google places GONE - HELP

[mikey9991]

Ive been on page one #2 on googlr places for so long now. Today, gone. Cant find it on google places at all. The red dot doesn't even show. The only thing that makes me think that it was taken off is because of the reviews ive put up using the local review software i bought.

Any suggestions is welcome.

Mike

 

[mikey9991]

This sucks since I don't even show up typing my business name on G places.

I copied and pasted my G place address and it's blanks.

Any ideas?

 

[NOKENNY]

site:yourdomain.com if no results , u r fucked up

 

[mikey9991]

My www.mydomain.com is still up and strong but only my google places is F up.

Any ideas why?

Things that I have done in the last three weeks.
1. Put up reviews using local business listing robot x 3 reviews (one per week)

2. Changed the phone number on my www.mydomain.com

3. Tried changing my phone on the G places but that need verification and couldn't since I did not live there anymore. I don't want to change the address since I'm not in the downtown area anymore.

Any suggestion?

Thanks,
Mike

 

[TehEpidemick]

if your number 2...why use the software?

 

[xhanuman]

Definitely the phone number. I have one business and site... still listed in GPlaces fine no prob. 2nd biz, did the postcard dance with them successfully (was listed fine for a long while)... account in limbo for like 6 months even after successful postcard pin.

A tele-seo-marketer called me the other day and I was picking his brain (while he was trying to get me to bite) and he asked if I had used the same number on both businesses... I said, well, yah. He said that was likely the main problem with my second biz not getting back into the Places listings... so jockeying around with telephone numbers for business isn't good for business usually and clearly GP thinks so too.

Plus, looks like your biz is doing great - getting loads of reviews, yet your telephone number is changing - might be a flag of sorts for them... maybe taper down on the reviews... might take some time to get it all smoothed out.

 

[mikey9991]

if your number 2...why use the software?

The business is a photography biz that doesn't get much biz since there are about 1 photographer per 100 people in my city. That doesn't include the non-listed photographers on Craigslist. I actually kinda stopped doing it but will do it for the right price.

Definitely the phone number. I have one business and site... still listed in GPlaces fine no prob. 2nd biz, did the postcard dance with them successfully (was listed fine for a long while)... account in limbo for like 6 months even after successful postcard pin.

A tele-seo-marketer called me the other day and I was picking his brain (while he was trying to get me to bite) and he asked if I had used the same number on both businesses... I said, well, yah. He said that was likely the main problem with my second biz not getting back into the Places listings... so jockeying around with telephone numbers for business isn't good for business usually and clearly GP thinks so too.

Plus, looks like your biz is doing great - getting loads of reviews, yet your telephone number is changing - might be a flag of sorts for them... maybe taper down on the reviews... might take some time to get it all smoothed out.

The problem is it's no longer listed at all (even searching for my biz name) Do you guys think its F up forever? Should I change the number on my website to the same as it was? Will that make a difference? Or should I start my google place again. This time, making other citation sites first before registering on Gplaces to get it listed sooner?

Does anybody think it's the local business listing robot? I have to ask since I'm offering this service to my offline client (just started).

THanks,
Mike

 

[boom1]

if you changed the contact phone number that is very likely the cause why it is nowhere to be found on g places

 

[mikey9991]

Can I get it back if I change the number? If I do, how long will it take?

 

[Sacrilege]

Definitely the phone number. I've had this problem with some clients before. You'll need to start over or possibly re-verify the listing.

 

[mikey9991]

Definitely the phone number. I've had this problem with some clients before. You'll need to start over or possibly re-verify the listing.

That's F up. Since the biz name doesn't even show up when searching for it, Re-verifying is impossible. It looks like I have to start over.

I will change the phone number in my main website that was associated with the G place to the same phone as before and see if it will come back.

 

[iiaok]

Does anybody think it's the local business listing robot? I have to ask since I'm offering this service to my offline client (just started).

Botting anything with Google runs its risks. If you're doing it for your own sites, it's your own thing on the line. I would never run the risk of blacklisting someone else's domain, though. Not worth the risk, especially with how many white-hat methods there are to get reviews.

 

[SEOWhizz]

Things that I have done in the last three weeks.
1. Put up reviews using local business listing robot x 3 reviews (one per week)

2. Changed the phone number on my www.mydomain.com

3. Tried changing my phone on the G places but that need verification and couldn't since I did not live there anymore. I don't want to change the address since I'm not in the downtown area anymore.

Mike,

It's very likely to be number #2. It's critical that your NAP (i.e. business name, address and phone number) on your Google Places listing EXACTLY matches the NAP on citation sites. Effectively you're letting G00gle know about your business by getting citations with consitent NAP information. If you change the phone number, then you risk losing your Google Places ranking as the NAP is now inconsistent.
(Building citations is similar to building backlinks; changing your NAP is like changing your anchor text; which in turn will likely effect your rankings).

Solution:

1. Make sure that there aren't other businesses online using your (original) business phone number. To get the full benefit of Google Places, your business's phone number must be used exlusively for your listing. To check, do a search for the phone number, e.g. "026 238 5392575"

2. Change your phone number back to the original number (you seem to already taken these steps).

3. Build more citations using exactly the same NAP:

http://ebrianrose.com/list-of-google-places-local-citation-sites/

4. Look at your competitors to see which citations they use. See this great Citation Analysis method:

http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackhat-seo/white-hat-seo/393553-method-local-search-engine-optimization-7-pack-citation-analysis.html

Best of luck.

 

[slowlyslowly]

When you log in to Places, does it ask you to verify?

Consistent NAP is one of the most critical parts of Google Places ranking algo. I've seen all sorts of problems where the NAP varies, from listings disappearing to Google creating duplicating listings.

Can you confirm that no dupes have been created by Google? If you leave this one a little while you are likely to find that Google creates another Places page with the old number based on the strength of finding existing citations to the business with that number (assuming you have a few decent citations out there).

Changing the phone number back will probably still take a few weeks to fix things.

If you are unable to change the number back, I would suggest getting all your citations updated to the new number ASAP to minimise problems down the line.

One other thing... you mention some reviews software... if you have created a large number of reviews in a short space of time (particularly if you had none before), you will tend to find some of them disappear!

Don't get them from the same IP, or same pc using proxies (unless cookies cleared). If customers want to leave a review, let them leave you a review from home (email them instructions of how to), don't get them to leave reviews from your work pc - else Google will wrongly think you are spamming them

 

[mikey9991]

When you log in to Places, does it ask you to verify?

Consistent NAP is one of the most critical parts of Google Places ranking algo. I've seen all sorts of problems where the NAP varies, from listings disappearing to Google creating duplicating listings.

Can you confirm that no dupes have been created by Google? If you leave this one a little while you are likely to find that Google creates another Places page with the old number based on the strength of finding existing citations to the business with that number (assuming you have a few decent citations out there).

Changing the phone number back will probably still take a few weeks to fix things.

Thanks

It seems that everybody else here is in agreement that it's the phone number thing that is the problem. I feel better now and know not to mess with that anymore in the future.

When I log in, there is no more listing. ZERO, Kaput, Nothing. Google totally deleted it. No duplicate listings.


I think that I will just let google create another one and create more citation sites instead with the new number since I'm no longer in the hurry to.

Thanks SEOWhIzz for the list/link. I can add that to my other list.

Mike