How are you all handling temporary closings on GMB?
-
Hey! Obviously things are crazy right now and in my company, we are having to temporarily close some locations. How is everything handling that with GMB? Obviously I will post but should I add special hours?
-
Hello Daniel,
You are right - this is an unusual time for all of us, and local businesses are facing some real challenges. If you need to temporarily close your location, contact Google via twitter at @GoogleMyBiz. Mike Blumenthal reported on the 16th that Google will be pushing out a "temporarily closed" label on businesses that local and state governments have ordered to close.
Other areas of your GMB listing you can use to push out info about the changes include:
-
Hours of operation
-
Google Posts
-
Description
-
Google Q&A (remember, you can write questions AND answer them as the business owner, but you can't apparently mention COVID-19 in this area.)
For restaurants, Google is apparently allowing them to edit their business name to state that they are offering takeout.
I recommend reading this post from Darren Shaw for more ideas: https://whitespark.ca/blog/keeping-gmb-accurate-during-covid19-pandemic/
I hope this helps, and I'm wishing you well.
-
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
-
Using PO Box/Virtual Address for local citations, but not GMB?
Hello. So, I am aware that it is in violation of Google My Bussiness's terms of service to use register a PO box/virtual address with GMB, but is it problematic to use such addresses for general link building with local citations, such as local directories and resource pages? Would the cons outweigh the pros (more backlinks)? And what about using one of these kinds of addresses on my website, but not GMB? Is it all so interrelated nowadays that I should steer clear of publishing a virtual address anywhere? That just seems hard to wrap my head around as PO Boxes have served a valuable function for small businesses for some 150 years. Thank you, Jon
Local Listings | | custardextract0 -
How to remove a link in GMB "Products & Services: places.SinglePlatform.com"
I manage a GMB account for an HVAC client and noticed in their knowledge graph it shows: "Products & Services: places.SinglePlatform.com" I cannot find this anywhere on the backend on GMB. Has anyone experienced this and how did you fix/remove the link? Luckily, the link goes to the clients profile on SinglePlatform, but the info is outdated.
Local Listings | | Bryan_Loconto0 -
What are the best link strategies to increase rankings in Local Pack / GMB and where to find them?
As someone who manages GMB for 50 plus local US clients, I absolutely loved this article https://mza.bundledseo.com/local-search-ranking-factors#local-pack-finder-ranking-factors and found it somewhat useful. Most of the gurus are saying link building is the key, but I wish at least one of them would mention where do we find these links. Is there a reliable source for this ( based on personal experience only please ) ? A one stop shop for any local business to do quality links ? I feel like to be truly useful to a local business this piece of the puzzle is missing and I would truly appreciate anyone's help.
Local Listings | | OlegLevitas2 -
How Should We Handle Citations for a New Building?
One of the companies I work with has purchased a business complex they plan to move their offices into. The current tenant is fairly reputable in the community, but ran into some financial issues, hence the sale. For easy, I'll refer to this place as the Simmons Center. So, currently, the Simmons Center has a Yelp!, GMB and other pages devoted to what it offers (mostly restaurants and small shops) but the new company will be turning the location into a large corporate campus. We'd like to bring naming conventions in line with the new center title and remove (where applicable) citations for the Simmons Center. What would be our best way to go about doing this? I'm thinking our best option is to: 1) claim current listings, where applicable, 2) mark the Simmons Center as closed, 3) Create new listings for the new name at the same address, 4) Use Moz Local and Whitespark to help clean up citations where needed. Is this the best approach for this type of situation?
Local Listings | | AtlasGlobal0 -
GMB departments - what is the setup
Without duplicating i'm looking at a similar setup to this thread There is a marine business that has within it 3 distinct departments, Sales & brokerage, marina and shipyard all within the same location but with unique telephone numbers grouped into sections on the website with the unique numbers. I'm clarifying whether there are genuine distinct customer facing locations for each department. We want to create department pages because each one has unique opening hours. However looking at this I have some questions i'm unsure about. Each department has a unique landline number that routes through to the main switchboard when called, does that matter? The departments kind make the idea of a core G+ page, map page redundant because there are only 3 areas of the business and the departments handle that. So can you have just departments, or should we set up the main 'hub' page as the brand page, linking to 3 departments? Where can I find information on how to correctly set up a department so the connection/hierarchy is in place? Looking around I can't find any instructions.
Local Listings | | MickEdwards0 -
Google Places - Remove Completely vs. Permanently Closed?
This is a bit confusing to explain so bear with me please. We have a client that used to have an old law practice with a partner. The site and backlinks were very large and it had a lot of domain authority. It also had a very large citation profile and history. The two lawyers have since split, but there remains multiple Google Places listings out there for the old partnership. We have fixed the one showing the old business practice name, but not the one that he setup for his personal name. One of the biggest hassles is that the old location he setup has his attorney name in the actual listing. The issue is that we cannot close the old listing (we tried this), as it comes up permanently closed when you Google his name. If you search for his new Law Firm, the correct business listing that we have set up will show. The new listing also includes his name and has over 50 five star reviews. We hoped that the large amount of legitimate reviews would get rid of or at least suppress the old listing, but it is not happening. So I am a bit confused as to what to do. If we close the old listing Google shows the red "permanently closed" listing when you Google his name. We cannot update the old listing information to show his new address as then it will compete with the new listing that we setup that shows all the positive reviews. The old listing was not created by us, and the new one was. The new one shows when you search for his Law Firm name in Google, but not for his personal name i.e "NAME HERE ATTORNEY" or "HIS NAME and LOCATION" Interested to hear your thoughts. The only way I can think to fix this is to contact Google directly and see if there is a way to permanently delete the listing from Google maps, but I am not aware that this is possible.
Local Listings | | David-Kley0 -
4 shared locations - 1 phone number - legacy GMB - HELP!!!
I have a friend who is a dietician and has the following issue with his business He works in 4 different locations across town- Each location is shared with other practitioners. - he uses the same phone number for each location (free 0800 UK number)- he has legacy google places profiles for some locations with some reviews he'd like to keep and other locations he'd like to delete.He'd like to be present on page 1 of google for terms like dietician in "name of location he works in"I am clearly concerned about his NAP profile since he only has 1 phone number for all locations.The address of each location can clash with other practitioners working there who have already registered a GMB profile using the same addresses although there might be the possibility of using something like "suite x" to differentiate his business in the address.Can anybody advice on how they would approach this one please.Thanks
Local Listings | | coolhandluc0 -
Removing phone number from GMB = lower rankings?
Hey, all! I have a client who needs for people to see her website before they call her, or else she spends 15 min explaining what's already on the site. Her Google My Business rankings are excellent for a lot of keywords (yay!), so people are seeing the number big and bold and just picking up the phone. I called GMB support to ask if removing the phone number would affect rankings, and they said "I don't think so". If this weren't a HUGE deal to the client, I wouldn't take the chance, but she feels that she's losing business by being on these calls when legitimate prospects try to call and get voice mail. So... any experience with removing phone numbers from GMB, or any other creative solutions to the quandary? Thanks so much for reading! ~ Scott UPDATE: Well, we went ahead and tried it anyway, and our GMB listins on the 7-pack nosedived! STRONGLY recommend against this, at least with the current algorithm!! The phone number is back now. 🙂
Local Listings | | measurableROI0