In theory, Google wants each listing to lead to a unique business that can be driven to for an answer. In theory your business meets that criteria. In practice you always run a danger of Google merging your listing and those of your office mates if they can not adequately distinguish between the two or think they are the same. Merging is painful as half of one listing gets mixed into half of the other and vice versa. It is somewhat unpredictable.

If you choose to list both businesses, it is important to make as many distinctions as possible in both the business listing and across the local ecosystem that Google scrapes for the content of your particular cluster. Minimally that means a unique website, a unique registrar record, a unique phone number, a unique office suite number (ie 1a instead of 1) and a unique LBC account AS WELL AS having all of that uniqueness shown in every major primary and secondary data provider that Google uses.

Even then there is no guarantee, but it is the only way.

Thanks for stopping by and taking the time to comment. It is legitimate that a business rank on multiple terms…but Google wants to be the arbiter of that.

Jen is referring to creating multiple listing entries in the Local Business Center in an effort to game the results in an effort to rank on those multiple terms NOT whether a company will show up on multiple search terms. It is possible and appropriate for a business to show up on a number of terms without entering a business multiple times.

If a business listing is the most relevant listing to a searchers intent, it is google’s goal to show it. It is possible for a business owner to craft his entry and manage his presence in the local ecosystem in such a way as to improve their chances.

But by changing a business name to the specific search phrase and entering that business name , 7 or 10 times a business might be able to come up on a range phrases as well. It is this latter gaming that Google has declared as “[not] useful in any way for our users”

Just because a business has two legitimate functions, google does not want them to enter their business twice in the LBC.

Mike

As I understand the comment posted by Jen, it would be OK to rank for different terms such as “oil change” and “body shop” but it would not be acceptable to rank twice with the same physical location for one of those searches. Am I understanding correctly?

By the way, you have a great site. I have been subscribing to your feed for several months and enjoy the focus on only local search.

Well in this case,

I have noted in the medical, insurance and a few other fields Google by default offers both practitioners and the practice at a location.

That being said, it is still unclear if Google is going to proactively search and remove listings, or wait for end user reports before they take action.

There really is a dirth of clear Google offered guidelines in this area. And I for one am hoping that Google will make a few more public utterances so that legitimate businesses have a clear path to compliance.

Mike