Short answer: you can only have one Google Business Profile per business. If you’ve got two, Google eventually hides one of them from search and Maps, but “eventually” can mean months of split reviews and a confused map pack in the meantime. Fix it by finding the duplicate and requesting a merge, not by trying to delete the wrong one yourself.

Here’s how this usually happens. A business moves, changes its name, or gets bought, and somewhere along the way a new profile gets created instead of updating the old one. Sometimes an employee does it. Sometimes it’s a customer suggesting an edit that accidentally spins up a second listing, and that happens more than you’d think. Nobody notices for a while because both profiles technically work. Then one day the reviews look thin, the phone number on one listing is wrong, and a customer calls to ask why your address shows up twice on Google Maps.

I’ve pulled up audits for local businesses here in San Antonio where this was sitting there the whole time. A profile from a previous name or location, never claimed, still showing up in search right next to the real one. It quietly splits the review count and the ranking signal between two listings instead of stacking everything on one. Neither profile looks as strong as it should, and the business owner had no idea it existed.

Google’s own help documentation is clear that duplicate profiles violate their guidelines and can get suppressed from search results entirely. Not just one of them either, potentially both, if it’s unclear which one is legitimate. That’s the real risk here. This isn’t a “pick your favorite” situation. Let it sit too long and Google can decide for you.

How to fix it:

  1. Search your business name and city on Google to see both listings side by side.
  2. Claim the one that’s missing an owner (if you haven’t already claimed either).
  3. From the correct profile, go to Google Maps, find the duplicate, and use “Suggest an edit” to report it as a duplicate, or request a merge directly if you manage both.
  4. If reviews are on the duplicate you’re keeping, note that merges preserve reviews but not your replies to them, so screenshot anything you want to keep before merging.

This is a five-minute fix once you know it’s there. The part that costs businesses money is not knowing. Checking your Google Business Profile the right way means actually searching your own name the way a customer would, not just logging into the dashboard you already know about.

Good Company AI helps local businesses in San Antonio and South Texas get found, get trusted, and get more calls from Google. If you want to know exactly where your business stands in AI search and what actually moves the needle, request a free visibility audit and we’ll show you.