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Google Doesn't Rank My Site for My Own Brand Name

45 points hypeaccount | 4 comments | 10 Sep 25 18:15 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source

I run a small business in Canada. Oddly, if you search my brand name, my own site doesn’t show up at all on the first page. Instead, Facebook, Instagram, and random sites that link to me outrank me.

I’ve submitted my sitemap to GSC, checked indexing, and built branded backlinks—but Google still ignores my homepage. It’s bad because people looking for me are funneled into other platforms where I lose control of the user journey.

Has anyone else experienced this? Is this Google punishing small/new sites, or do I need to approach brand SEO differently? At this point it feels like Google wants me to buy ads just to show up for my own name.

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bell-cot ◴[10 Sep 25 19:09 UTC] No.45202270[source]▶
How long have you been on the web, and how crowded is your industry (from an SEO PoV)?

At $Job, we've got a couple long-time micro-clients in niche industries. They don't bother with SEO. Spend $0 on ads. Have decades-old site designs. And are in the top 3 Google results for most search strings that they care about.

replies(1): >>45202317 #
hypeaccount ◴[10 Sep 25 19:14 UTC] No.45202317[source]▶
I am not able to rank for my own brand name, it's not crowded. All the pages that are ranking from other websites (linkedin, facebook, x) are owned by me.

The website is 1 year old.

replies(2): >>45202397 #>>45202774 #
ChrisArchitect ◴[10 Sep 25 19:22 UTC] No.45202397[source]▶
Why would you think that a new website with no history is going to outrank a facebook page etc? It will take time for the website to establish as the authority and then place alongside the social pages etc. At this point you're lucky the social pages etc show up so at least you have something representing in the space.
replies(1): >>45202607 #
1. rerdavies ◴[10 Sep 25 19:42 UTC] No.45202607[source]▶
Why would you think that a Facebook page should outrank a website? I would think that a Facebook page SHOULD be considered only slightly more authoritative than a youtube comment.
replies(3): >>45203924 #>>45204129 #>>45204183 #
2. type0 ◴[10 Sep 25 21:21 UTC] No.45203924[source]▶
domain names don't weight as much in search ranking it used to be
3. tracker1 ◴[10 Sep 25 21:33 UTC] No.45204129[source]▶
The same reason that I'll click on a restaurant in Yelp or Google reviews over $RestaurantWebsite.
4. xboxnolifes ◴[10 Sep 25 21:36 UTC] No.45204183[source]▶
Why shouldn't a facebook page be ranked similarly to a website? Why should having a domain different than facebook give some arbitrary advantage?

If a Youtube comment happened to give the best explanation to my query, I'd want to to show up at the top of my search.