Business name change - Impact on reviews?

[Durandl]

Hi

I have a client who has created multiple GMB listings for his business using the same address, post code and phone number and I am trying to sort it all out.

2 of the listings have 1 review and 1 of them has 13 reviews.

Obviously i want to keep the listing that has 13 reviews and delete the other 2. Keeping the listing with 13 reviews means I will have to update the business name in Google my business because it was originally entered wrongly.

Will the profile need to be verified again? Will my client be able to keep those reviews or will they be deleted?

Thanks

 

[James Watt]

Google's pretty clear about when you can keep your reviews during a rebrand:

Name changes that don't reflect core changes to the business's services aren't eligible for review removal. For example, if Dasha’s Dry Cleaner becomes Dasha’s Super Dry Cleaner, or JFK Limo Service becomes Super JFK Limo, reviews will remain in place.

You will more than likely not be looking at a re-verification from changing the name. That said, you can get Google support on Twitter to transfer all the reviews from all the duplicates to your 'real' business listing as part of your process for consolidating. The 13 review listing isn't the defacto real one just because it has the reviews. Get all the reviews onto your main listing, then merge what you can and delete what you can't until you only have one listing left. Joy has a good go-to of what to do when merging listings.

 

[Durandl]

super helpful, thanks james.