Google changed my "primary category" on GMB

[MarvinF]

Hi everyone,
I hope you are well,

I am currently managing a pharmacy store. Redcliffe Discount Drug Store
Here’s my challenge: Improve the visibility of this pharmacy for chemist/pharmacy queries without on-site optimisation.

I tried to focus on GMB:

• Ensure the information is up-to-date. (On GMB)
• Add a description with important keywords. (On GMB)
• Add health services into GMB with the service feature
• Added 15 new Photos (with Geo-targeting)
• Added post

Next step is to respond to all the reviews.
I started GMB optimisation on the 19/09/2019. Does my GMB optimisation Improve Rankings? NAH
On average, I lost 2 - 3 local rankings.

E.g: Lat & Long (-27.2292,153.11532) for “Chemist” query
Chemist
I used to be in position 2 and now in position 4.

What changed?

• I used to have “chemist” as primary category on my GMB dashboard and the category display to users was “chemist”
• Now, I still have “chemist” as primary category on my GMB dashboard and the category display to users is “Drug Store”. I lost rankings since that.

My thinking was:

• It looks like Drug store, chemist, pharmacy are the same for Google. The problem is that all my competitors kept Chemist as primary category.
• “drug store” is mentioned into the brand name. (Doesn’t help)
• I added more content into GMB (description & services). The brand name was repeated a lot of times… After seeing that, I modified the content and tried to change the brand name with pharmacy store, chemist….

The Category is still “DRUG STORE”. Is there a way to change it back?
Guys, I would appreciate hearing your thoughts because I am stuck and I know that some of you are great local expert.
If you need extra information please let me know!
And thanks for your help
Marvin

 

[Colan Nielsen]

Hey Marvin,

I just wanted to confirm, is "Chemist" still the primary GMB category inside your GMB dashboard?

 

[MarvinF]

Hi Colan,
Thanks for your reply.
Yes I confirm that "Chemist" is still the primary GMB category inside my GMB dashboard. I didn’t add any additional categories yet.
Cheers,