What types of businesses does Google display reviews in SERP for?
-
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?
-
Hi Jacob,
Yes, unfortunately there is no strategy for overriding Possum if you are being affected by it due to sharing a building and category with a competitor. This is a completely separate issue from whether or not Google is displaying in-SERP stars for your industry. It's highly unlikely that the two things have anything to do with one another.
While I don't know the complete details of your scenario, what you are describing regarding having to zoom on Maps to see yourself sounds very much like Possum, given your shared building/category with a competitor. Unless you can change your categories (which normally you wouldn't want to do) the effect you are experiencing is now being felt by numerous businesses in your same scenario.
How are you doing in terms of competing with that competitor who is showing up at the non-zoomed level of the map? How are your citations (do you have a good set, are they accurate, free of duplicates)? How about review count and sentiment in Google? How strong is your website?
Because Possum is still so new, I've yet to see many cases brought to light of how a given business is chosen over another one as the one Google is showing at the non-zoomed level, but I would expect ranking factors and user behavior have something to do with it.
Sorry not to have an easy solution for you. I hope these thoughts are at least helpful.
-
Thanks for this.
The Possum article is very interesting, but there's no word as to how to appear on the map. We don't show up until you zoom in to the block, which is problematic for us. We had actually been showing up first on the local search results (on page one, but not the actual map results page) until the SERP stars were removed.
-
Hi Jacob,
From what you are describing, it sounds like you are actually experiencing two different things:
-
Google not showing in-SERPs stars for your geo-industry (they do make these pop in and out of existence, so they could come back).
-
Possum. If you are sharing a physical building and Google categories with a competitor, this is most likely why your business isn't showing up in Maps unless you zoom in. Here's a very good guide to this: http://searchengineland.com/everything-need-know-googles-possum-algorithm-update-258900
Hope this helps.
-
-
I'll add that what I'm seeing is similar to this issue, reported last February. At the time, it was temporary, so hopefully this is a bug that Google will address shortly:
-
It looks like what happened is that Google removed review summaries (stars and such) from SERP for our business category, so our reviews are no longer visible on the page. On local, the review summary is also missing, unless you click on us specifically.
This had the effect of removing us completely off of the local map results. We're listed, but not on the map. This is probably the biggest loss for us, as we share a building with a competitor and only recently overtook them (as local did not like displaying two companies in one building unless you zoomed in close).
The link you provided doesn't discuss how reviews are displayed on SERP, but thank you nonetheless!
-
Hi Jacob,
The definitive resource on reviews for Google is found here: https://developers.google.com/search/docs/data-types/reviews
I'm not 100% certain I understand your problem. Are you worried about first party reviews wrapped in schema, or third party reviews? Are you able to see reviews in your Google My Business dashboard, or in a knowledge panel when you search your brand? Have you checked competitors who have been garnering reviews?
There are some industries that cannot display reviews due to legislation, such as financial advisors. I don't believe your industry falls into that category, and you may just be experiencing some normal fluctuation in the SERP. Verify the points I mentioned above and perhaps we can find an answer.
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
-
Does having a Google My Business website help my local seo?
Everybody says it's important to put as much information as you can into your Google My Business listing. I'm wondering if it helps to take Google up on it's offer to give you a free website in addition to the website I already have of my own.
Reviews and Ratings | | KenLapp1 -
Does Google's 3rd Party Reviews Guideline Update make Review Aggregators Obsolete?
Good day!We are concerned about Google's updated Guidelines in ratings and reviews, specifically as quoted in the SEO Roundtable: "The new guidelines specifically disallows you from using 3rd party reviews, found on other sites, and marking those up on your site."https://www.seroundtable.com/google-updates-reviews-markup-guidelines-22608.htmlThe Guidelines are here https://developers.google.com/search/docs/data-types/reviews#local-business-reviewsWe enlist the use of a 3rd party aggregate for one of our client's (service business). Since, in effect, it is a 3rd party review site, and what the shortcode does is copy reviews from that third party site and mark them up on the client website. What do you guys know about this update, and what are is your take on what the update says and how it relates to a 3rd party review aggregators? Thanks!
Reviews and Ratings | | LinkRightMedia0 -
Indeed reviews
Hi guys, Is there any way I can respond or have a review deleted from one of my clients' profile on Indeed.com? Is there a mediation process of any sort? Thanks.
Reviews and Ratings | | echo10 -
Yelp to Show Evidence of "Review Fraud"
I just came across this post on SELand: http://searchengineland.com/yelp-adds-link-to-evidence-of-review-fraud-222740 Has anybody noticed this on their/a client's Yelp page? I'm curious to know what percentage of listings have received this type of flag. What are your thoughts on this new implementation?
Reviews and Ratings | | JimmyPage1 -
Started using a 3rd Party Review Company for our Website. Do we need to show the reviews or is a widget (badge) with a link back to review company sufficient enough from an SEO ranking point of view?
Hi All, We have started to use a 3rd party review company and now have the choice of either implementing their re-supplied widgets (Java ) on our site showing customer reviews or use their an API to get this information. The widgets (Java) , would be loaded once the page is actually loaded so I am not sure how and if google will read this information if at all? If we use a widget then we won't be able to implement it with Schema.org although we will be able to use rich snippets to it will appear on any PPC (once we have had 30 reviews). If we go down the API route, it's more expensive for us but we can use the review schema.org for this. Does anyone have any experience of what works best for them ?.. We have a choice of having a widget showing latest reviews or just a badge (which is actually a link to the review site showing our reviews). From an SEO point of view, is one better than the other ? Does google actually read the content of the review or is the link back to the 3rd party review company sufficient enough to help with rankings etc. Am I correct in assuming that by linking to a 3rd party review company and showing our reviews on our site , this will help with rankings as even though the content in the reviews doesn't really say much ,. I did see it was a ranking factor on the survey but not sure how google uses this. ? I've read up some information on reviews etc but wondered what the general consensus was with what others found works best for them Any help greatly appreciated Pete
Reviews and Ratings | | PeteC120 -
Migrating Reviews from Old SIte
We recently changed our Website to Word Press and I would like to move the old reviews to the new site. I am concerned Google might not understand the reviews showing up all of a sudden. The old reviews were on a sub-domain (store.domain.com). I will be able to match the dates and text as well as names. Any advice or Best Practice on this? Thanks!
Reviews and Ratings | | Chris6610 -
Google reviews only show up in local results, right?
Two quick questions: 1. google reviews only show up in local results right? 2. If you're 100% e-commerce business with no office location, can you even get a google review? Thanks, Ruben
Reviews and Ratings | | KempRugeLawGroup0 -
How to display reviews from review sites on your own website?
Is there a good way to display reviews that people have left on sites like Yelp, City Search, Google, etc on your own website without triggering duplicate content issues? It's hard to get reviews, so I'd like to make the most out of the ones that I get.
Reviews and Ratings | | atstickel0