A listing that vanished last week has most likely been filtered, not removed. Search for your business name to confirm it exists, check categories and address, and avoid big changes while results settle.

What moved on Thursday

Last Thursday, September 1, the businesses Google shows in its local results shifted for a great many searches.

Some owners found their listing missing from searches it had appeared in for years. Others found themselves showing where they never had before.

Google has not announced or explained the change. The search industry has nicknamed it Possum, and what is known so far comes from people comparing results before and after.

Two patterns are clear already, and neither of them means a listing has been deleted.

What changed, and what did not

The fourth is the one to hold on to this week. A listing filtered out of one search has not been suspended or penalised, and there is nothing broken to repair.

Just outside the city

For years, a business with an address just past a city's limits struggled to appear when people searched for that city by name.

Since Thursday, many of those businesses are showing for the neighbouring city. For them it is good news, and there is nothing to do except notice.

For businesses inside the city, it means more competition for the same three places, from addresses that used to be left out.

Shared addresses and the filter

Google has long avoided showing several near-identical results for one search. Its local results now apply that more firmly to businesses at the same address.

Two dentists in one building, a law firm and its individual lawyers, the practitioners in one clinic: where several listings share an address and a category, the results often show one and hide the rest.

Which one appears can depend on where the searcher is and exactly what they typed. The others are still there, filtered for that search.

What not to do this week

Big changes in local results bring a wave of hasty fixes, and most of them make things worse.

Do not create a new listing, or delete and recreate the old one. Do not add the city or a keyword to the business name either: Google's guidelines forbid it, and a suspended listing really is gone.

Do not move the listing to another suite, and do not rush out requests for reviews. Changes this large are often adjusted in the weeks that follow, and watching costs nothing.

A worked example

An independent optician rents a ground-floor unit in a medical building. Upstairs, an optometrist's clinic sells glasses from its own dispensary, and both have Google listings at the same street address.

On Friday the optician noticed that her shop no longer appeared when she searched for glasses from the street outside. The clinic upstairs appeared instead, and she assumed her listing had been removed.

It had not. A search for the shop's name showed the listing, verified, reviews intact.

Both businesses had chosen the same primary category, so for a search made nearby they looked like two versions of one business, and the filter kept one.

The owner changed her primary category to the one that describes what the shop actually is, checked that the unit number matched the sign and the website, and left everything else alone.

Whether the filter now treats them as different is Google's decision. The listing gives it accurate information to decide with, which is the part an owner controls.

What to check

Search for your business name. If the listing appears with its address and reviews, it exists, and the question is filtering, not removal.

Then search for your main service the way customers do, from a phone in a few places around your area, or ask staff who live in different neighbourhoods to try.

Note who appears in your place. If it is a similar business at your own address, the shared-address filter is the likely reason.

Finally, check your own details: the primary category, the unit or suite number, and the name exactly as it appears on your sign.

Write down what you find, with the date and where you searched from. In two or three weeks, repeat the same searches from the same places and compare.

Watching the numbers

Google My Business Insights shows how often the listing was viewed and what people did next: website visits, directions requests and calls.

Compare whole weeks before and after September 1, not single days. Small numbers jump about from one day to the next.

If calls and directions requests hold steady while views fall, the change is costing little. If the actions fall with the views, it deserves a closer look.

In Analytics, add an annotation on September 1, so whoever reads the reports later knows why a line moved.

Where the website comes in

When Google decides which of several similar listings to show, the website behind each one is part of the information it has. It is also the part an owner can change freely.

A site that says plainly what the business does, where it is and how it differs from the business next door is the clearest evidence you control that the two are not the same.

The counter-case

Not every drop last week came from this change. Listings also slip because of a competitor's new reviews, an edited category, or a change on the business's own website.

Some businesses gained, too. One just outside the city that now appears for it has nothing to fix.

The real risk this week is panic. Confirm the listing exists, check its details, and leave the rest alone while results settle.

Before rebuilding anything

  1. Search your business name to confirm the listing.
  2. Search your main service from several locations.
  3. Note who appears in your place.
  4. Check your primary category describes the business.
  5. Match the unit number to your signage.
  6. Annotate September 1 in Analytics.
  7. Compare Insights before and after, by week.

Step one comes before anything else. A listing that still appears under its own name is being filtered, and filtering is not something an owner fixes by rebuilding the listing.

How the three places are chosen in the first place is covered in three places in the map results instead of seven.

Frequently asked questions

What happened to local results last week?

On September 1 Google changed how local results are filtered. Businesses just outside a city's limits now appear for it, and similar businesses sharing an address are filtered more.

Is Possum Google's name for the change?

No. It is a nickname from the search industry. Google has not announced or explained the change; what is known comes from people comparing results before and after.

Has my listing been removed?

Probably not. Search for your business name: if the listing appears with its address and reviews, it exists and is being filtered from some searches, not removed.

Why would a shared address matter?

Google avoids showing near-identical results. Where several similar businesses share an address and a category, it often shows one and hides the rest for that search.

What should I avoid changing?

Do not create a new listing, add keywords to the business name, or move the address. Those break guidelines or create duplicates, and can make things worse.

How do I measure the effect?

Compare Google My Business Insights week by week before and after September 1, and mark the date with an Analytics annotation so later readers know why.

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.

Listing gone from the map results?

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