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

45 points hypeaccount | 1 comments | 10 Sep 25 18:15 UTC | HN request time: 0.204s | 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.

1. csomar ◴[13 Sep 25 06:34 UTC] No.45229837[source]▶
Unless you have very strong backlinks, then the answer is yes: Google will prioritize sites like Instagram, Linkedin and Facebook. You are lucky, I guess, that these are your very own pages but it could be worse.

There isn't much to do about it unless you want to play the backlinks game and pay to play. There is a reason top brands pay ads when you search for their very own name and that is to make sure they are priority funneled.

Google is just a huge gate keeper these days.