Business Sold, New Owner hasn't updated GMB

[Conor Treacy]

Hey Guys,

I have a buddy (and non-client) who owned a carpet cleaning business for a number of years. They've now sold it as of last year.

The new owner that took over the company has succeeded in driving the business into the ground, losing staff and dropping customers by the truck load. How they plan to stay in business is beyond me. Heck, they no longer answer the phone for their clients, and they have now failed to pay their web hosting company and no longer have a website! Crazy way to do business!

Anyway, the issue with the former owner is that they transferred the GMB info to the new owner, who was going to update the address etc, but hasn't and refuses to do anything. As a result, the old owners home address, picture of his house etc still shows on Google Maps when you do a search.

Today, he received a visit at his house from an old customer to see what's happening as phone calls and emails etc weren't being responded to (they came to his house since it was listed in Google). The customer ended up being cool about things, but he's dredding a disgruntled client showing up one night now.

Submitting a "Suggested Edit" that the place has moved doens't have any effect (this was done a few weeks ago from what I understand).

What are the next steps that he can do, or we can assist with? Is there any method to notify Google that the business was sold and the new owner never updated the mailing address/street address for the business?

Any thoughts?

 

[BenFisher]

This resolution of this could be complex since the new owners business. Have you reached out to Google My Business Twitter support? @GoogleMyBiz

 

[Conor Treacy]

Thanks Ben,

I hadn't gone that route - the forum here was my first public outreach. I'll drop a note to that account.

Thanks,

 

[JoshuaMackens]

I would suggest a Mapmaker edit but Mapmaker is gone as of today.

Joy would probably be the best one to assist you on this.

 

[Conor Treacy]

I've been in contact with GMB via Twitter, they reviewed things and then linked me to a contact form to submit further details in hopes of a solution.

I'll update here when I have answers/solution.

 

[JoyHawkins]

If you haven't got anywhere yet, go ahead and list the link to the business and I'll see if I can find a pending edit for it that you submitted and approve it.

 

[Conor Treacy]

Hey Joy, thanks for the offer.

I submitted the form etc, but the big issue is that there's no GMB showing any more, just the house in the maps.

https://www.google.com/search?q=carpet+techs&rlz=1C1CHWA_enUS529US529&oq=carpet+techs

It does have a flag on it saying that my edit is being reviewed (same with the old owner), but no GMB showing any more - which I guess is good

 

[JoyHawkins]

That link doesn't send me to a local listing. Do you have the URL for the listing on Maps?

 

[Conor Treacy]

Just an update for everyone here. I received an email from Google My Business team this morning.

They have completely removed the Knowledge/Business Info tab on the search display. So it looks like this one can be put to bed.

Thanks again for suggestions in resolving this, and Joy for offering to move this along too.