Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Local Search - can I use a shortened company name
-
Can I use a shortened version of our company name for local search or does it need to match the name registered at companies house exactly?
-
Thanks, thats put my mind at ease
-
I always find it useful to look at real-world examples, Paul. For example, look at the footer of Whole Foods' website: http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com. You'll see them identified there as Whole Foods Market IP, L.P., but if you look up Whole Foods San Diego Ca, what do you see on the GMB listing? Just Whole Foods Market.
So, for legal purposes, you may need to include your full designation in the footer of your website, but provided the things assets I've mentioned previously (street level signage, website logo, etc.) are all consistent with your Evowrap name, I don't envision you'd have a problem there. Whole Foods clearly doesn't seem to be.
-
The fact that companies house has got the full name doesnt matter too much then?
On the website everything refers to us as Evowrap except at the bottom of the websites footer it says our registered office details. This has the full LTD company name. Will that cause a problem? Would I be better changing that to the none full name?
-
Hey Paul,
So, if your street-level and website-level marketing is all Evowrap rather than your full legal business name, then its Evowrap Google would want. It's the real-world consumer experience that Google wants reflected in their product.
-
Our full company name is Evowrap Films and Vinyls LTD. We own the trademark Evowrap and our logo, print material etc is all Evowrap. This is what we trade as altohugh our full legal name is the full version the full LTD version. I heard something suggesting that NAP included companies house which is why I thought Id need to use the full version for the local citations.
-
Hi Paul,
Good question. Google's guidelines make it clear that they want your business name on your GMB listings to identically match what consumers see in the real world. So, the name on your street level signage, your print marketing, your website logo and content, and your telephone greetings should be what you put on your GMB listing. And then, for the sake of consistency, as Sean mentions, you'll want all of your other local business listings to match this. So, short answer - no, don't shorten your name, unless you wish to formally change it and update all off and online marketing to reflect it.
I'm curious as to why you'd need to shorten the name. Is it super long?
-
Hey there,
In an ideal world, I would recommend maintaining the NAP (Name, Address & Postcode) you use anywhere else on the internet. This allows search engines (and users for that matter) to have some degree of continuity between your business listings.
Moz local is a decent tool for analysing your business listing and checking that your NAP is the same across the internet. It'll even highlight sites where this isn't the case so you can manually update them.
All the best,
Sean
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Adding Schema to multi-location Wordpress Website using Schema Pro
All, we're building a new version of our existing website using Wordpress and have both Yoast SEO Premium and Schema Pro installed. Our site has 70, a medical practice, has 70 different locations. Each one of our locations has a page tile like the following: "Los Angeles | ABC Dental". The first part of the site title is the town we're located in followed by our site name. Using Schema Pro, we're not sure about what to place into the "Name" field. You can see the direction from Schema Pro for local businesses here, https://wpschema.com/docs/add-schema-markup-for-a-local-business-page/ By default Schema Pro has the name field set to Site Title. However, using this on all 70 or our landing pages wouldn't provide the local aspect we want. It would just say ABC Dental. We changed this to use a new custom field where we could enter a more descriptive name. Using our page title example of "Los Angeles | ABC Dental", would we simply enter this into the name field of Schema Pro? If not, would we format this another way such as "ABC Dental Los Angeles" We could use some help in a strategy for Schema markup for multi-location businesses, in particular, the name field. All other information such as address, phone number, etc seems rather straight forward. Thank you for the assistance
Local Listings | | morciuoli0 -
Is it more beneficial to use Yext rather than doing the citations manually?
Our company wanted to experiment on whether it truly is more beneficial to use Yext for citations rather than to do them ourselves. The thought process here, is that when we manually do the citations, some of our listings would increase in quality. The problem we have been running into, is that Yext has exclusive deals with nearly half of the sources we were previously listed under. Is there a way around this, or is Yext truly worth the cost?
Local Listings | | rburnett1 -
Should apartment management companies have a separate website for each of their properties?
I work for a company that owns and manages apartments. I would like to know which of the two website design decisions are better from an SEO perspective: One single website that contains pages for all of our apartments. (Example: http://www.equityapartments.com) Separate websites for each apartment and one main corporate website allows users to search through our apartments. (Example: https://www.greystar.com) I have spoken to three marketing companies have all recommended option 2. The best reason I have heard is because then the separate apartments are all more likely to rank. They say Google doesn't want to rank multiple pages of the same website.But Google would still know that I have an administrative relationship between the sites. (Source: https://cloudz.click/blog/how-google-knows-what-sites-you-control-and-why-it-matters-whiteboard-friday) So I don't know why they would treat multiple sites differently than one site?For what it's worth, it seems the majority of apartment management companies use a different website for each property.So should have a separate website for each of their properties?
Local Listings | | mikleing1 -
Google My Business - two locations but same name and phone
Hello, I manage SEO for an orthopaedic practice and I'm wondering what to do about their GMB listings. They have two locations, but I'm starting to think we shouldn't have separate GMB pages for the two locations because of the advice about other GMB questions I've been reading on this forum. I read a helpful response that said you must ensure the following if you want to create separate GMB listings: Unique name Unique address (even if only a suite / office number) Unique phone number Clearly different categories on Google My Business I can only ensure one of those - unique address. The business has the same name, phone number, and categories at both addresses. What should I do about this? I would think it's important to list both addresses so that patients can be guided to the appropriate location, but is there a way to do that with just one GMB listing? Thank you, Susannah
Local Listings | | SusannahK.Noel0 -
Google Business - Adding location into business name
Hello, I've a client that has many services in different locations and addresses with the same website and phone number. But the thing is they want me to involve location name to business name. Is there a way to add and verify as bulk ?
Local Listings | | omeryamac0 -
Using same business number on different websites
Hello, I have number of websites in different locations with different business name and address with verified listings. However, I am thinking to use the same phone number on all the websites as it is difficult for me to keep track of all the numbers. So, is it okay to use the same phone number on different websites with different business name and address? Waiting for your thoughts. Brian
Local Listings | | BrianBotts.0 -
Why is the incorrect city name being appended to search results when that search is done from a completely different city? Screenshot Included
Hi Guys, This is weird. When searching "generator rentals" from within Vancouver/Lower Mainland and on a mobile device, our organic listing is ranked #1. That is the good news. The bad news is that for some reason the title returend is: Generator Rentals & Temporary Power Distribution - Edmonton". The "-Edmonton" is dynamically added, but I have no idea why. Edmonton is in a completely different province than Vancouver... over 720 miles apart. The only thing I can think of is that there is some sort conflict with our Google places account. You see, we do have an Edmonton branch. I have setup two branches... one for the Coquitlam/Vancouver branch and one for the Edmonton. And as far as I can tell, both are setup correctly. A screenshot from my iPhone has been linked (http://imgur.com/9YvyLDB). Any ideas would be appreciated. Thank you, Jarrett 9YvyLDB
Local Listings | | TrinityPower0 -
Best Local Citation Building Services
Hi, have any of you ever used a local citation building service? Are some better than others, any recommendations? Any bad experiences or companies to avoid? I'm fairly new to the process and it looks like there's a lot of snake oil salesmen in this vertical, so any and all insight you could give me would be great! Thank you in advance, I look forward to hearing feedback from all of you!
Local Listings | | maxcarnage0