My Competitor's GMB Address Is a Starbucks

[Steve234]

Hi all - new to this game. I apologize if this has been asked before.

I am trying to get my law firm to rank higher in GMB. A competitor has an office in another state but has set up a GMB listing in my city and is ranking very well. Thing is, the address is a Starbucks on Main Street. I know this is a no-no for Google. Is there a way to report it?

 

[Tim Colling]

...Thing is, the address is a Starbucks on Main Street. I know this is a no-no for Google. Is there a way to report it?

You can just suggest an edit right on the maps listing or the knowledge panel, and then choose "Remove this place", and then choose "spam, fake or offensive" as the reason. That should work, most of the time.

 

[Steve234]

Thanks Tim

 

[JoyHawkins]

Steve,

If it helps, here is a guide on removing spam that I wrote.

 

[Phil Rozek]

@Steve234, is Starbucks the only occupant of that building? Some office buildings have a public Starbucks (or similar joint) in the lobby area.

(Of course, I'm not sure whether your client's competitor is located in a big city.)

 

[Steve234]

Thanks Joy - and thanks for all your great information and help. Your advice says to mark it as a closed listing and then select “Spam”, I'm tempted to change the name settings to Starbucks though!

Thanks Phil - it's a medium size city - not small. And it is without question a stand alone Starbucks. The funny thing is, the picture of the outside of the Starbuck is on his GMB listing. He (and Starbucks) comes up when you search for that address and he has the Starbucks address with his real (other state) address on his website. We are a city close to a state line so I'm sure many businesses are using this type of tactic.

 

[JoyHawkins]

Lol I definitely would not change the name to Starbucks. The edit will likely get denied and would hurt your account's credibility. I'm assuming it could also do some harm to Starbucks since they would want their real listing to be the one to rank for their brand.

 

[Phil Rozek]

@Steve234, in that case, you may want to try reporting the competitor's listing as a duplicate. Google probably will show the Starbucks in its list of matches (see Is anyone else noticing a change to the "Suggest an Edit"? | Local Search Forum).

I've found Google is more likely to act on reports of duplicates than on reports of "spam, fake, or offensive."

 

[JoyHawkins]

@Phil Rozek - when you say report as a duplicate are you referring to the "duplicate" option on Maps? I've found reporting duplicates that way to be like a black hole but am super interested to hear you've had a different experience.

 

[Phil Rozek]

@JoyHawkins, yes, I'm referring to the "duplicate" option on Maps. It doesn't work as consistently as I'd like it to, of course, but I've had enough reports approved that I wouldn't say it's a black hole.

 

[Steve234]

Update - reported them to Google as spam and ... she gone!!