Change of operator

[Charles Chalk]

Hello LSF,

I have just started working for a multi site business with 8 sports facility locations. (I'm new to local SEO)

My employer has recently taken over as the new operator of this business, so the name of our company is new but the sports facility location names remain the same.

The previous operator has many poor reviews, so I am trying to understand if we are allowed to start a fresh and create new listings for each of our locations or will this cause more issues and be seen as duplication?

Many thanks,
Charles

 

[JoyHawkins]

You should be able to get the former listings marked as permanently closed and then you can create new listings for the new brand.

 

[Charles Chalk]

You should be able to get the former listings marked as permanently closed and then you can create new listings for the new brand.

Thanks a lot for your reply Joy, I will look into this now..

 

[Tony Wang]

@JoyHawkins you can mark them closed even if the NAP is still the same? Just because the owner changed?

 

[JoyHawkins]

He said the company named changed as well, so that would likely be considered a rebrand.

 

[Tony Wang]

Ah, I must have misinterpreted because he said the "sports facility location name remains unchanged". But yes, if rebranding, then definitely close the old listing with poor reviews.

 

[Charles Chalk]

Ok so, it appears a rather unhelpful colleague has already connected the new business to 3 of the old operators listings which means we have inherited the poor/historic reviews!

Is there anything that can be done to rescind this and start a fresh listing for these 3 sites as we are a new operator?

Many thanks,
Charles

 

[JoyHawkins]

Hey Charles,

At this point, you'd need to work with the GMB support team to see if the reviews can be removed.

 

[Charles Chalk]

Hey Charles,

At this point, you'd need to work with the GMB support team to see if the reviews can be removed.

Thanks so much for you help Joy! I really appreciate it

 

[Neal Resnik]

Hey Charles,

At this point, you'd need to work with the GMB support team to see if the reviews can be removed.

Do you think it is possible to get prior restaurants reviews that the GBP inherited? There are lots of 2-5yr old reviews that were for the old restaurant.