Seasonal Setting Options for Google My Business
-
Hi there,
Not sure if anyone will have any insight but I have a seasonal business that I am closed for from September to March. I don't want to mark my business as "permanently closed" through Google My Business as I don't want my customers to think I've gone out of business. I've seen a few times through forums that you can change your business to temporarily closed, but I can't find the specifics on how to do this. Any insight, suggestion or resources would be great!
Thanks!
-
Here is the answer that I've received:
"Hi
At the moment the work round is to set as open for 1 minute at 2am on Monday morning.
It worked for a top contributor but not for Nathan who tried it.
I think it could be a bug affecting older GmB entries?
Its been known about for a long time.
Andrew."
-
Brick and mortar - I have a patio furniture store.
-
Thank you for documenting your experience, Matt. May I ask, is your business a service area business (like a plumber), or brick-and-mortar?
-
I actually ended up finding a link for Google Customer Service and got on a support call with a rep to review my situation. There was quite a bit of back and forth and proof required to show why I wanted "temporarily closed" vs. Closed and I needed to provide a 're-opening date' to achieve this. But I was able to achieve it.
The other thing to mention is that there are two ways you can be found on Google for Business listings: 1) via Google Maps Search (google.com/maps) and 2) Google Search.
For the Google Maps Search it is not possible (I confirmed with a Google specialist) to temporarily close a location via the Maps. Google Maps requires you to be open or closed.
For Google Search, once the seasonal location is ready to re-open you have to contact them again to have "Temporarily Closed" removed from your listing.
Hope this helps.
-
Hi Miriam,
I've posted on the GMB Forum and let you know if I've an answer.
-
Hi Jonathan,
I wonder if Matt ever posted to the GMB forum. This seems like a bug. I would recommend reporting and would be grateful if you'd let me know what you hear from the Gold Product Experts there.
-
Hi Miriam,
I've the same issue. It seems that you need 1 opening day. You can check the video in attach.
Regards,
Jonathan
-
Hmm, I wonder if there's a bug, Matt. How this should work is that you simply remove your open hours when you're not open and then put them back up again when you are. But you're encountering an error message? If that's right, I'd take this to the Google My Business forum: https://www.en.advertisercommunity.com/t5/Basics-for-Business-Owners/bd-p/Basics_for_Business_Owners
Do a search there first to see if anyone else is encountering a similar problem right now. If not, post your business details, explain exactly what you're trying to do and ask if you're dealing with a bug or are making a misstep somewhere along the way.
-
Thank you so much for the suggestion. The info you tried above was the first way I tried to mark as temporarily closed but as soon as I tried to close all the "regular" hours I got an "invalid or missing data error". Do you know if this only works if there are special hours set (i.e. for holidays?)
-
Hi Matt!
Glad you've asked, and you're right - you definitely don't want to mark your business as closed. Instructions for this are found in the Guidelines for Representing your Business on Google, which read:
Seasonal hours
If your business has seasonal hours, use the following guidelines:
- During the season in which you’re open, set hours that reflect the current season's opening hours. You may set special hours for holidays, temporary closures, or other events.
- When your business is out of season, remove all opening hours, so they appear as unset. Set your opening hours again at the beginning of your next open season.
Hope this helps and that you have a good open season!
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
-
Verifying Google My Business After An Address Change
Hello,
Local Listings | | Ben-R
We are trying to verify our Google My Business listing, however, the current unverified listing is using an old address we no longer have access to. The only option for verification is through the mail. We tried requesting an edit but it didn’t go through. Would the best option be to create a new one and try to have the old (unverified) listing removed? Any insight would be appreciated. Thank you in advance.
Best,0 -
Incorrect Image is Displaying on Google My Business Knowledge Graph - Need Urgent Solution??
Incorrect Image is Displaying on Google My Business for our company. We have updated new image on google business But still, Google is fetching and showing old image on the google my business knowledge panel. What will be the right fix for this? Our site URL : www.yolobus.in
Local Listings | | AnkitS.19900 -
Google Events Pack - Our events never show up while others not related do
When doing a search for "des moines wa events" the top results are the events pack. When we do a search, none of the events are even happening in Des Monies but in Seattle proper. Our pages have events schema on them and they do get warnings but no errors. Here is a link to one of our events pages in Des Moines that does not show up. Is there anything wrong with our page that could be preventing it from ranking? What are the factors that get events to rank in that area? What else could we be doing to improve our results?
Local Listings | | GRDigital0 -
Children's club Google My Business conundrum
Hi there I have been contacted by a small business to help them with their <acronym title="Search Engine Optimization">SEO</acronym> effort.
Local Listings | | coolhandluc
The business is a children's club offering drama classes, music classes etc... Looking at their online visibility shows they don't even have a Google my business profile which is where i was going to start however, they operate from a local school after hours. The local school already has a GMB profile, obviously with the same address and postcode. Is it possible to set up a GMB for the children's club anyway? Many thanks0 -
Google My Business Login
Is there a way to turn off the Google Security feature that kicks someone out after logging into the account because it isn't a trusted computer or in a different location?
Local Listings | | BlairKuhnen0 -
Has Google Local search algorithm changed in the last 6 months?
My organic search results have increased, but I noticed that my Google local search results have dropped drastically. I haven't changed anything on the local side. I consistently get reviews. In my industry, I have more reviews (all 5 star) than anyone else. It actually shows weird results, like competitors that have no reviews and don't even have all of their information filled out. It is even showing competitors that are out of business. I have a lot of citations with the same NAP. I use Moz local for this purpose as well. So, I am wondering if the algorithm has changed and if I need to update my profile to match it. Thank you in advance!
Local Listings | | CalicoKitty20000 -
Adding new business location. Google My Businesses vs. Google Map Maker
Hi everybody, Adding new business location. Is it better for local visibility to add it via Google My Businesses dashboard directly or via Google Map Maker first (and then claim it in My Businesses dashboard)? Thanks
Local Listings | | Ryan_V0 -
SEO strategy local service area business
Hello, I run a service area business that rents and delivers moving boxes in the San Francisco Bay Area. Our service area spans 75 cities and many millions of people, and several major metropolitan areas, including San Francisco, San Jose and Oakland, but there are also numerous smaller cities that collectively represent a large number of monthly searches. I would like to rank well for the higher level search terms, like “moving boxes” and “moving supplies”, but also city-specific searches like “Moving Boxes San Francisco.” What’s unclear to me is the best strategy for organically ranking on the specific cities in our service area. As I see it, it seems there are several approaches. Is the best approach to either to: A.) Create clean “universal” web pages for pricing, products and landing pages and use blogs to build up content keywords for each of the cities B.) Create 10-15 city-specific web pages with the hope they'll each rank well (e.g. Moving San Jose, Moving in Cupertino) C.) Other? Thanks for your comments.
Local Listings | | bruteboxmoving0