Thanks once again to local search expert Mike Blumenthal for allowing us to share his insight into the ever-evolving features that appear on a Google business listing. In the following item, Mike explains that Google is now responding to requests for businesses to indicate they are temporarily closed (e.g., seasonal, renovation, etc.) in their Google business listing. Previously, Google would only indicate a company was closed permanently.  As you can see from Mike’s explanation, the process to get the temporarily closed message posted is still clunky and requires a bit of advocacy — but it is possible.


Google is apparently partially supporting temporary business closures with a process and an appropriate messaging on the business Knowledge Panel (the information box about a business one sees on the results page following a Google search).
Currently, there is no public facing interface for this and the only way to get this done is to create a post in the Google My Business Forum with full business details and then get a top contributor to escalate the problem.

To get the temporarily closed message requires that the business close for than two weeks and that the company’s’ website also clearly reflect the closure.  Note that the change is only currently visible in the Knowledge Panel but that in Maps the business will still be shown as permanently closed.  Here is a location

Note that the change is only currently visible in the Knowledge Panel but that in Maps the business will still be shown as permanently closed.  Here is a location showing that status. (Click to view the listing in the context of a desktop search.)


istock

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