Beware of this potential problem

[Michael S. Doran]

I recently setup a customers Google listing for their new business and encountered a problem I think is worth sharing. After laying a foundation of citations and creating a website, I verified the Google listing and it went live. Shortly after that the listing was suspended and after contacting Google I found out that the reason was because I had posted on their website that they would be having a Grand Opening party in a few weeks.

Google assumed that the business was not actually open to the public, but in fact they are and have been for weeks. After submitting photo proof, the listing is being restored, but the impression that they wouldn't be open until mid March ended up costing them a week or two of having the listing suspended.

It is common in my experience for businesses to have a Grand Opening weeks after actually being open, but be careful about promoting a Grand Opening and make it clear that the business is actually already open.

Hope that helps someone else avoid the same issue.

 

[Colan Nielsen]

Interesting. Great tip!

Sent from my XT1058 using Tapatalk

 

[Chris McCreery]

Thanks for sharing Michael. That's very good to know.

 

[Linda Buquet]

Thanks Michael!

Yes it's true businesses that are not yet open to the public are not allowed to have a Place page.

However what I'm surprised about is that someone even checked and went to the site. The fact we can't even get them to look at and remove blatant spam we've reported multiple times, yet they are checking new listings this carefully is surprising to me. But it's good if it cuts down on fake listings.

But yes, good word of warning because sometimes company do have grand openings after the fact. BUT you would think they know that and would call to see if the business is open or not???

 

[Chris McCreery]

Just curious if Google actually told you the issue was they thought you weren't open and that was the reason for suspension.

There is also policy for G+ that states:

Contests and Promotions
Do not run contests, sweepstakes, or other such promotions directly on Google+, except by pre-approved means. For additional details about this policy, visit the Contests and Promotions Policy page.

Wondering if perhaps they viewed your "Grand Opening Party" as a promotion of some sort.

 

[Michael S. Doran]

Just curious if Google actually told you the issue was they thought you weren't open and that was the reason for suspension.

There is also policy for G+ that states:

Contests and Promotions
Do not run contests, sweepstakes, or other such promotions directly on Google+, except by pre-approved means. For additional details about this policy, visit the Contests and Promotions Policy page.

Wondering if perhaps they viewed your "Grand Opening Party" as a promotion of some sort.

There was no promotion on the Google+ page, only on the blog of the website.

One other factor that might have brought attention is that one of the practitioners created a false listing using her old business name and the new business phone number, which resulted in two listings with 2 business names using the same phone number. The listing I created was the correct listing and the practitioner corrected her listing. This might be what started the problem, but Google definitely told me that problem was the opening date.