Bought Out Competitor - Now 2 Locations Same Biz Name

[Heidi Powell]

Help! First time posting. I searched for the same scenario/question first and came up empty. This can't be the first time this has happened but I didn't find any reference....hope I didn't blow it and hope someone can help.

My client bought out a competitor. Both businesses have their own GMB listing. Both businesses sell the same product (consignment clothing). Each have own website. New purchased business's name will be changing to the same name as new owner's other business and act as a second location across town.

I will forward the purchased business's website url to the 1st locations website, listing both locations (with announcement of name change) and do 301 redirects on pages.

I'm hung up on how to merge the GMB pages together (what I've read says you can't merge pages) or do I keep them both and change the name on the newly acquired business? Logic tells me that will mix Google up having two pages with the same business name but marking the business as closed will have an effect on existing customers that are used to shopping there and/or referrals.....or do I add the location of each business on both pages, change the name of the one and wait for Google to merge them?

Thanks!

 

[Tim Colling]

Don't try to merge the two GMB listings. It's completely legitimate to have one GMB for each genuine location. Having both GMB listings and optimizing both of them to the maximum possible degree will help you rank in local results for two locations, not just one. That's good, right?

For what it's worth, you could use utm tags to keep track of how many visits each GMB listing is sending to your website. With just two locations, you probably should have both of them list the website's home page as their "URL", and just add appropriate utm tracking codes to them.

Will they each have their own phone number?

Post photos for both GMB locations, with at least some of the photos showing the exterior of each location with the business's signage on them. Shoot video for each location too and upload it. Cell phone video can be just fine for this, if you do it carefully.

Also, you should try to get online reviews (preferably Google but others after that are good too) for both GMB locations.

This is a good thing, having two GMB locations for your client.

 

[Heidi Powell]

Thank you Tim!

Each of these business has close to 30 Google Reviews at this time. That was one of my head scratching moments for the location who's name is changing. A few of the reviews mention the biz name. A little confusing to read after the name changes. It was a double perplex to me....don't want to lose the existing reviews but I didn't think you could have two pages with the same name. I'm very relieved to hear you say that it's legit!

Thinking about the tracking code idea...but the GMB insights already show how many visitors go to a website via the listing. Need to think about that after some sleep.

Thank you again!

 

[Linda Buquet]

Hey Heidi, thanks for a great 1st post topic!

And thanks Tim for your help as well!

Just to be sure we're clear. What you ended up with is 2 pages for 2 different locations, correct? Your existing listing/location and the newly acquired store will be location #2, but currently has the previous store's name on listing?

"or do I keep them both and change the name on the newly acquired business?"

If I understand the scenario correctly, yes, that's the best way to do it.

"Logic tells me that will mix Google up having two pages with the same business name but marking the business as closed will have an effect on existing customers that are used to shopping there and/or referrals"

Yes, as Tim said, each location should have their own page, so just change name/phone on the other one.

Another reason to try to avoid closing the old location, is having a closed listing at an address often hurts ranking on the new listing.