Locations With Two Websites

[Lanerizz]

Hi, I'm sure this has been asked before so please direct me to that thread if you know of it.

Company has 8 locations that provide oil and propane services. They have an Oil website, and a Propane website.

1. It's two brands but the same company, so I cannot create two listings per address, correct?
2. How do you choose which one to use in a Google My Business listing? Which site needs the love more?

If you need the URLs I can provide. Any tips appreciated.

 

[Cherie Dickey]

Hey @Lanerizz,

If they are both the same business, then you're correct that there can only be one listing.

Are both websites optimized for just that service? Is there one that more accurately represents the business overall? Is there one that is older, and better established online? Does one have a better user experience? Which one ranks higher when you do a search for the business by name? I'd take all of those factors into consideration when choosing the site to use.

Personally, I wouldn't advocate for separate websites for two brands that are so similar in general though. It's diluting the SEO to a point. For example, any backlinks you earn could go to either one of the sites, instead of all going to one. They are both heating fuel, so fall under the same category basically. I'd put my efforts into building one strong website for a fuel company with internal pages that highlight the different services as well as locations.

But for now, I'd go with the stronger of the two that best represents the business as a whole.

 

[Lanerizz]

Here are the two sites:

https://mccrawpropane.com/

McCraw Oil & Propane | Serving Texas and Oklahoma

McCraw Oil and Propane – Delivering comfort, convenience, service and safety since 1992 for both residential and commercial needs.

mccrawoil.com

Propane is brand new and needs the most help. They are updating the Oil website next. I was brought in after the decision was made to run separate websites.

So they're separate "Brands" but the locations offer both services. Their trucks say McCraw Oil Company or McCraw Propane. However I'm not sure if that makes them different enough.

Does this change anything?

 

[Yan Gilbert]

Different phone numbers or business hours for those services? Might be able to push it to qualify as different departments if some changes are made.

Guidelines for representing your business on Google - Google Business Profile Help

If your business either has a physical location that customers can visit, or travels to customers where they are, you can create a Business Profile on Google. To make sure your Business Profile won’t

support.google.com

Publicly-facing departments that operate as distinct entities should have their own page. The exact name of each department must be different from that of the main business and that of other departments. Typically such departments have a separate customer entrance and should each have distinct categories. Their hours may sometimes differ from those of the main business.

• Acceptable (as distinct listings):
  • "Walmart Vision Center"
  • "Sears Auto Center"
  • "Massachusetts General Hospital Department of Dermatology"
• Not acceptable (as distinct listings):
  • The Apple products section of Best Buy
  • The hot food bar inside Whole Foods Market

For each department, the category that is the most representative of that department must be different from that of the main business and that of other departments.

• The main business "Wells Fargo" has the category "Bank" whereas the department "Wells Fargo Advisors" has the category "Financial Consultant"
• The main business "South Bay Toyota" has the category "Toyota Dealer" whereas the "South Bay Toyota Service & Parts" has the category "Auto Repair Shop" (plus the category "Auto Parts Store")
• The main business "GetGo" has the category "Convenience Store" (plus the category "Sandwich Shop") whereas the department "GetGo Fuel" has the category "Gas Station", and the department "WetGo" has the category "Car Wash"

 

[Lanerizz]

Thank you Yan! I will do some checks on this as a potential option.

 

[pony]

Does your client have a viable reason for splitting their business across two domains? That would worry me long term.

Any links built to the new site are not going to help the oil site/business. If they combine their branding into a single domain they would most likely have better long term results imo!

 

[RICKDO]

One of my competition operate from a big house, one address and had for long time been using 3 diferentes names for the same Transportation business and vehicles. They have been reported, they are on top listing on Yelp and Google map.
So for a legit business like the one mentioned here, shouldn’t be ok?

I been checking on them to see if GMB does something but not action taken yet.
The problem with this is that other companies are watching them and might used the same tactics thinking that might be ok.