Seeking Help from Smuggers with Google+ Experience

Lemur Lover

Hi,

Having tried unsuccessfully to seek help on all this through Google support and help forums, I thought I'd bring this here in the hope that someone can enlighten me.

I set up a Gmail and Google+ account/profile some time ago, using the same name I used for my website, which at the time was Ashley Vincent, and one of the immediate benefits I noticed was that nearly every Google search I did on a name of a specific bird or animal species (I'm a pro wildlife photographer) came up with at least one of my website pages on the first page of Google search results.

Problem is, I've since changed the name of my website to Nature Impressions and, having done so, my webpages no longer come up on first-page Google search results as they did previously.

Seeing as I updated my Google+ profile, changing the my old SM URL for the new one, yet this seemed to make no difference, I'm assuming the way to remedy this is to change my current Google+ account/profile name to NatureImpressions.

For anyone who is an experienced user of Google+ I would greatly appreciate if you could help answer the following questions:

1. Am I correct in assuming that I would be better off having the name Nature Impressions (as opposed to Ashley Vincent) for my Google+ account/profile, because this will once again bring my webpages back to first page Google search results as before?

2. If the answer to that is yes, how can I change my current Google+ name, Ashley Vincent, to Nature Impressions?

3. If there's no way to do this, is it possible for me to set up a second Google+ account, or would it be better to completely remove/delete my current Google+ account and set up a completely new one?

Many thanks for your time in reading this and, hopefully, your help!

Ashley

rainforest1155

If you change the name of your site, search engines like Google may have to start indexing your site from scratch. So yes, it's to be expected that you lose your page ranking and have to rebuild it.
Check out the SEO page for suggestions on doing that - especially getting your new site link out on other pages (like G+) and blogging your content.

1. I don't know if this has any bearing for G+, but I would guess it doesn't.
2. Check this page for information on names on G+ (including details on what you can and can't do). To change your name, simply edit your profile and click on your name to change it.

Lemur Lover

rainforest1155 wrote: »

If you change the name of your site, search engines like Google may have to start indexing your site from scratch. So yes, it's to be expected that you lose your page ranking and have to rebuild it.
Check out the SEO page for suggestions on doing that - especially getting your new site link out on other pages (like G+) and blogging your content.

1. I don't know if this has any bearing for G+, but I would guess it doesn't.
2. Check this page for information on names on G+ (including details on what you can and can't do). To change your name, simply edit your profile and click on your name to change it.

Hi Sebastian,

Thanks for your time in addressing this for me, much appreciated.

I did actually come across the page you linked to, so I've already figured out that there's no way Google+ will accept a profile name that sounds like anything other than a real name, and lucky I didn't figure out how to change my profile name before to Nature Impressions as I'd wanted to; their help forums are filled with threads of people crying "HELP!" trying to find out why their Google+ account has been suspended, in most cases it seems that users didn't realise they had to use their real (so-called "common") name for their profile and it appears that Google+ has a programme that sets off a red light when a word as a name does't seem right, then automatically it suspends the account.

A couple of threads I read this morning complaining about this having happened to them were written respectively by a Sarah Killer and Michael Love. Although these are the actual names of these people, the Google computer no doubt picked up on the words "killer" and "love" and is set to weed those words out. It wouldn't be so bad but for the fact that evidently it takes way too many days before actual support from Google gets back to individuals, and in some cases it's suggested they never respond at all, which for a huge company like Google who no doubt need to maintain a high level of customer satisfaction, makes no sense at all.

Anyhow, as I've decided to go with Blogger now instead of WordPress, sticking with Google+ seems like a smart move, so I guess I'll have to go with the flow and use my given name instead of the name I've chosen for my website.

Thanks again Sebastian and wishing you a great weekend!