How to reinstate your Google Business Profile

Essential Business Documents Google Requires to Restore Your Business Profile

by Google Business ProfileLocal ListingsLocal SEO

Facing challenges in reinstating the Google Business Profile, despite adhering to all guidelines? Chances are the documents you sent to Google to verify your business are not sufficient enough to prove legitimacy.

Essential Documents for Registered LLCs to Submit to Google

While Google suggests submitting a utility bill for reinstatement, it often isn’t adequate on its own. To expedite the reinstatement process, provide Google with the following essential documents:

  • Articles of Incorporation
  • EIN documents
  • Assumed Name document or a Doing Business As (DBA) document

It’s worth noting that many businesses use a separate mailing address from their physical location. It’s crucial to ensure that the business name on your Google Business Profile aligns with the name on your Articles of Incorporation. If there’s a discrepancy, you’ll need to present your DBA document to Google.

  1. Articles of Incorporation or Organization: These documents often require listing the physical address of the registered office or place of business.
  2. Business Licenses and Permits: These often require the address where the business operations are conducted.
  3. Commercial Lease Agreements: If your business rents its space, the lease agreement will show the physical address of the rented property.
  4. Assumed Name Document/DBA: If a business operates under a trade name, the DBA filing often requires the physical address of the business.
  5. Utility Bills: If the utilities are in the business name, these would show the physical location of the business.
  6. EIN Confirmation Letter: This document doesn’t necessarily list the physical address of your business, it might contain the address where the IRS should send correspondence which could be the physical address.

The documents listed above are what Google is looking for when verifying or reinstating your Google Business Profile. Offering comprehensive information can expedite your reinstatement process. Keep in mind, Google’s primary aim is to confirm your business name and physical address. Therefore, make sure to submit documents that clearly highlight your business’s name and physical address.

How do I upload more then two documents to Google?

When applying for reinstatement with Google, you’re initially limited to uploading just two documents. However, post-submission, you should receive an email containing a case ID. Use this email to respond and send additional documents to further verify your business. While the response may seem generic, always assume that Google will review the supplementary documents you provide.

In your correspondence with Google, it’s best to steer clear of showing frustration or desperation about the reinstatement. Such sentiments won’t aid your cause. The suspension team’s primary focus is to determine that you’re a legitimate business, authorized to operate in your country.

Essential Documents for Sole Proprietors to Submit to Google

Sole proprietorships are abundant on Google Maps. These types of businesses are popular among handymen, appliance repair technicians, cleaning services, consultants, tutors, home-based ventures, and more. If you operate a sole proprietorship from your home, it’s essential to hide your address to stay compliant. For more details, refer to the Guidelines for Guidelines to Maintaining a Service-Area Business.

To assist Google’s suspension team in verifying your business, provide the following documents:

  • Local Business License or Permit: While many jurisdictions don’t require sole proprietorships to register at the state level, obtaining local business licenses or permits might be necessary based on the business type and local rules.
  • Utility Bill
  • Cell Phone Bill
  • Better Business Bureau Profile: Secure your complimentary BBB Business Profile

It’s crucial to emphasize that if your documents don’t confirm your business address and align with your business name on your Google Profile there’s a risk that Google won’t reinstate your business listing.

What If I Don’t Have an Address Listed on My Google Business Profile?

Hide your Address on your GBP

All Google Business Profiles mandate the input of an address. After entering it, you’re given the choice to conceal this address. It’s essential that the address in your profile aligns with the one in your documents. If you’re unsure about the address you’ve used, just navigate to the address field and select ‘edit’. From there, you can input the address again and then switch off the ‘show business address to customers’ option. Your profile’s map will display your service area, not the stored address.

Service Area

If you require assistance with reinstatement, don’t hesitate to contact us.

Is Local Listings Management necessary for today’s marketing efforts?

by Local Listings

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Local Listing Management

Many businesses are often wondering if  local listing management otherwise known as citation management is still relevant for their marketing budgets.  Do citations still matter and should a business be paying for ongoing local management services?  The million-dollar question this article is meant to help you think through.

The most commonly known citations are Google, Facebook, Yelp, Apple maps, Yahoo and Bing.  It’s the responsibility of a business to ensure accurate data across all listings.  Name, address, phone, hours and URLs should all be managed consistently across the web.  Having inconsistent data will result in loss of trust from your consumers.  The very thing we work so hard to establish.  It also confuses Google and other search engines which can negatively affect your local SEO.

Citation Management

The above screenshot is for a swim school on Yelp.  Yelp is one of the most critical business citations that every local business should make sure is managed properly.  Most citations contain basic contact information, others like Yelp include rich data of reviews, ratings and images.

Google relies on directories to understand your prominence.

According to Google, “Prominence is also based on information that Google has about a business, from across the web, like links, articles, and directories.” How exactly does Google do that?  Well, having your business listed on trusted sites sends signals to Google legitimizing your existence.  The more times Google sees your Name address and phone number on the world wide web the more significant your business becomes.  However, making sure the data is consistently the same is also critical.  Inconsistent data can hurt your local SEO efforts.

Google looks at third party sites for reviews and information.

You may find that Google links your social or other review sites to your Google My business page.  Underneath your Q&A section Google will display “Reviews from the web.”  Making sure you claim and optimize these citations is more relevant than ever.

Review from the web

Prominence includes your review rating.  Have a significant number of reviews and a high review rating shows Google that your business is significant.   Reviews can convey several messages over all.  They can tell us everything we need to know about the business.  How popular they are, if they have good or great customer service.  Does this business have good food, products or services as well as the business ambience?  It’s no wonder Google and other search engines rely on other sources to determine your business prominence.

Risk vs. Benefit of a Passive vs. Active Local Listings Management Approach

When developing your marketing strategy, a business needs to fully analyze the risk vs benefit of taking a passive vs active approach to their citations.  Let’s review…

Passive Approach Risks:

  • Minimum number of local citations
  • Inaccurate data
  • Duplicate business listings
  • No approval process of edits to local business listings
  • Not Discovering new reviews
  • Zero control of your brand representation
  • Lose consumer trust

Active Approach Benefits

  • Ensure accurate and consistent data across major platforms
  • Awareness of inaccurate data
  • Closure of duplicate listings
  • Discover and manage reviews
  • Brand control across the web

Managing your data across multiple platforms is good business.  In today’s digital world your brand presence online is as significant as the appearance of your storefront.  After all, most customers will find your business online before they step into your establishment.  Putting your best foot forward starts with your online presence.

Reach out to Reputation Arm for Professional Local Listings Management Services

Citations are snips of your business data on the internet.   Local customers and all search engines are reviewing this data.  They influence not only consumer spending but how you will rank overall compared to your competitors.  We know that having several citations and making sure they are accurate will impact rankings, reputation and ultimately your revenue.  Having minimal and inaccurate data can negatively impact your business rankings, reputation and revenue.

For more help on building citations reach out to Reputation Arm’s contact form.  We understand that managing a business is not always easy nor do most business owners understand or have the bandwidth to handle their marketing needs.  We are here to help you put your best foot forward.