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Category: Reviews and Ratings

Dive into how to manage reviews and ratings for your local marketing strategy.

  • aj613


    Just spent 2.5 hours on the phone with Google.  I created dozens of GMB pages for clients using my email address.  Now I am discovering that this is not the right way of doing this.  Each business owner should create a GMB account with her own email address.  Then I can be added as a manager of that GMB account. Question:
    Now that I have dozens of GMB accounts under my email account, is it worth it to create a new email address for each client and associate it with the new email address? I think the best thing would be to have each client do it herself, but I'm not sure it's worth the headache of walking each one through it.  What do you think?

    | aj613
    0
  • Slumberjac


    Howdy Moz fans! Does anyone know if you can use Google Reviews as a Rich Snippet in the actual Google listing for your business? It seems strange that you can have this for widgets like Trust Pilot and Reviews.co.uk and not Google Reviews. Surely Google allow you to display Google reviews on your site that can then be used for schema mark up? Maybe they don't because those reviews are used for local searches? Hope this makes sense. David.

    | Slumberjac
    0
  • revelkayla


    Our review stars from Rich Snippets are not showing up in Google for Novus products. I believe these are structured correctly or at least there are no errors. We have tried to troubleshoot on our own and asked multiple SEO'er's and partners, but have not had success.  Turning to MOZ! They were there in September/October timeframe but dropped off in October to January timeframe. example URL: https://www.google.com/search?q=hif+1+alpha+antibody&oq=hif+1+alpha+antibod (It seems to be off all products); This started in October to January time frame so was before the latest algo update.

    | revelkayla
    0
  • Travis_Bailey


    I've been sitting on this for a while due to The Busies. So if this is nothing new, feel free to lash me several times with a somewhat moist noodle. And in that event, I promise not to make it weird. 😉 I use the Rewards application, from Google. Long story short, you fill in some demographic information and you receive Google Play credit when you complete surveys. It's a nice way to get a book, app, or music for little effort. But after giving a friend of mine a ride to a local hotel, I've received multiple survey requests that relate to that hotel brand. And it asks me to drop a local review, for extra Google Play credit. How is that ethical? Their own docs clearly state there is no way to pay for better local ranking, but they also admit reviews can improve local ranking. So isn't soliciting reviews, for any sort of compensation, at least a bit unethical? What are your thoughts? Attached are screenshots of the solicitation and GMB documentation. w4hEe

    | Travis_Bailey
    1
  • BrianAlpert78


    I've been trying to wrap my head around marking up various bits of information for a local business website, and I want to make sure I understand a few things. If I understand Google's schema guidelines, marked up reviews should only appear on the page of a specific product, not every page, and _definitely _not the homepage, correct? Does this also mean that the LocalBusiness schema that is on every page should **not **use the AggregateRating parameter? And if the AR is only to be put on certain pages, what page should it go on if the business in question provides a service rather than selling specific products? In other words, situations where the local business _itself _is the "product" being reviewed/rated. Individual reviews cannot be taken from 3rd party sites (GMB, Facebook, Yelp, etc) and posted on your website with capital R Review schema (http://schema.org/Review). That markup is only to be used for reviews that have been generated on/for your site specifically. Does this also mean that the numbers used to calculate an AggregateRating have to be unique as well? In other words, if there are 10 reviews of your business on Facebook that average at 4.5/5, you can't take those individual reviews and post them on your site as marked up Reviews. But can you use that "4.5/5 based on 10 reviews" information in the AggregateRating schema? Can AggregateRating scores include ratings from different sources? In other words, if there were 10 ratings on Facebook and 20 on Yelp, could the AggregateRating be marked on the website as "__/5 based on 30 ratings"? If I can simply take the numerical average and pop that into the LocalBusiness JSON markup that goes on every page automatically, alongside the other basic business info like name, phone number, and address, this will make things much easier. Thanks!

    | BrianAlpert78
    2
  • CalicoKitty2000


    I am bringing this topic up again.  Last year, I suddenly stopped ranking for Google Local search results.  I tried backing away and hoping it would correct itself, but it has not.  When I do a search for myself, I rarely show up in the results anymore, and this image shows AFTER I've zoomed WAY in just to find myself.  I think it has something to do with many fishing charters having the same address.  I read the Moz article about which signals are most important, but to be quite honest, I don't think any of these competitors really bother with SEO or even have filled out their Google My Business in its entirety.  They all have way less reviews than I do as well.  I really try to do everything right, but it doesn't seem to help.  Is there something small ad obvious that I am missing.  Any ideas on what to do?

    | CalicoKitty2000
    0
  • brooksmanley


    Hello Moz World! My agency has never had a great strategy for reputation management, but have begun acquiring some Google reviews. We know it's best practice to respond – but I've never considered whether I should respond as an individual or with our company's GMB? The owner of our GMB is "Engenius" – a general admin account for our agency. I'm also a user on the account, as the "owner," but I'm technically not the owner of our company. Should the owner be added as a user and respond directly? Or is it okay to respond as "Engenius" (the brand)? Or can I respond as the "owner," though I'm not technically? I know ultimately it's probably not a huge deal, but any thoughts would be awesome! Thanks!

    | brooksmanley
    0
  • irapasternack


    They are now promoting themselves as an alternative to Yext. In theory it sounds good, as it includes listings management that publish updates within 72 hours, along with review monitoring and notifications. I'm wondering if they live up to their pitch.

    | irapasternack
    0
  • Mike-i


    An optometrist is looking to buy a practice with really bad Google reviews. They want to rebrand it under their name. This practice has pretty bad SEO as well. What should they do? Should they just mark the GMB page as permanently closed then make a new one under the new business name? Or is that risky or considered spammy since the "new" practice is also an optometrist? Could Google think it is a duplicate or an attempt to trick them?

    | Mike-i
    0
  • PeterCol12


    Hi Mozzers, We use a google approved 3rd party review company to collect reviews for our branches and now also for our products( this is about to be implemented). We currently use one of their widgets on our site (its javascript) to show the reviews. I don't think google can read this and  I don't think we currently, therefore, get any direct seo benefit from it. My questions are as follows : I obviously want to get any SEO benefit from any review text which customers leave but as the data itself is housed on the review site with a widget on my site pointing to it,should I use an API feed as opposed to a widget. If google can read the review text on my page - then surely i should some benefit from it even though, it could technically be classed as duplicate content what are peoples thoughts ? . thanks Pete

    | PeterCol12
    0
  • robertsteck


    Hello Moz Community, I am finally getting around to creating markup for a bunch of the sites we work with using JSON-LD. I have a question specifically regarding adding review markup for a local restaurant. It's my understanding that putting the aggregate rating on the homepage never results in stars being shown in the SERP's. So what would be the best practice for taking advantage of all the great Google reviews we've accumulated over the years? These are reviews for the restaurant in general and not for any specific service or product. Should I create a reviews page on the site and use the markup there? Thanks for any and all suggestions.

    | robertsteck
    0
  • Ruchy


    Hi there, I am trying to do some research in the field of reviews, I have set up successful review systems for local stores, but once I get to businesses that want to get reviews for their products or not a local business I cant get it straight. What should I do, What should I avoid at all costs etc., What are the basic guidelines and advice from Google to get reviews? Please give me advice and resources to anything that would be helpful with this topic and the topics listed below What are  Google restrictions and requirements for reviews in a local business and a national business? Schema markup for reviews. Product reviews vs company/store reviews Thanks I really appreciate your time and help

    | Ruchy
    1
  • Mr.Suren


    Rankings for almost all the keywords are not improving and going down, not sure why. Can anyone please suggest me what's wrong with my site and what can i do to improve the overall performance of the site.I would really appreciate your help.

    | Mr.Suren
    0
  • therealtechs


    Hi, I am wondering about the best way to ask a customer for reviews. I've read in articles back in 2016 that Google my places reviews will often show reviews from facebook page if they are linked together appropriately. Is this still true? Does anyone know additionally of other sites that do this ?

    | therealtechs
    0
  • brettmandoes


    Hey there fellow Mozzers! I work with a broad variety of clients, many of them local businesses, and they in turn sometimes find a vendor that stumps me. This is one of those special cases, where the vendor is doing some shady stuff with reviews schema. First, they're taking reviews from third party sites and filtering them to only show 4 and 5 star reviews (red flag #1), then they're asking us to post them to the website (red flag #2) and finally they are marking them up with schema (red flag #3). If this were my vendor I would have fired them when they started telling me Google doesn't care, doesn't enforce the guidelines, and all that other nonsense, but hey, I'm not the client and I have to make good for them. I did flat out refuse to place these reviews as they asked, but they came back with a "solution", that I'm not sure I trust. They're telling me they can't remove the schema (red flag #4), but they can iframe it onto the website. Their logic, which is wrong, is that Google can't/doesn't crawl iframes so therefore the reviews can be displayed without any negative consequence. I obviously have some ethical concerns with this, but I have to provide the service to my client whether or not they share my values. However, I can object on professional grounds if I think they will take on undue risk. My only problem here is that I have no documentation for how this proposed solution would work. Working through this logically still leaves me with a gap, and that's where you folks come in! 
    A) We know that Google crawls iframes
    B) We know that Google can apply schema within iframes (works with YouTube embeds)
    C) We know that content within an iframe is technically on another website, so it doesn't normally apply to your website
    D) I don't know how specifically reviews schema would interact with an iframe
    E) I don't know if this would result in Google triggering an alarm and blocking the business I'm hoping you guys can help me figure this out. Ethics aside (making me cringe to type that) is this technically feasible without risk, or would this still be a risky move? For the record, another client tried filtering their reviews while marking up with schema against my recommendation and got caught, and received a penalty alert. They were removed from results until the problem was fixed.

    | brettmandoes
    0
  • imjonny123


    I have a separate /reviews URL, but want to markup the main page with aggregate reviews and also add preview reviews on there. Roughly, how many reviews do I need on the page in order to markup with aggregate review?

    | imjonny123
    0
  • coolhandluc


    Hi I have a client who has created multiple GMB listings for his business using the same address, post code and phone number and I am trying to sort it all out. 2 of the listings have 1 review and 1 of them has 13 reviews. Obviously i want to keep the listing that has 13 reviews and delete the other 2. Keeping the listing with 13 reviews means I will have to update the business name in Google my business because it was originally entered wrongly. Will the profile need to be verified again? Will my client be able to keep those reviews or will they be deleted? Thanks

    | coolhandluc
    1
  • eyeman


    We currently have around 5-10 colour/size variations per product on a configurable page and were thinking of changing to Simple Sku so that we have more product pages and will rank for each colour variation other than just the generic product. However with configurable products we could enable product reviews which would mean that we get more reviews on one URL as opposed to a less reviews on multiple URLs for color variants. Also, we are thinking that we will get more links and traffic to one page rather than multiple pages of the same product as well as time spent on that particular page. What is the consensus on what is better for SEO on this? Many Thanks

    | eyeman
    1
  • a_toohill


    I'm trying to get the star ratings to appear next to our client's website in google search results.  Here is the url:https://cstoneroof.com/ I believe I have it setup correctly but am unsure why the stars don't appear: structure data test here I pulled the rating value and count from Facebook.  Not sure if it has to be Google reviews or if FB will work as well.  Anybody have any thoughts here?

    | a_toohill
    0
  • jeenu_svs


    **Concern:- **Please try to understand my concern. I'm not worried or talking about my ranking. #1. Business Name - Law Office of Paul M. Marriett
    Address - 308 West State Street #97 B, Rockford, IL 61101 #2. Business Name - Law Office Of Brendan Caver, Ltd.
    Address - 308 W State St #96, Rockford, IL 61101 These are two business pages and both have different location as you can see in mentioned address. If #1 (Law Office of Paul M. Marriett) ranked on any keyword then #2 (Law Office Of Brendan Caver, Ltd.) does not appear anywhere in result. That's not for a single keyword. Issue is running for all keywords Approx (8-10). Keywords :-
    DUI Lawyer Rockford,
    DUI Attorney Rockford,
    Criminal Lawyer Rockford,
    Criminal Attorney Rockford,
    DUI Lawyer Rockford IL,
    DUI Attorney Rockford IL,
    Criminal Lawyer Rockford IL,
    Criminal Defense Attorney Rockford, Law Office of Paul M. Marriett ranked for upper mentioned keyword and you can see Law Office Of Brendan Caver, Ltd. is not appear anywhere in search.
     ....................................................................................................................................................................................... Keywords :-
    Best Criminal Attorney Rockford IL,
    Best Criminal Lawyer Rockford IL,
    Best Criminal Lawyer Rockford,
    Best Criminal Attorney Rockford,
    Best DUI Lawyer Rockford,
    Best DUI Lawyer Rockford IL,
    Criminal Defense Lawyer Rockford,
    Criminal Defense Lawyer Rockford IL,
    Criminal Defense Attorney Rockford IL, Law Office Of Brendan Caver, Ltd. is ranked for upper mention keywords and Law Office of Paul M. Marriett is not appear anywhere in search. 
    Please check deeply and let me know.

    | jeenu_svs
    0
  • BigChad2


    A client of mine noticed that some of their customers that leave GMB listing reviews have special symbols in their profile avatars (please look at the attachment).   Is this a sign of a influencer? Has anybody else noticed this? r6mhX

    | BigChad2
    0
  • Dions


    Currently, I use an embeddable Yelp review widget on my site. The widget I use has been helpful, but is no longer actively maintained and I'd prefer to show Google reviews instead. Does anyone have a recommendation for a widget to embed Google reviews?

    | Dions
    0
  • mgordon


    I have a client (law firm) who has been dominant locally for years.  A few months ago he stopped showing locally when you search in his city, but when you search from other cities, he's still dominant.  Here are a couple facts: 1.  None of the competition is in his building. 2.  He does rank dominant locally if you select "top rated" in Google maps.* *Interestingly enough, his competitors on regular searches have great ratings too so its a bit weird that he shows up in front of them but only when you select top rated. Have you seen this?  Any suggestions?

    | mgordon
    1
  • BeckyKey


    Hi We have a third party review provider, but were also looking at increasing our Google reviews. However after more research, should Google reviews only be used on local listings? For organisations which don't have a physical location to buy from - is the solution to use organisation schema, which incorporates 'reviews on other sites' with the hope Google may show your Feefo review count? When checking similar companies - all seem to have the organisation knowledge card and not the local Google My Business listing. Is it worth pursuing extra reviews on Google My Business or not? Thanks!

    | BeckyKey
    0
  • Marky_Mark


    the business filing with the Secretary of State is a name of an individual (e.g. Matthew Smith, M.D.). This is on reflected on Localeze and such. However, the business is operating under a name "Healthy Body and Minds Clinic", which is the Facebook, Google My Business, and website name and info. So, how is it best to get consistency in NAP with the two different business names being used? (Ideally, no change in State registration or filing for a DBA). Thanks much! One idea I have seen is to include both and separate them by a colon. As in "Healthy Body and Minds Clinic : Matthew Smith, M.D." I appreciate any suggestions or tips to help.  Thanks.

    | Marky_Mark
    0
  • jeremyskillings


    Hello,  recently came across a company that has been paying people directly for reviews. I of course do not recommend this and realized the ethical implications and even the lawsuits that can come from this, but does Google have a manual penalty for fake reviews or do they just algorithmically discount ones that raise red flags? I have never really had to worry about this in the past.  I know you can flag fake reviews to them on an individual basis, but does anyone have history of knowing specific situations where a company was manually punished for doing this?  Just curious and I kind of wanted to give them strong documentation to knock it off.  Thanks in advance.

    | jeremyskillings
    0
  • ViviCa1


    Hi all, We recently received a 1 star rating on GMB. It's just the rating, no review/comment with it. We don't recognise the name so we think it must have been made in error or is spam. We discussed this internally, and it was decided that we should try to have it removed, although I personally didn't think our chances of getting it removed would be very good (because we wouldn't be able to prove it was spam). I flagged it as spam but didn't get a reply (would you even expect to get one?). I also sent GMB a DM on Twitter a couple of days ago, and again no reply. Edit: Google have now replied as I tweeted them again and as expected they won't remove the rating as it doesn't violate their policies. Normally, I wouldn't be so concerned about one individual poor rating (especially as it is just a rating), but we haven't had any reviews on Google before, so now our average is one star which just looks bad when someone googles our company. We use an external review provider for getting reviews from customers, so we don't actively encourage our customers to rate us on Google. I was thinking we should reply to the rating, with a message saying something along the lines of "We can't find your name in our accounts, but if you get in touch with our customer service, we are confident they will be able to help you." It would also help to get more ratings or reviews to even out the one bad one and improve our average. Is there anything else we could do? How would you handle this? Thanks!

    | ViviCa1
    0
  • MissThumann


    Hello, Moz's I'm thinking about added scheme markup to show my google reviews. I have a 4.8 rating and 25 reviews. I'm thinking about added scheme markup to show my google reviews. I have a 4.8 rating and 25 reviews. My first question is: when people see that and then visit my site, would it be good to have the Google reviews on the home page? My second questions is: Is there any reason why I wouldn't want to add this to my site? None of my competition has done this, so I'm a little apprehensive? Thanks in advance 🙂

    | MissThumann
    0
  • LocalSEOSearch_john


    It's been over a year of going back and forth with Google My Business team regarding my GMB page.  It was active for 2+ years prior with over 20+ reviews.  I email GMB weekly to find out the status of the page and they keep saying it is a technical glitch and they are waiting for an update.  Would love to get any advice on how to resolve my business page so it appears again on the Google maps or who I can contact to resolve this issue. This is our third time creating a new G+ business page https://plus.google.com/+LocalSEOSearchToronto

    | LocalSEOSearch_john
    0
  • BR1948


    Hello, I updated a blog post with JSON-ld Schema Markup (ItemList): http://www.acmetools.com/blog/11-best-cordless-circular-saws-2017/ It is currently not being recognized within Moz's toolbar, but if you view the structured data testing tool, you will see it is there and has no errors? 1. Does that mean I have an error within my header pertaining to JSON-ld markup? I can also see all the markup in the structured data testing tool. Right after the closed script of the markup I have this message: 2. Is that an issue to have all my markup, then it says START --> then END -->? Should my markup be between them?

    | BR1948
    0
  • mothner


    At a bit of a loss on this one... If anyone has any ideas about what's going on or how to tackle this, I'm all ears. One of my clients, an orthodontist, is appearing in the top three organic positions and in the local pack for almost all keywords we're targeting. However, for the keyword "orthodontist" without any location modifiers attached to it, we're appearing in the top three organic results but our Google listing is not appearing in the local pack. The three listings appearing in the local pack are his next-door competitor, one practice that closed almost a year ago, and a practice in two towns over. He and his competitor are the only two orthodontists in this town, so they should theoretically be the two main listings that are being pulled in. The listing for the closed practice is marked as closed on Google and has been reported to Google several times in the last few months. The listing has no website or reviews on it, although it does have an address and a phone number. We have spent months doing aggressive, in-depth NAP/local listing cleanups. We have 24 Google reviews with an average rating of 4.6 stars, and we're organically gathering reviews every week. We went through a site redesign at the beginning of this year, so we now have a mobile responsive website. We are appearing in the local pack for almost every other keyword that we have high organic rankings for, so we know it isn't necessarily an issue with our Google My Business listing. Does anyone have any ideas of what's going on, or what we can do to get our listing to appear in the local pack for this keyword? The keyword "orthodontist" is the single most important keyword to this client and our strategy, so we're open to any and all suggestions or thoughts.

    | mothner
    0
  • SuperNovi


    I have a second question to put forward! Probably close to 8 years ago I exchanged a link with a good friend's construction company, Grace Construction.  We are a local fence company in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.  They were new home builders and we sometimes would build a fence for their new home owners.  They wrote a positive review of our business and I published it on our reviews page: (it's near the very bottom) http://www.a-better-fence-construction.com/fence-reviews.html And, they linked to our website from their website. However, now after 8 years, they no longer build homes and have let their domain name expire and has been repurchased by a construction company in Florida. I had linked to their website from the text and the image of their logo.  I am not up to speed on what is best practice.  What do you recommend I do? dwhAV

    | SuperNovi
    0
  • GabeGibitz


    I work for a University with 10,000+ students and alumni that could submit reviews. But how many reviews should I be collecting at one time? I don't want to overload the reviews and put up a red flag in Google...any insight on how much is too much?

    | GabeGibitz
    0
  • Tiedemann_Anselm


    Hi guys I have a question about google merchant set up: Products on my website have a single URL with the material option. Each material has a different price for the same product. Ex: A Winter Coat, if it is leather the price is $100 if it is fabric is $80 if it is on Nylon $60. 
    Google Merchant XML dont allow price variations, so I have two options1) Create only one entry for product and chose one price. When the user arrives on the page he can choose other material and prices. MXL ExProduct: Winter Coat, price 60, Product: www.store.com/winter-coat2) Create a single entry on the XML for each product/material variant. Ex:Product 1: Winter Coat Leather, price 100,  www.store.com/winter-coat?q=leatherProduct 2: Winter Coat Fabric, price 80, www.store.com/winter-coat?q=fabric Product 3: Winter Coat Nylon, price 60, www.store.com/winter-coat?q=nylonWhich one its better for SEO? On option 2 Google can punish me for duplicate products?Thanks

    | Tiedemann_Anselm
    0
  • HeaHea


    Hello, We have some local business sites where we have user submitted reviews. We then post those reviews on that business' page and use the schema aggregate markup.  Works like a charm in getting stars in SERPs on branded searches for these location. We already have information about the persons who work at these locations and are about to work out a process where we can get even better data on these persons. Right now they are marked up as employees on the local business pages. Right now the ratings are for the business as a whole, but we are looking at expanding where you can not only submit a location review, but designate which employee you worked with. We work in the health care industry and so you can see why this would make sense. Right now we mark up a local clinic and employees in the following way Local Business > Employee > Person > Name of Person Person Bio > Person info etc We are going back and forth on if this would be worth marking up reviews at the employee level as well. So, on a page each employee would have an aggregate rating and then the location would have an aggregate rating that consists of all of the reviews for that location - a combination of all employees. As I looked through the schema standard for person https://schema.org/Person there is nothing there that shows a markup for the aggregate rating of a person.  Also when I look at other more specific business types https://health-lifesci.schema.org/MedicalBusiness same thing.  It looks like schema has rating tied to a business vs a person. Right now - the markup validates. It shows up in the SERPs. People are happy. So, I am inclined to say, if it aint broke ... but we are always looking for better ways to present our data to user and to Google. My gut right now, based on how Google is reading things, to just keep the aggregate rating on the location, but start to track reviews on a per employee basis for potential future use. Lemme know what you all think!

    | HeaHea
    0
  • loudernet


    For a Lawyer in Chicago? any experiences with this would be helpful.

    | loudernet
    0
  • BlueCorona


    If someone leaves a review of your business on your Google My Business listing, and you respond to that review, will they receive an email notification of your response to their review? We are working with a client who has unanswered reviews from several years ago, and though it's best practice to respond to all reviews, we didn't want to respond to reviews from 2013 if the person (who has likely forgot about their experience with the business in question) is going to get an email notifying them of our late response to their review. Thank you!

    | BlueCorona
    1
  • MissThumann


    I've paid a company to add Schema to my website, but they just told me they can't add it to my homepage? Is this correct??

    | MissThumann
    0
  • LindaWolfe


    Yelp has embed code for reviews now - does it count as duplicate content?  Will this hurt or help my SEO?

    | LindaWolfe
    0
  • FathomMarketing


    I'm a home based business. I know Google has cracked down on PO boxes and UPS locations. What is one to do if they work from home but don't conduct business with clients from their home office? How can I get an address that's Google-approved?

    | FathomMarketing
    1
  • PSLab


    Most of my clients go to the clients home to provide their service.  For example a plumber or a bed bug extermination.  Most of my clients find it hard to ask for and get reviews even though they do a great job.  Is there an app or anything else out there that makes the process easier and gets better results than just asking? Are there any review aggregator applications?  Maybe an application that a client can write a review in one location and the review is pushed out to multiple sites like Google My Business or YP?

    | PSLab
    0
  • PaulS71


    I'm looking at paid review services like Trustpilot, FeeFo and others. I'm told I can filter out bad reviews, which I can't do with my Google Certified Stores reviews. I'm struggling to understand why Google include these in the reviews it uses for the star ratings in search ads. I know it's a different thing, but surely these reviews are in breach of the rules that Google apply to their own "My Business" reviews? They talk about "Conflict of interest: Reviews are most valuable when they are honest and unbiased" here: https://support.google.com/business/answer/2622994?hl=en Does anyone have a take on whether Google will drop these as the momentum builds in collection of their own reviews? Thanks, Paul

    | PaulS71
    0
  • AL123al


    Hello, This is pretty frustrating. This is the third time Yelp has hidden a review for my business. I don't know why. I am trying to get lots of reviews on different platforms but I feel at the mercy of  Yelp as they decide what to show and what not. I think it was triggered when I actually replied to the reviewer on Yelp. I should have done nothing I think. Any hints or reasons why this might be happening?

    | AL123al
    1
  • Carwrapsolutions


    Hello Moz fellowship. Ive been learning and following SEO and local optimization for many years. MOZ has been a SEO playbook and bible for me. Im running into a transparency issue with Google and need some help please. I sent Google GMB this email:Hello GMB "Hello GMB There is a bug in your system that revises a previously posted review date to a become a new current post date. The bug occurs when someone updates a previously posted review with new pictures or deletes and updates new pictures. When the deletion occurs and new pictures are uploaded, the old review becomes the new date of the picture updates. This bug allows an old review to become a new review. I can send screen shots and can explain how I found this out if Google would like. Basically it doesn't show a true representation of the time line of posted reviews. Thank you"Google GMB support on the phone says it is not a bug. The problem is that its show non-factual and untruthful timeline information to potential consumers because of the original review date changes. The rep says that example: a reviewer from 3 years ago original review could show up as the most recent review with the most recent date. The main problem is, any consumer shopping and doing research would misinterpret this as being the newest review when it was not. On GMB dashboard the date gets revised to show the latest date. There is no notation that the review is old or that there has been a modification to the original review. So where is the transparency on Google's side to show the customer the actual real date of the review? This problem opens up a can of worms for millennials trying to make it happen and for business owners that are trying their best to become better at their service, etc. Especially when you want the newest review and not something from years ago or months ago or dealing with a potential harassing customer who knows the bug exist and will take advantage of the flaw and constantly update his review so it shows as being the 1st all the time. How does the online customer know this is happening?thank you.

    | Carwrapsolutions
    0
  • David-Kley


    I have noticed that some directory or profile sites are showing a longer than normal meta description in search results. How is this accomplished? All regular sites are only showing the normal amount, but these sites are showing a higher character limit in search results. NGNz7

    | David-Kley
    0
  • znotes


    Would anyone know why after adding schema.org markup to a websites products, reviews and ratings why it still isn't showing up in Google SERPs? Does Google pick and choose who's rich snippets get displayed on a random basis or some other criteria?

    | znotes
    0
  • Parker818


    In just the last week, it seems like Google has removed reviews for businesses in our industry (staffing), which is unfortunate since we've been working hard for those reviews. The effect has been to be completely left off the local google business results. One week, we're at the top of the business reviews with our location prominently featured on the map and the next, we aren't even listed. It seems like there must be list of industries in which Google takes reviews into account (or if they do, then at least displays the reviews in the results). For us, up until last week, if you searched "temp agencies", these reviews were included in SERP. Now, nothing. Is this fairly normal behavior for Google?

    | Parker818
    0
  • Amorg


    Some of our searches are coming on the first page at Google, which is great (these are New Product Watch pages  https://hometesterclub.com/au/en/Products/ ) https://www.google.com.au/?gws_rd=ssl#q=Kettle+Popcorn+Salted+Caramel+review https://www.google.com.au/?gws_rd=ssl#q=Coca-Cola+Ginger+review https://www.google.com.au/?gws_rd=ssl#q=Herbert+Adams+review .. and yet some (particularly Home Tested Section https://hometesterclub.com/au/en/HomeTested/ ) have very poor results, ie no where to be found: https://www.google.com.au/?gws_rd=ssl#q=hydralyte+sports+review https://www.google.com.au/?gws_rd=ssl#q=Rafferty%27s+Garden+review https://www.google.com.au/?gws_rd=ssl#q=Purina+Beneful+Medley+review .. we are often either nowhere to be found, even if we have hundreds of reviews for these products… and seem to be often beaten to the punch by the likes of: www.productreview.com.au / www.influenster.com / www.mouthsofmums.com.au do you think that these other sites just have more sites linking to them, and so stronger natural page ranking? Any insight would be helpful..

    | Amorg
    0
  • brettmandoes


    Google released new guidelines last year governing how schema markup is to be deployed on a website. One of those guidelines states that reviews on your site must not be filtered or altered to receive the benefit of schema markup. After my client was slapped on the wrist by Google for ignoring their Webmaster guidelines (and our advice ahem) they removed all filtering from the websites. However, being a family friendly company it is a requirement that no profanity be displayed on the website. Google's guidelines are not entirely clear about what to do. They state: "Profanity and vulgar language are discouraged. Reviews should be appropriate for a broad and diverse audience. Consequently, reviews containing vulgar or profane language may be ineligible for use." and... "Critic reviews must allow for customers to express both positive and negative sentiments. They may not be vetted by the business or restricted by the content provider based on the positive/negative sentiment of the review before submission to Google." The issue is that we need to vet the reviews to remove profanity, yet that may be triggering for Google. Any thoughts?
    Source: https://developers.google.com/search/docs/data-types/reviews

    | brettmandoes
    1
  • Christian_T


    We have a website where you can book on restaurants, and afterwards you can review the restaurant you visited. So we have this page: https://www.r2n.dk/restauranter/restaurant-bonjour-vietnam (We have one for each restaurant). English version https://www.r2n.dk/en/restauranter/restaurant-bonjour-vietnam The page is marked up in microData, and when I test the site in google structured data it shows no errors https://search.google.com/structured-data/testing-tool#url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.r2n.dk%2Frestauranter%2Frestaurant-bonjour-vietnam . But the page does not show up on google with a rich snippet (The review stars). I am thinking it might be one of the following things. Either it is because there is multiple "Restaurants" on the page, where the others appear in recommended restaurants, where we also marked them up as much as possible. Or else it could be because the reviews are hidden behind the "Anmeldelser"(Reviews) button, where they are retrieved via a ajax request, but if this was the case I don't get why this other site where the reviews does not appear is working fine: https://www.just-eat.dk/restaurants-bonjourvietnam Also it is a week since we finaly correctly implemented the structured data on the page, so I don't know if I should wait a longer time(Though the page has been cached by google multiple times since we updated the code)

    | Christian_T
    0

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