If you are not having any luck getting your business to display on Google Maps then you might have a problem similar to what I encountered today for the first time.
The Problem
A Sandgate business owner was going through the process of setting up and claiming their Google Places listing for their business.
We had received the Google postcard with verification PIN and completed the normal process for optimising the content of the Places listing.
However searching for the business in Google and via Google Maps would not bring up the Google Places profile. “See your listing on Google Maps” via the Google Places dashboard was equally unsuccessful – providing an error message the location was not serviced by Google.
Strange!
Yet all the business’s data and information in the editing section of the dashboard was still visible and correct.
Solution
After a little head scratching we replaced ‘Sandgate’ with ‘Brisbane’ in the business address details.
And that was it! Google was then happy to show the listing correctly.
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If you run into the same problem with getting your business to show despite having the correct street address entered then altering the business address to the next larger geographic town/city may also work for you.
And if you are in Sandgate then this might save you some confusion working with Google Places.
Do you know a Sandgate business owner? Flick them a link to this blog post.