Best approach for closing bricks & mortar when ecommerce is still live?

[merlin_1234]

Hi all,

I have a client who has recently had to close their physical store and move all of their business online. We've marked the GMB as permanently closed but the client isn't happy with this messaging appearing in the knowledge panel in the big, red, in-your-face way it does.

Does anybody have any bright ideas on how to get around this issue? The only idea I've tabled so far is perhaps updating the physical address to their office changing the business name to make it clear it's an office, and then reopening it to remove the messaging. Ideally, we would just make the listing disappear altogether but I'm aware that's not feasible.

All creative ideas are welcome....

Thanks in advance!

 

[Colan Nielsen]

I double checked with @krystaltaing and she said that the rule of thumb for now is that if they had a legitimate physical presence in the past, that they can now turn to a SAB and use the new online appointment attributes.

 

[merlin_1234]

Thanks @Colan Nielsen !

I probably should have been clearer and noted that it's a retailer that's moved to purely ecommerce - so they won't be offering any appointments, and they'll be shipping worldwide. Is changing the listing to SAB still the best approach?

 

[Colan Nielsen]

If the business never plans to go back to meeting customers in person then they might need to stop using Google my business.

@krystaltaing What do you typically suggest in a situation where the business is now purely e-commerce with no in person contact and no plans to go back to that model?

 

[merlin_1234]

100% agree - I guess what I'm trying to figure out is if there's a way to 'soften the blow' of closing down the GMB.

At the moment the big bold 'Permanatly Closed' messaging when anyone performs a brand search isn't sitting well with my client. If we could silently remove the listing altogether, that would be best. As we can't, I'm willing to consider temporary alternatives (e.g. keeping the listing up in some capacity - at least for the time being)

 

[krystaltaing]

Yes even with no plans to go back to in-person, Google is allowing them to continue operating their profile as a SAB. I can bring this topic up again to the team to discuss long term strategies such as an easy process to remove listings or an alternative they may have in mind.