How to Edit Business Listings on Google My Business
July 18, 2018
What do you see when you review your “Google My Business” page?
You hope there is accurate information, plenty of positive reviews, and a variety of reasons for customers to check out your products and/or services.
Unfortunately, this isn’t the way things always work out. For example, you could soon find that your business information is incorrect.
An important Local SEO ranking factor is having the company and phone number to the physical address and URL, everything should be 100% accurate.
If it’s not, you could be missing out on a lot of business – and that’s not a risk you should be willing to take.
It Starts with You
The information you provide Google should be accurate and current. If it’s not, you have the right to make immediate changes.
Google provides a clear set of guidelines regarding how local businesses should conduct themselves if they want to rank in local search results.
If you want to make any changes to your Google My Business page – including hours, address, contact information, and more – you can do so by taking these five steps:
- Sign in to your Google My Business account and select the listing you want to manage.
- Click the Info button located at the top of the page.
- Click the section that you want to edit.
- Provided the updated, accurate information.
- Click Done editing once you are complete.
By taking these steps, you can be 100% confident that your Google My Business page is accurate at the present time.
Reasons for this Problem
You already know that inaccurate information can work against you. What you may not know is the reasons why this happens.
As noted above, the most common reason is that you included inaccurate information when creating your Google My Business page.
You are responsible for providing accurate details, and it’s good to know that Google gives you full control of this part of your listing. This ensures that you can make changes as necessary.
Remember this: your business information can and probably will change over time.
- Did you move to a new location?
- Did you change phone numbers or website URLs?
- Did you alter your hours of operation?
If you make any change to your business, be sure to check it against your Google My Business page. You may soon realize that you need to edit your information as to provide more accurate details to your target audience.
Another reason for this problem is that you have yet to add or verify your business. Many people expect Google to do all the legwork for them, however, this isn’t the way things work.
You are required to add and verify your business, through your Google My Business page, if you want your edits to be eligible to appear on Google search.
Why Citations (like Google My Business) Are Important
Citations are defined as mentions of your business name and address on other webpages—even if there is no link to your website.
An example of a citation might be an online yellow pages directory where your business is listed, but not linked to.
Citations can also be found on local chamber of commerce pages, or on a local business association page that includes your business information, even if they are not linking at all to your website.
Final Thoughts
All in all, if your business information is incorrect on Google it comes down to one thing: the steps you have taken.
It’s easy to blame Google, noting that the company made a mistake when adding your business information. But since you have full control, you don’t need to resort to this. Instead, you should put your time and energy into making changes for the better.
Through your Google My Business page, the world is at your fingertips. You can review your listing, make changes, and have them appear immediately. But remember, nobody is going to do this for you.
Google has come a long way over the years, especially when it comes to providing small businesses with top-notch tools to control their own destiny.
Be sure to use every tool that is available to you, as this will go a long way in helping Google serve accurate information in regards to your business.
15 responses to “How to Edit Business Listings on Google My Business”
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dear Google you are currently showing info for A Better Lawn Service
tellmewhereis.com/business/1179/a-better-lawn-service. The phone number shown is no longer for that business. I don’t know if the business is no longer running, but the number is now a private one, namely mine. I would appreciate it if you would rectify the information with the business concerned or take down the information they have supplied as I am tired of people who want their lawns mowed ringing me.
Hey Janelle, Sorry to hear about the misfortunate incident with receiving phone calls. While I am not a Google representative, below is a link on how to fix the problem. If you have further questions feel free to post them. Thanks, Charlie
Steps to report an error on Google maps: https://support.google.com/maps/answer/3094088
I having issue with my website address on google .. my address is Ontario .. Quebec
On google search my website show Tampa Florida
Hello Charlie,
Once I make the change in our site (for a wrong phone number), do you know long it takes for the Google crawl to index the change/new content and display the correct info?
Thank you.
If you fetch it through Google Search Console it speeds it up. But just naturally maybe a 7 to 10 days +/-. It depends on the popularity of your site and the authority. Hope this helps! ~ Charlie
I have not moved or done anything to my address….unfortunately, i share the same postcode with another , not so nice area which is in fact a long way away from where i am based. I have tried many times to edit the information and the area name, it keeps saying “pending” so not actually changing it at all unless i look into my account . The whole point is i dont want people googling my business to think its in the other , not so nice area….its not good for business considering my clientelle! ….im sure its losing me business. Also, I would like that it doesnt show my house on google, as i work from home…..i have emailed them about them many times as a pricacy matter, with no response. I fear there is no hope
Have you tried contacting Google? Sometimes a conversation on the phone can fix a lot of issues. Though its a bit of a challenge to get in contact with them. ~ Charlie
I had a similar situation with Google My Business. Our website appeared in this as a local business ( which we aren’t) ,under a completely wrong category,( medical,not sport) with ‘ Office hours'( not relevant ) and to add insult to injury, with a photo of a house in the vicinity which thankfully wasn’t ours ( invasion of privacy,inclusion of unlisted number which was ours and grotty house ).
I emailed Google many times asking to remove our site from local business listing, got a ‘being reviewed’ reply and then months later after having given up, found that this listing has disappeared! But I have no idea how we appeared in Google My Business to start with,as I believe it is for local businesses and we certainly wouldn’t have requested it as it would be completely misleading.
Hey Moria, A lot of information is pipped and gathered form around the web. Its possible they built it on their own and launched it with stitched information. Glad you could get it removed from search indexes. ~ Charlie
I have a google verified business that is showing the wrong name. I have signed in and corrected the name many times but it continues to show the incorrect name. The really strange thing is if an edit is suggested, it displays the correct name in the input field. Any ideas how to fix this?
How long have you been waiting? It can take a few days and sometimes over a week to show up in Google the correct way.
Greetings!
I have a question, regarding to changing the verryfied name of google business. Will changin the name of my restaurant on google maps effect on my reviews? There are hundreads of reviews written during the last few years, so I am a little bit concerned about this.
Thank you!
No it won’t effect your reviews. Have you claimed your profile on Google My Business? Once you do that it’s easier to change your name and change the other information as well.
I have an Amusement Park (A Maze’N Things Theme Park) which is located next door to a accomodation business and we share part of the same name, (A Maze’N Things Holiday Park) but different addresses, phones and contact details. Both businesses have been verified by Google my Business, but Google continues to incorrectly show my business as a Motel, even though I have been correcting the details for 12 months, have spoken via phone 4 times to Google who admit to a technical problem that they “are working on” (for the last 3 months) and have emailed them more than 20 times. It causes customer confusion, wasted time on wrong phone calls, incorrect google reviews and is generally bad for business. However, Google is so big, the staff you talk to don’t really care. They just keep on saying “we are working on it” without ever saying what they are doing or even if the problem is repairable.
Without really analyzing your situation its hard to give specific advice. But it seems other, similar mousey establishments, suffer a similar thing with Google My Business.
When I Googled your name, it looks like they have merged the two establishments together. Well thats my assumption based on the Booking option.
There are a couple of things you could do to improve this situation. But its more to do with functional elements vs. quick edits with Google My Business profile.