Potential Ethical Conflict: Google My Business Paid Reviews
-
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.
-
I probably got hit by the survey a half dozen times over the course of a year. The problem was it's really difficult to take screenshots on my phone, without closing out to the 'desktop'. Finally managed to capture one about six months ago, then sat on it.
I know the brands involved, so it's probably pretty easy to verify if the pay per review thing was sanctioned. I'm just not certain which tree to bark up.
To me, it's clear the ethics have been at least modestly bent. Compensation involved with any review is a paid review. But the dark side tells me if this is readily available, it might be handy one day.
-
Hmm, not sure what to make of that, and what I don't like about the graphic you captured is that image showing the 5 stars on it. I wish I had some more time to dig into this, but I'm swamped right now. If this is being regulated by Google, the there's nothing to do about it, but like I said, I'm not familiar with Rewards, so I don't know all the ins and outs.
-
Little bit of column A, little bit of column B. It appears to me that it's an option a marketer may choose, and Google is cool with it - hence the 'Hey, this is gonna be public, but you'll get more credit. The portion of the survey I captured has a graphic.
Usually it's just text with tick boxes, and/or radio buttons.
-
Hey Travis,
I've been thinking about this thread and wanted to come back to it with a question for you. You wrote:"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?"
I'm not signed up for Google Rewards and have a question. Is the solicitation for the review in exchange for an incentive something being automated by Google, or is it your impression that the review ask is stemming from unique language created by the hotel, itself?
-
How do Miriam,
My concern here is that it appears, face value, to be a sanctioned measure. And it wouldn't be the first time Google ran afoul of their own standards. Though I'm a little torn.
On the one hand, it's a review for compensation. On the other, given a larger metro, you can build up a decent bit of reviews on the quick. So it's either a gift horse, or a moral quandary.
That's why I thought it was an interesting question.
I don't think this was a rogue actor thing. I think it was, at least at the time, sanctioned by someone in the Rewards domain.
-
Hey Travis,
Excellent topic. You have two options here, as what the hotel is doing is absolutely a violation of Google's guidelines if they are offering any kind of incentive in exchange for a Google-based review:
- If you feel concern for the hotel, you could be kind here and reach out to them directly to let them know they are seriously endangering their entire corpus of reviews as well as their brand reputation by incentivizing reviews. Personally, I would take this route. I would point the hotel to this recent thread in the GMB forum in which a brand was reported for offering free zoo tickets in exchange for reviews and ended up losing 96 of their 101 reviews: https://www.en.advertisercommunity.com/t5/forums/v3_1/forumtopicpage/board-id/Spam_and_Policy/page/1/thread-id/22628
It is so not worth the risk! At any time, any customer or competitor could report the hotel and they'd have a total reputation mess on their hands. So, I'd probably do the nice thing and let them know that. Sometimes, brands genuinely do not know the guidelines and haven't made the connection that they are deceiving their own clientele by making an incentivized review appear as though it is unbiased. So, I'd be inclined to give them a heads-up, if I thought ignorance was the root of their marketing activities. I'd be more inclined to believe this if the business was a small hotel. If it's a large hotel chain, I'd be less inclined to believe they'd just made a mistake ... they have a marketing department that shouldn't be allowing this activity to put the brand at risk.
- However, if you feel the hotel is wittingly doing this, knowing they are deceiving the public and violating Google's guidelines, then you can take this over to the GMB forum and document/report this obvious case of review spam. It will then be up to the TCs there to escalate or not.
Good luck. Unfortunately, review spam is an incredibly widespread issue, often being generated by global networks. It's really unfortunate.
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 to make Google show reviews from Facebook and Google My Business?
I wonder if there is anything I can do to increase the chance that Google shows stars that indicate the average score of our reviews from Facebook or Google MyBusiness for the keywords where we rank nr. 1, for instance our brand name?
Reviews and Ratings | | AudunBK0 -
Beware of Fishy 4-Star Reviews
Hello to all our folks who market local businesses! I came across something this week that I felt was important enough to share. Hopefully, if you're a Moz blog reader or a Moz Local customer, you're already well aware of the importance of monitoring your Google My Business reviews on an ongoing basis, responding to them as they come in, whether they're positive or negative. And, you know to be on the lookout for spam reviews. But a strange new form of spam seems to be emerging that might be really easy to overlook at first. We're all familiar with the spammer who leaves you fake 1-star reviews for the purpose of harming your brand. But you might not immediately be suspicious of a 4-star review, or even a string of 4-star reviews until you realize your former 5 star rating has been whittled down by a succession of less-than-perfect, fake reviews. The worst thing, I think, about this tactic, is that it can be overlooked. Jason Brown has captured this phenomenon in his recent post: http://reviewfraud.org/4-star-negative-review-attacks/ and I highly recommend reading it and paying extra attention to any 4-star reviews companies you market may be receiving. I'd suggest, if you find this going on with any of the GMB listings you manage, you report it to Jason so that he can continue to track this activity. He's a Google forum TC, and, perhaps, with enough evidence, he might eventually be able to make a case to Google about this practice.
Reviews and Ratings | | MiriamEllis5 -
Reviews and Google - whats their relationship?
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
Reviews and Ratings | | Ruchy1 -
Review page set up
Hey Gang! So I have a client with multiple locations in different metros. I would like to set up a page in WordPress for each metro that the technician can give to the happy client so they can review us. I would like to have a link to my GMB, Yelp, Yellowpages, and whatever else I can grab. Is there a badass plugin for this or what would you guys do? Much love.
Reviews and Ratings | | Meier0 -
Motivating Clients to leave reviews
We are a bankruptcy law firm and therefore getting clients to post a public review is challenging, as they don't wish to disclose the fact that they filed for bankruptcy. I recently audited our local competitors. Most just have one or two reviews. But 2 firms in particular have 6- 10x the amount of what is "normal" for our practice area, and in addition they are 1.) all 5-star reviews 2.) the only review they had ever posted by that person (seems unnatural that your first and only review is of a bankruptcy attorney). This is the exact same fact pattern for both attorneys, so I am wondering if they are using a special tool or some how incentivizing clients to leave a 5 star review...is there any way to know if they are using unethical practices? So my question: how do we motivate happy clients to leave a public review when they the nature of our practice is a private matter? Is there a helpful tool or method people have found good success with? Is there a way to leave anonymous or first name only reviews on Google Plus? We have a lot of review on the testimonials section of our website, but clients who submit ask us to change their name for privacy. Could we somehow post these on Google Plus for the clients, while still keeping within the regulations of Google? Thanks in advance for your insights!
Reviews and Ratings | | JulieALS0 -
Moving my photography business to another state. Is it possible to transfer Google My Business listing WITHOUT losing my Google Reviews?
A friend of mine is transitioning her photography business to another state. She moved about 5 years ago and consequently lost all of her Google+/Yelp reviews. Having reviews as a photographer is EXTREMELY important for her business reputation. She doesn't want this to happen again. Is it possible to change the location of a Google my Business page and keep the existing reviews? Thanks
Reviews and Ratings | | RosemaryB0 -
Too many reviews too quickly?
Is there any sort of guideline on this? Right now, we have very few google reviews. However, I've cross referenced a list of our happiest clients with people who have g+ accounts. There are at least 12 clients, I feel strongly would write us g+ reviews if I asked them to. I want to just get the word out today, but I'm worried if 8-12 reviews in a week would red flag us. I've heard that getting too many reviews to quickly can be a problem, but I'm thinking that more like 100 than 10, but I have no idea. Most of my competitors don't have any reviews, and the most any of them have is 10. I don't know if that matters at all either in terms of triggering a red flag. I'd appreciate whatever insight you all could give. Thanks, Ruben
Reviews and Ratings | | KempRugeLawGroup0 -
Best E-Mail Service For Customer Reviews
Hello Moz Community, I manage an online wallpaper store. The site is totalwallovering.com We already have a 5 star review form in place on all product pages with rich snippets. I want to set up my own system for e-mailing customers two weeks after they purchase wallpaper from us, in effect asking them leave us a review of the product. Most people are generally willing to do so if they get a reminder. So far in the past 6 months since we have added the review form we have gotten eight reviews. I got a call from Trustpilot last week and I really liked their system ALOT but I am unwilling to pay $600/month. I would rather have all of my reviews on my own website. I literally have thousands of past customers and would like to bulk upload them into the system so that I can generate hundreds of reviews quickly but if that is not possible I can just start with the customers I get today. I am open to any suggestions. Thanks
Reviews and Ratings | | Wesley-Barras0