Google confused with zipcodes and geotargets.

[hmarmo]

A client has a medical business with 3 locations. One of the locations seems to jump from position 2 to 30+ erratically (they say for around a year). It is either position 2 or position 30+ for the location+business category.

Google seems to be confused with the address too as the zipcode which was 07302 was changed a year ago to 07311 - Google still views the area encompassing this business as 07302 and attempting to find the address of the business or inserting the coordinates consistently change the zip to 07302.

We finally came to the conclusion that if we can't beat em join em and advised the client to change the zip on GMB and citations back to 07302.

However since Friday the GMB is down in the 30+ position.

The clients GMB is well optimized- constant reviews, posts, citations. Website is also pretty well optimized, local schema etc. and organic positions have been consistent and dont seem to get affected by the Local pack jumps back and forth.

Of course we tried suggesting changes to the address, contacting Google etc.. unsuccessfully. (They claim Google once told them their GMB listing had a bug and it was fixed...)

Anyone ever experienced anything like this? Any suggestions? Client is frantic as 80% of their business comes from Google local..

 

[JoyHawkins]

Is this for a geo-specific term (Ex: plumber dallas)? If so, it makes sense and there isn't really a way around it if the business is on the outskirts of the area searching. It's hard to say though without more details.

 

[hmarmo]

Hi
Thanks for replying!
Yes it is a geo-specific term. The strange thing is they were in position 2 in the local pack. They just seem to yoyo from position 2 to position 36 any tiny change they make say on their site. They are never position 3,4,5 etc. ie. they dont drop slightly in ranking and then they will update the site or even just resubmit in search console and hey presto they are position 2 again until the next drop..
They actually just got back to being position 2 since I posted a couple of hours ago!!
It is so strange!
(Would be happy to share more details but not in the public forum as its a client..)

 

[JoyHawkins]

It could be a filter issue as well. If there is another listing that shares the same website/phone or is right beside this one (next door, different suite number), that could also be causing fluctuations like this.

 

[hmarmo]

Could having too many Google reviews be a problem? They have 5 star rating.. but it real..
The client has over 500 legit reviews - most of their competitors have anywhere from 3-70 (except for one competitor has ~100 and one ~300)

 

[JoyHawkins]

Could having too many Google reviews be a problem?

Having a lot of reviews wouldn't cause a decrease in ranking.

 

[hmarmo]

Ugh down again from position 2 to 30+..
Had a thought - do u think its possible someone is doing negative seo to their GMB account? (They did mention a nearby competitor who hates them and has tried to make complaints and send letter to the council about them..)
I have heard flip flop ranking is commonly a spam indicator but cant figure out what is spammy!

Any insight/suggestions appreciated!

 

[JoyHawkins]

It's really hard to say without knowing specifics. A few options here - you could look to hire someone to do an audit if you want a second opinion. I'd be happy to make a recommendation if you want to let me know what country they are in.

Secondly, if you want to join the LocalU forum, it is a paid forum but it's protected behind a login wall so it's often what people utilize when they want opinions from people without putting their client's info out there for Google to crawl & index