How does google know if rich snippet reviews are fake?
-
According to: https://developers.google.com/structured-data/rich-snippets/reviews - all someone has to do is add in some html code and write the review. How does google do any validation on whether these reviews are legitimate or not?
-
Hi Lingke!
Good feedback from everyone here. I just wanted to be sure to throw into the mix that fact that John Mueller specifically stated last December that Google does not want markup on on-site testimonials:
https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/webmasters/wY1vF2RRos4/discussion
More on this here:
-
My guess is that Google is getting better and better at detecting false review data. There is a lot of academic research around this area, particularly in accounting fraud, where patterns created by humans to appear random do a poor job of actually representing standard data. A popular example of this is called Benford's Law where leading digits of certain data sets (like electricity bills) are more likely to be lower digits (starting with the number 1, for example). When people try and fake the data, they don't tend to follow this law.
Google has huge data sets on validated reviews and known-fraudulent reviews. If there is a way to detect unbelievable reviews, you got to believe Google is working on it.
That being said, this is probably the best reason not to start posting fake reviews... it's illegal.
-
The answer here is "no" Google has no idea if they are fake or not. Google may be able to tell if the reviews are duplicated on other sites (as it can do with other content) and so could in theory not rank the pages with the duplicate content/reviews. A common recommendation we give to a small business is to not copy reviews from other sites for this reason, and usually reprinting reviews are a violation of the TOS of the review site. I would speculate that Google could look at the overall reputation/authority of a site to see if they display snippets, but that it really only a guess on my part.
The only thing that Google can validate, to a degree, are the reviews that come through Google+ type profiles. They can do things like see if a profile was created, gave a single positive review and then the user never logs in again. That would obviously be a suspect pattern and there are for sure other examples. I have seen Google sometimes do things like look at a business, see if it has a validated Google Local profile and if they do, Google will pull in reviews from review sites and display them in the Google local cards. There is a bit of validation there as the business has taken the time to verify itself in Google Local.
That said, I would say many users can tell a fake review a mile away. We bring focus groups onto a review site I help with and they can tell when things look "off". I would not waste my time with fake ones for that reason alone.
Also, if you do have legitimate reviews, you do need to make sure the markup is correct if you want the snippets to show in the SERPs. If your markup is not valid the snippets will not show up. The Rich Snippets testing tool can help with this
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
How Do You Know or Find Out if You've been hit by a Google Penalty?
Hi Moz Community, How do you find out if you have been hit with a Google Penalty? Thanks, Gary
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | gdavey0 -
I was penalized by Google? What do you think i have to do?
Id like some help, My site had a rank fall and I think I was penalized by Penguin, I compared running a 'Full SERP Report "and I see no reason for me to be in 4th place in the SERP.The Facts: I have a higher: Page Authority, # of Root Domains Linking to the Page, Domain Authority, # of Root Domains Linking to the Domain, MozRank, MozTrust My mT/mR is 0.955 against: #1->0.983 #2->0 #3->1.023 (but my mozrank and moz trust is higher My website is: https://www.soprojetos.com.br/ this occours since Nov 2015. I have 99 external links against: #1->15 #2->0 #3->11 Link to OSE:https://moz.com/researchtools/ose/links?site=www.soprojetos.com.br&filter=&source=external&target=page&group=0&page=1&sort=page_authority&anchor_id=&anchor_type=&anchor_text=&from_site=What I think:I guess a have to Disallow some links that some crazy Real Estate Websites made to my website, but i'm afraid to do this, and id like an oppinion about why my website is not ranking first to "plantas de casas" and "projetos de casas" anymore, my competitors are not so well seen on google as me (according to moz) (sorry for my bad english i'm brazilian) Thanks in Advance
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | aneebelo0 -
I have plenty of backlinks but the site does not seem to come up on Google`s first page.
My site has been jumping up and down for many months now. but it never stays on Google first page. I have plenty of back-links, shared content on social media. But what could i be doing wrong? any help will be appreciated. Content is legit. I have recently added some internal links is this might be the cause? Please help .
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | samafaq0 -
Unnatural inbound links message from Google Webmaster Tools!
Hi Everyone, I just got this message from GWT(image below) This is probably a penguin Penalty. What is clear is I have to find the best and most efficient way to tackle this issue. We will probably lose tons of traffic in the next couple of weeks so I would like to get the best suggestions and maybe a guideline on how to do this in the most effective way! Thank you! 1a0X2M2a1h0A
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Ideas-Money-Art0 -
How do I write tags on a youtube video for a local Google search?
I've been reading into tags, and I would like to know what the best ways to do them for a local search are. Right now I have a title that reads similar to, "Keyword1 and Keyword2 in City X" Would I make a corresponding tag that reads "Keyword 1 and Keyword 2 in City X,"? Or would I do "Keyword 1," "Keyword 2," and, "City X," as separate tags? Thanks!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | OOMDODigital0 -
Website is not stable on maps.google.com
My website is daily showing different position on maps.google.com and for the last few days like yesterday it was on 21st position on some keyword and today it is no where and same with other keywords. Is this a Google Dance ?? what can be its period ? and what is the solution to handle it ??
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | mnkpso0 -
Keyword Rich Domains on Same IP
In addition to my main website, I want to create two new sites for the upcoming football and basketball seasons. By starting now, I'm thinking I have enough time to get them ranked decently. I have purchased www.collegefootballpredictions.net for the upcoming football seasons. The intent here is two fold. First, I'd like to rank in the top 3 for "College Football Predictions." Second, and this is why I'm thinking that Google won't hate me for the approach, is that someone looking for that search term is much more likely to convert on a landing page geared for them then on my main website. If the goal of a separate website is truly to compliment the main website, then is it considered white hat? I'm thinking that, as long as my intentions are pure, they should go on the same IP. Placing them on separate IPs could be a good way of letting the big G know that I'm trying to cheat the system and get away with it.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | PatrickGriffith0 -
Hi, I found that one of my competitors have zero backlings in google, zero in yahoo but about 50.000 in Bing. How is that possible?
Hi, I found that one of my competitors have zero backlings in google, zero in yahoo but about 50.000 in Bing. How is that possible? I assumed that all search engines would finde the backlinks. Besides that he ranks fair well and better than I do with only a single site and with only one article of content while I have a lot of content and sites. I do not undersdtand why he is ranking better in google, while google assumingly does not see any backlinks of the 50.000 bing is finding. Thx, Dan
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | docschmitti0