simply need to realize that their website is no longer going to be their top source of leads. Leads may have to come from other sources, now. It's a strategic shift the client likely needs to confront.

2. This does not mean the client should give up on their website. I would suggest that you conduct an audit for the client in which you take their job category searches (both their top ones and their longer tail ones) and identify all the sites outranking them for those searches. Then analyze those sites to see:

• Which ones the client can be listed on

• Which ones aren't job listing sites but might link to your client via a list, a guest article, a sponsorship or other unstructured citation opportunity.

I would consider the old concept of Barnacle SEO (https://moz.com/blog/barnacle-seo-whiteboard-friday) to see where it can get the client.

3. Finally, after taking care of everything you can do online for the client, I would advise them to evaluate their offline opportunities. If your client has a physical office in Dublin, what are the offline connections they need to make with job seekers in Dublin? What events can they sponsor, attend, speak at? Where do they need to advertise (billboards, newspapers, local radio, local TV?). What can they do on their physical premises to bring employers and job seekers into the building? Host events? Offer additional trainings and services? What would bring people in the door for a face-to-face interaction?

Google cannot replicate face-to-face communication. If your client can master the personal touch, offline, then they will be doing something Google can't rob them of, as you've said.

I hope these suggestions are of some help with creating a strategy for the client. Good luck!

Hi Mª Verónica,

Just want to be sure I'm fully understanding the query. Your client is a job center in Dublin, and is being outranked by competitors with a higher DA. Is that right?

If I've understood correctly, and you're convinced that it's the DA-related metrics that are causing these competitors to outrank your client, then the answer would be to improve your client's DA-related metrics, too. Is there something specific you were thinking about and wanted particular advice on about improving your client's DA?

Hi Dakota_G,

This is a good topic and you've come up with some good ideas to get started on your content development. You might find some of the suggestions in this article useful, as well: https://placester.com/real-estate-marketing-academy/real-estate-local-seo-tips/

Competing with a company like Zillow, if you are marketing a small-to-medium realty firm, may not be a realistic goal to set, at least not for the top search phrases you'd probably most hope to rank for. You may need to think of sites like that as places to get listed rather than to surpass in the SERPs for core terms.

So, where does this leave a company like the one you are trying to market? Typically:

1. Competing for longer-tail searches

2. Competing for something other than the "10 blue links", like featured snippets, video results, image results,  local pack results, etc.

Some of the ideas you've had, like providing weather results, are probably not going to be worth your time. People already have apps for that, or get their info on that right inside Google's results. But if you can come up with the best possible answers for questions that people are asking and that haven't already been covered with a perfect answer by a huge powerhouse publication, you might be able to start seeing some more visibility.

I would identify long tail terms that directly relate to your geographic and industry market. Do the searches for these terms. See what comes up. Look at featured snippet opportunities, People Also Ask boxes, Answer The Public, Google Q&A queries, Quora topics, etc. I'd begin gathering direct feedback from your firm's clients. What are their FAQs? Investigate FAQ schema to answer these queries.

Finally, I would look at those top sites that are outranking yours and see if there are opportunities for you to be interviewed by them as an expert, to be listed on them, to guest post on them and similar activities so that you at least have a presence on platforms you can't surpass.

I hope these suggestions help.

Hello There!

That's a great question, and it represents a challenge local marketers have faced for years without a good solution. I have some good news on this topic that I hope will come at just the right time for you. At Moz, we are currently in beta with our new Local Market Analytics software which is breaking ground in multi-sampled local analytics. Check out these two screenshots, please, for a sense of what Local Market Analytics provides, including local keyword volumes and rankings:

https://imgur.com/a/2eFUZJm

https://imgur.com/a/7kz8FN3

I would like to personally invite you to come join the beta and, especially, to participate in an experiment our engineers are  currently running surrounding scenarios just like yours that involve neighborhoods/boroughs within markets. For example, if you look at the above screenshots I've shared, above, you'll see analysis refined down to the level of the borough of Queens. To sign up to be part of this beta experiment, please go here:

https://moz.com/local-market-analytics-announcement

We're extremely excited about developments and would love to add you to the beta and have you be part of this experiment!

Very helpful, Daniel, and congrats on the good ranking!

Here is what I would do to try to jog Google:

1. Remove the logo image from the dashboard

2. Upload 5 new high quality images to the dashboard, choosing one as the profile image.

Google just wasn't showing me very many photos for this business and I think you should take away what you don't want and give them more to choose from among photos that you do want. Give that a shot. The change could be immediate or could take a few days. If you try this experiment, please follow up here if you can to let me know what happens.

Hi Daniel!

If you're able to share the client and search term so that the community can actually take a look, that would definitely help narrow down feedback to what is most relevant to your scenario. If you don't have permission to do that, though, it's okay. Advice will have to be a bit more general, in that case.

I have some questions:

1. I want to just confirm that you are talking about the image showing up WITHIN the 3 pack in organic search ... not something you are seeing in Google Maps, and not just the image you see on your solo Google Business Profile. Is that right? We're definitely talking about the 3 pack image here?

2. What is showing up as the cover photo on your Google Business Profile when you do a brand name search for your business? Is it the logo or is it one of your actual photos?

3. Have you uploaded the logo in your Google My Business dashboard, or are you saying it's not in the dashboard and Google is pulling it from elsewhere?

4. Are the photos that you have uploaded for this location of high quality and in alignment with Google's guidelines?

5. Has the logo always been what you've noticed on this listing, or was it previously showing a photo and then suddenly started showing the logo?

Please, let me know!

My sincere pleasure, Julie!

Hi Julie!

So sorry to hear of the trouble you're having with that. It's not an uncommon scenario. There are basically two steps to take to try to resolve this:

1. Do a competitive audit between the business and the partner. Set up a spreadsheet so that you can compare the metrics of the two entities you're investigating. Look at keywords in business title, DA, PA of the GMB landing page on the website, review count, rating and sentiment, possible duplicate listings, citation accuracy/spread for each, etc. Once you have those metrics, you may be able to spot some specific reason why Google is favoring the partner over the firm. If not, move on to step 2.

2)  If the client judges that the partner outranking the firm is harming a critical metric like conversions or revenue, you can decide to minimize the partner listing to try to demote it, if the client agrees. Remove photos, remove hours of operation if you can, point the listing to a low PA page on the site (typically a partner page rather than the home page, unless your partner has a strong landing page?), remove any keywords from the partner's title, etc. At the same time, try to earn a few good new links for the landing page of the firm, and showing a bit of extra love to the firm's listing can't hurt. Add new photos, maybe start scheduling some Google posts, do some Q&A.  Hopefully the combination of minimizing the partner and maximizing the firm will generate the desired results.

This won't be the right solution for every scenario, but if it's deemed that the partner outranking the firm is negatively impacting the business to a degree that the partner's listing prominence needs to be sacrifice for the sake of the brand, hopefully my instructions will help!

Good morning!

Did your images appear? If not, answering EffectDigital's questions could help the community troubleshooting this with you. Also, if you can provide a link to the actual listing, that would be really helpful, if you have permission to do so.

Yay! You're welcome, Bryan. So glad that worked out!

Hello Ash!

Sorry to hear you're not yet ranking as well as you'd like to be. You're right that SEO is a long game, but here are some tips I hope will help you.

1. Remember that there are no absolute local or organic rankings. For each customer, the results will differ based on their locations at the time they search. This means you have multiple chances to rank well for different customers in different areas of your geographic market, for each search phrase you are focusing on.

2. When trying to assess why competitors are outranking you, you need to first find your true competitors. If you want to do this manually, here is a simple tutorial:

https://moz.com/blog/find-local-competitors

If you don't want to do the work manually and are a Moz Pro customer, please check out Local Market Analytics, which finds your organic competitors for you: https://moz.com/local-market-analytics-announcement

3. Once you know who your competitors are, you are ready to audit them. The purpose of an audit is to stack up your metrics against theirs to discover why Google might be seeing them as a more relevant result than your business. You'll want to look at things like:

• The absence/presence of spam/guideline violations in both your business listing and in the listings of competitors

• Keywords in the business name and domain

• Google My Business accuracy, activity, etc.

• Citation consistency, spread, etc.

• Domain authority and GMB landing page authority

• Review count and sentiment

• Links

• Unstructured citations

• Content quality

• On-page SEO

• The impact of Google filters, like Possum

etc.

Here is a post I wrote in 2017 about performing a basic local competitive audit between your business and one of its competitors. The post might need a little updating, but it will at least get you started with this work: https://moz.com/blog/basic-local-competitive-audit

4. Each competitive scenario will be different, but in general, what you'll typically see is that the brands outranking you in either the local or organic SERPs have some factors in which they are doing a stronger job than you. Once you know what those factors are, from your audit, you'll know where you need to focus your efforts to meet and then surpass them. This is the basis for all local SEO strategies.

5. If this is more than you can personally take on, then you may need to reach out to an agency for professional assistance with the audit and strategy.

Hope this helps!

Hi Ryan,

I'm so sorry your good question didn't receive a reply yet. May I ask, are the pages you've published representing actual physical locations of the business (like a Taco Bell with thousands of locations) where the business meets face-to-face with its customers? Or, are they just areas of the country you are targeting without having physical locations and in-person interactions? A few details on the business model in question should help you receive some good replies here.

Hi Bryan!

Sorry for the delayed reply. I believe this thread in the GMB forum should be relevant to your scenario, but please let me know if you have any further questions after reading it:

https://support.google.com/business/thread/1859764?hl=en

Hi Davit,

I see! Yes, I do think you should start a new thread specific to technical issues, as they are different than the original scope of this thread. You could get some fresh eyes on it!

Hello Davit,

Nice to hear from you again, and good for you for investing in your website.

My apologies, but I'm not a code writer, so I'd not be the best person to ask about this.

I reviewed this whole thread before looking at your new website, and while the layout is certainly nicer, I'm still seeing some of the same issues we highlighted with the website homepage clearly focusing on DC, when your issue was that you wanted to do better in the LA area. I'm also still seeing some need for the text, itself, to be edited.

I recommend that you start a new thread here in the forum to specifically ask coders to come look at the technical issues that are concerning you. I'm sure you'll receive helpful replies. Wishing you good luck!

Hello!

Thank you for bringing your question to the community. Unfortunately, holiday rental properties are not eligible for Google My Business listings. You can read the guidelines regarding this here. They read:

"Ineligible businesses

The following businesses aren’t eligible for a business listing:

• Rental or for-sale properties such as vacation homes, model homes, or vacant apartments. Sales or leasing offices, however, are eligible for verification."

So, while the office from which you rent out these properties is eligible for a GMB listing, the chalets are not.

Please let me know if I've misunderstood anything about your business model or question.

Hi Justin,

So sorry you were unwell and I hope you're feeling better. I'm afraid I'm not quite understanding your follow-up regarding citations. Your initial question was about use of DBAs. If you have a second question, please share a few more details and I'm happy to keep chatting!

Hey There,

So, when a business is local, it's typical that we consider what Google wants first, because of their dominant role in local search.

What Google wants you to put on your listings is whatever name appears on your street signage, how you answer the phone, etc. So, if you are Cars UK on the sign above the door, you should be Cars UK on your Google listing. This then, would make sense as how you brand yourself in other areas, as well, such as in your schema, so that Google can associate your listing name with all other assets belonging to the business.

What I can't answer for you is questions related to legal requirements in your country. That would be something to discuss with a government official or business attorney.

Hi There!

So sorry to hear that happened. Are you able to share your name/website address with the community so people can look with you?

It might also help if you could list out any changes you might have made, prior to the change you've seen, and whether there was a specific date on which you noticed the change.

Sounds like a plan.

One thing I immediately notice looking at this, now that I have the info on the dentist, is that they appear to be sharing an address with at least 2 other dentists, and another dental practice (Fountain Grove Dentistry)  is just down the street.

Just at a glance, I'd make a strong bet that you'll have to confront Google filters going on here. The Possum filter is likely to be at play with so many dentists located on the same street. This basically means you will, indeed, have to best the other players by a good amount to get your particular dentist to be the one that isn't being filtered.

I think there's a lot you can do here, which it sounds like you intend to do. But, definitely do let the client know about filtering and that, with such a competitive term, this is going to be an uphill battle between the dentists he shares and address with as well as the other Fountain Grove practice, and then the rest of the dentists in the city.  Good luck!

Hey There!

I'm sorry you've not received a response from anyone who has experienced a like scenario. I haven't either, per se, but I did want to respond to say that high traffic to pages is unlikely to be the cause of absent local  rankings. Regarding bounce rate, several Google reps have stated in the past the Google doesn't view it as a good ranking signal (see: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-bounce-rate-signal-23671.html) but, obviously, statements like this from Google are the cause of speculation and dispute in the SEO industry.

So, in your shoes,  I would be focusing elsewhere on why your client is failing to rank well locally. If you're allowed to share the identity of your client and the term they are trying to rank for, I'm sure the community would be happy to take a look.

If you don't have permission from the client to do that, I have some resources that could help you troubleshoot the cause of lacking rankings:

https://moz.com/blog/find-local-competitors

https://moz.com/blog/troubleshooting-local-ranking-failures-2018

https://moz.com/blog/basic-local-competitive-audit

The third  link is getting a bit old. I need to re-write that post, but even in its 2017 state, it should point the way to how to do an audit between your client and their competitors that should yield clues as to why the client may be failing to rank.

Hope this helps.

Hi VELV,

So glad you came back to the thread. Can you clarify some things for me, please?

1. Is this your company: https://www.ifixappliancesla.com/

2. Is it in any way related to this company: http://ifixappliancerepair.com/

3. When you are searching for just "iFix Appliances" and not seeing either your Van Nuys or Beverly Hills Google Business Profile come up, where are you physically located when doing those searches? If you are standing in your location in Van Nuys and doing the search, what do you see? And the same with Beverly Hills. Is there absolutely no Google Business Profile (what you called the knowledge panel) coming up even if you are standing in the location of each while searching?

4. When you do add the geo-modifier (Van Nuys or Beverly Hills) does the GBP then come up?

5. How long ago did you create the listings for these 2 locations?

My pleasure, Maureen!

I'm so glad you asked about Moz Local. We have a whole new-and-improved Moz Local now, and yes, we are definitely supporting the UK. See more here: https://moz.com/help/moz-local

Please write to help@moz.com if you have any questions about what we can do for your clients in the UK, and I'm so glad you found help in the forum.

Hi Maureen,
Thank you for bringing your question to the forum. I have a few  of thoughts on this:

1. First of all, folks are very unlikely to be seeking your business or your services by entering a phone number. So, I would call this concern a very low priority.

2. However, here's what I think may be going on, as I was unable to immediately  find anything connecting your phone number with your competitor (something may exist somewhere, but you'd need to hunt to find it if it does): I suspect Google is confused. The similarity in business names and domain names is leading Google to be uncertain about the identity of the business connected with that phone number. Because your competitor has earned more links and has a higher Domain Authority than your business, Google (in their uncertainty) is bringing their SERP entry up above yours. It's certainly weird behavior on their part (if, indeed, there is no asset connecting your number with their business hiding somewhere). But, that's my best guess. Somewhere in Google's system, they are confused about the identities of the two businesses and are conflating them with the same phone number in your phone number search.

3. What to do about this? According to Moz, your numbers stack up against your competitor's like this:

Them:

Page Authority: 25 ; Domain Authority: 19 ; Links: 911

You:

Page Authority: 5 ; Domain Authority: 3 ; Links: 2

As these numbers indicate, your brand is behind in building overall authority, and this is why I strongly suspect that Google is allowing this business to get into the mix of your search engine results because they aren't quite sure whether the competitor's stronger presence is actually a better version of your own business. This is my theory, anyway, and if correct, what you need to do is build up the authority of your domain so that it is firmly associated in Google's mind with your phone number.

You need more links, in short, and, as others have mentioned here, you may well need to start building out your citation set. Moz Local would be our home-grown solution for a UK business like yours needing to ensure that its local platform and directory listings are accurate and complete . You can learn more about it here: https://moz.com/products/local

4. Back to the beginning of this: it's unlikely that your brand is being harmed much (if at all) by what you've noticed regarding the phone number. People just don't typically search for brands or services by phone number. But, there is a good chance that your low authority is causing you to be outranked for the keywords that people DO search for in trying to access services like yours. And, what you've noticed is actually a good indicator that Google currently lacks confidence in the information they have about your business. That definitely matters, and so, the best way to build up Google's confidence is to grow your authority. I recommend that you put priority focus on both links and local business listings and that should be a smart start to making Google more confident about who your business is (and who it isn't!).

Hope this helps!

Hey There!

Be glad to take a look. Please, let me know, what are the locations of your two businesses (street, city, state, zip). Thanks!

My pleasure, Simon! So glad I could help.

Good morning, Simon!

Thank you so much for providing these key details. So, on the face of it, yes, Google has likely acted with suspension because the two listings share the same general category, address and phone number. They likely believe this is a single business attempting to create spam listings for its different services, which is not allowed. In other words, they think your client is one business which offers both flat and thatched roofs, and while the roofing types are quite different, the business has signaled to Google that it really may just be one entity offering a variety of roofing.

The only surefire way to resolve this would be for the company to operate out of separate staffed offices with separate phone numbers, as well as separate websites. I would not be confident that you can convince Google to reconsider the suspension without this. This is actually a very interesting case, because roof thatching IS such a specialty business. Google could well have let this slide had the phone numbers been unique, but, given that the business didn't take this approach, they are in a pickle now.

So, your path at this point, as a marketer, is to see if the business has the resources to open a second, totally distinct business. If so, then you can start over again with the citation building process for them. If not, you may be better off telling them to combine the two websites into one, representing a single business with multiple roofing styles represented by a single Google Business Profile with multiple categories and good service menus.

Hi Simon!

Some questions:

1. Are both of the businesses that the client is running in the same business category? Are they both roofers? If not, what is the model of the second business?

2. Are they both using the same phone number, or unique phone numbers?

3. Do they have separate websites or the same website?

4. Are they legally registered as unique businesses with county/state/fed credentials?

5. Did Google provide any messaging regarding the suspension?

Good Afternoon, Justine,

This is an excellent question. There is no documentation regarding SEO benefits from the presence of thumbs-up activity on Google reviews. They may have some impact on the  order in which reviews are displayed, but I have never seen any study undertaken as to whether they have any impacts beyond that.

Because of this, I would treat the topic, in general, as one of low priority/low concern.

However, we've waded into something deeper here with this scenario of a client trying to pressure an agency to thumb up his positive reviews.  I'm assuming he's doing so because he believes it will benefit him in some way, but your question deserves a thoughtful answer.

So far as I know, Google has never released formal guidelines for the use of the "like" function on reviews since they rolled it out in 2016. They don't specify who should use that function (owners, the public, etc.) or whether they would consider any particular use of it spammy.  But what we do know is this: Google is very big on the concept of reviews being honest and transparent and sourced directly from customers. Anything that resembles manipulation is forbidden.

The "like" button isn't the review, of course, but it's associated with the review. Does it strike you that what this client is asking you do is to manipulate his review corpus? After all, you are his marketer ... not a customer. Google's position is weak here, because so far as I know, they haven't released specific guidelines. In that environment, I could certainly make a case for your client interpreting the "like" button as something he should use when he receives a review he's grateful for. He could respond to the review and hit the "like" button as a thank-you. But when the owner begins bringing in his marketers to do the same ... marketers who are not customers but are, in fact, paid contractors, does this not seem to be crossing a line from gratitude to manipulation?

Another way to look at this: how would the business owner feel if his competitor hired 100 people who did nothing all day but like his reviews? Would that feel fair or honest to him?

So, as I said at the outset, I would consider this a low-level priority given that I have no documentation indicating that likes impact rankings, and I can't even fully quantify the level of impact they have on review ordering because you will commonly see reviews with multiple likes being outranked by reviews with no likes. This isn't the biggest issue in local SEO, but your client's attitude could prove troubling if he is inclined toward manipulation. I've never had a client try to order me to do something, and that that seems odd, too.

If it were my agency, I would say "no" and talk with the client about the need to earn his reputation rather than try to fake it in any way. That kind of approach seldom pays off in the long run, and I'd hate to okay a client engaging in any practice that I was even remotely worried might be perceived by Google as spam. You'll need to make a decision on this at your agency, and then present it to the client. Good luck, and I hope my thoughts on this are helpful!

Hi Waquid!

Thank you so much for adding a bit more context to your question. I perfectly see your scenario now.

So, if a business does something like landscape design and has only two offices in San Francisco, it's likely that the homepage and both location landing pages will include references to "San Francisco" and "Landscape Design". The landing pages could also be optimized for hyperlocal terms like "North Beach" or "Glen Park" if they are in different neighborhoods.

However, if the business has, lets say, 20 offices in California, then they wouldn't be likely to use any city or neighborhood terms on the homepage because there are simply too many cities to cover. Rather, the homepage might reference regional names, like SF Bay Area, or Central Valley or Orange County, etc, or even just Northern California/Southern California.

If the service is identical at all locations, then there's really no avoiding using those service keywords on all pages. You can vary them in any way that keyword research shows you variants. For example, you could dice up findings like "sustainable landscape design, native landscape design, commercial landscape design" etc, between the pages, but if you have just one overarching service, then it will be reflected on all pages. It's the geo-terms that need to be parsed up to fit the scenario of your various offices.

Hi Waqid,

Thank you so much for bringing your topic to to the forum. I've read through your scenario now, but I'm not seeing the question you're asking. Can you please detail what your exact question is? Thanks!

Hello Larry,

Thank you for bringing your question to the forum. I'd like to address this in two parts:

1. I'm honestly concerned that a Google support rep has given you bad advice. This does happen. P.O. boxes are not considered valid addresses and are expressly cited as ineligible by Google's guidelines which read:

"Use a precise, accurate address and/or service area to describe your business location. P.O. boxes or mailboxes located at remote locations are not acceptable."

So, unless I'm missing some aspect of your business model, what the Google rep told you is incorrect. As I've said, this sort of thing does happen, and I'm concerned that your listings could be removed at any time for a guideline violation and this could even possibly prejudice Google against your account, in general, including its legitimate listing in Lincoln. So, I think this is the biggest problem you face right now and in your shoes, if you want a second opinion I would do the following. Go to Google's Forum and  title your thread: Gold Product Experts, Did a Google Rep Steer Me Wrong? Then, in the post, share the information about your business listings and repeat the advice that was given to you. Gold Product Experts are Google's top-level forum volunteers and the best source of an educated second opinion when something Google says seems off.

I strongly guess they will point to the guidelines I've indicated and that you will end up removing these listings as ineligible. You're not alone in facing some confusion surrounding this, and I believe a read-through of my recent Moz blog post on the topic of wanting to rank beyond your physical location could help you level up your strategy regarding this common challenge. See: https://moz.com/blog/rank-beyond-location

2. Your second question regarding hiding/showing your address is the center of a discussion that's been going on for many years in the local search marketing industry. On the surface of things, hiding your address is not supposed to negatively impact your ability to get your listing ranking well. However, I can personally say that I have seen enough evidence to the contrary to convince me that hiding your address can, indeed, negatively impact your rankings. There are some local SEOs who strongly believe that doing so can even doom the listing. So, know that your question is valid, but that the topic is controversial, with experts frequently stating that hidden addresses do negatively impact the ranking scenario.

I hope this is helpful. If you have any follow-up questions, I hope you'll ask!

Hi Dan,

Okay, thank you for confirming the URL. I do think the near-match of your brand to the one at shop21live.com could possibly be confusing Google as to the intent of a user searching for "Shop21".

Whether or not this relates to your site re-do, I can't say, but basically, you'd be looking at needing to become the authoritative result for that brand. Right now, with you being outranked by that Facebook page and another business with near-identical branding, you're in a tough spot.

I would analyze shop21live.com and see what you can do to surpass their metrics with yours. An audit is definitely in order!