Google Posts and Practitioner Listings

[wehrlse1]

Hello! I have 2 questions about Google Business Profile:

1) Google posts: recently one of my team members noticed on search, some Google posts are shown before others and not in chronological order. However, when you click into "view all", they are listed in chronological order. I noticed that the ones being shown on search appeared to have a higher level of engagement than some of the others. Do you think that the engagement factor is how Google is choosing to post over chronological order?

2) Practitioner listings: many of our clients are dentists, so many of them have a practitioner listing. Our team never claimed practitioner listings due to bandwidth, but we are planning to begin claiming and optimizing practitioner listings with the practice listing since we are growing! Per Google Guidelines, our team believes that multi-practitioner practices are the only ones allowed to have practitioner listings. Single practitioner practices should follow Google Guidelines naming with their name in the practice listing itself. I wanted to verify this was correct? We have a few people concerned that all practitioners, regardless of being single or multiple, should be allowed to have their own listing. I always like to follow the rules, but I wasn't sure if things had changed recently? Or if you would still recommend creating a listing for single practitioners?

Thank you!

 

[Colan Nielsen]

1) Google posts: recently one of my team members noticed on search, some Google posts are shown before others and not in chronological order. However, when you click into "view all", they are listed in chronological order. I noticed that the ones being shown on search appeared to have a higher level of engagement than some of the others. Do you think that the engagement factor is how Google is choosing to post over chronological order?

It's likely related to the query that they are appearing for. The post that shows, and the justifications from posts that get pulled into the 3-pack are heavily dependent on the query searched. The type of post can have an impact on visibility too.

Per Google Guidelines, our team believes that multi-practitioner practices are the only ones allowed to have practitioner listings. Single practitioner practices should follow Google Guidelines naming with their name in the practice listing itself. I wanted to verify this was correct? We have a few people concerned that all practitioners, regardless of being single or multiple, should be allowed to have their own listing. I always like to follow the rules, but I wasn't sure if things had changed recently? Or if you would still recommend creating a listing for single practitioners?

We wrote an article about that here - How Does Google My Business Handle Solo Practitioner Listings?

 

[wehrlse1]

Oh awesome! Have you ever had issues with profiles being suspended? Or what do you do if a dentist only has one category?

 

[Colan Nielsen]

I've never run into a practitioner profile being suspended. And I've actually never run into a scenario where only one category was applicable. Just due to their being so many options. You can see what I mean here 99 Problems: Local SEO for Dentists Ain't One - Sterling Sky Inc

 

[wehrlse1]

Oh awesome! Thank you so much. I think our team is going to make this a project of ours! I appreciate your help and insight.

 

[Colan Nielsen]

You're welcome!

 

[CoRichardson]

Hi Colan,

Thank you so much for your insight here! Sara and I work together and she recently shared this thread with me.

What are your thoughts on a single practitioner practice with the same name as their office, for example: John Doe, DDS.

Practice listing: John Doe, DDS (dental clinic as primary category)
Practitioner listing: John Doe, DDS (dentist as primary category)

Would creating a practitioner listing with the same name be a problem?

 

[Colan Nielsen]

I would not do that. There's a very good chance that they would just filter each other or get flagged as a duplicate

 

[CoRichardson]

Ok, great! Thank you again.