Google only posting some reviews?
-
A doctor of mine recently complained that his patient went on to his Google+ Local listing and submitted a review, but it never showed up. The patient can see it on his own page, but it's not viewable publicly.
Any ideas or posts you've seen about this?
Thanks!
Tom
-
Ah! Excellent point. Thanks!
-
My pleasure, Tom! Google reviews are important, for sure - widely considered to be a ranking factor in their algo, but I'd advise the doctor to get reviews in a variety of places, just so that all his eggs aren't in one basket.
-
Thanks Kevin - it's helpful to see where Google stands on the matter.
Miriam - you're amazing. Thank you so much for your help so far on this. I'm going to read those articles. I think they'll get me pointed in the right direction so I can tell my client what's happening.
Thanks again!!
Tom
-
Hi Kevin,
Google's review product has been buggy since day one, but as of the rollout of the new Google+ system, the rise in review issues has been totally astronomical. The Google and Your Business Forum is literally drowning in complaints about this.
Read Mike Blumenthal's quick post: http://blumenthals.com/blog/2012/07/30/google-local-and-review-issues/
And here's another one from Mike that's been widely cited: http://blumenthals.com/blog/2012/09/24/asking-for-reviews-post-apocalypse/
I have seen lots and lots of threads in the Google forum about reviews being visible when logged in, but not in public.
Here's one: http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/business/XQYWVOCFebc
Here's another: http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!searchin/business/review$20only$20visible/business/9ro8W8hzKiM/CALKB8W7vwAJ
I wrote a post here at SEOmoz back in August on the subject of lost reviews:
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/lost-your-google-reviews-take-a-proactive-stance
However, despite the efforts of things like the Mike Blumenthal consolidated thread of lost reviews (referenced in my above blog post) the review system continues to be totally broken. This is a cause of huge frustration, particularly since Google has made it increasingly difficult to even leave a review. When so many of them get filtered out, the appeal of making an effort to review a business is certainly diminished. Google is basically trying to fight spam - which is good - but they are throwing the baby out with the bathwater in too many cases when it comes to reviews.
-
Tom,
From Google (may not answer your question though):
Here are some potential reasons reviews might not post, as outlined in this sticky post.
- Duplicate listings of the business. If we've got more than one page representing a business, reviews may live on one but not the other.- Old reviews. Reviews written before the Google+ Local launch display differently and may be difficult to find. You can upgrade the display of old reviews by trying to write a new review of any place.- Review sort. The default review sort on a page is by Most Helpful. Your recent review is not necessarily the first one to appear. You can change the sorting of reviews to Most Recent using the drop down menu above the first review.- URLs in reviews. We don't allow URLs in reviews. If you edit your review to remove the URL, it should post almost immediately.- Marked as spam. We can't share details about what exactly constitutes as spammy behavior, but the goal is to ensure that users viewing pages see only quality, legitimate information to make informed decisions. We know that sometimes our algorithms may flag and remove legitimate reviews in our effort to combat abuse, but believe that overall, these measures are helping to ensure that the reviews appearing on local Google+ pages are authentic, relevant and useful. Here's our reviews posting guidelines and policy: http://goo.gl/LtFCS
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 google index html5 tracks (captions) for videos?
If we add the <track> tag next to a html5 video, with a Web Video Text Tracks Format (WebVTT) file for video subtitles / captions will google visit that and index it?
Image & Video Optimization | | ismgadmin0 -
Google+ Local ranking for company with no website
Hi,
Image & Video Optimization | | Ant71
Im about to start helping a small business who has a facebook account but no website. Has anyone got any experience of getting a business ranking locally without a website? Just wandering if NAP details from a facebook / Google+ account helps with local citation building? Or whether a basic website is required? Antony0 -
Encouraging people to review my client's business on google places
Hello mozzers, I would like to encourage visitors that come to my site's client to review their google places listings. In order to do so, I need the Google places badge or seal (if it exists) to place it on their website. Does anyone know if it is available or not? If it sn't available what should i do to encourage Google places reviews? Thanks
Image & Video Optimization | | Ideas-Money-Art0 -
How do I get my site to rank in Google Videos?
I have a site that has quite a few videos. When I do a search from Google video's using keywords for our site, the site is not listed with the video site although it is listed with the html site. So how do I get Google to recognize that the site has all the videos. eg google video search with keywords: social media "damon adachi" website: biztvcanada.com Thanks Janice
Image & Video Optimization | | jwdavis0 -
Is anyone experiencing a large number of reviews disappearing in Google Places?
Just curious if anyone else has had issues with any clients losing lots of reviews in the last week?
Image & Video Optimization | | 4RealLocal0 -
Optimizing for Google Hotel Finder
Hi! As the Google Hotel Finder was also launched in Europe some days ago I was wondering if there is already some best practices for optimizing the entries. I guess that most of the information is directly integrated from the respective Google Places Page... Any insights or views on this topic?
Image & Video Optimization | | adwordize0 -
How come none of my images are being indexed by google.
None of my images are being indexed by google. Here is a link to one of my site gallery pages : http://www.mconcrete.com/gallery/stamped-concrete
Image & Video Optimization | | munoz04510 -
Google Places & Maps
Hi I'm preparing a confernce in France to explain Google Places & Maps to an audience interested in promoting local businesses but mainly hotels and other tourism related. As you know, searches such as Hotel + City are giving a lot of visibility to Google Places results. Being in the top results is as important if not more important than organic ranking. I'm going to be looking into the new presentation of Google Places results in the SERPs and maybe underlining a difference in results between Places and Maps which I've just recently spotted. Can anyone recommend some good ressources online to explain the changes that came about with Google Places and ranking factors I should be talking about ? If you have a pet theory on what triggers the different presentation of Places results in the main SERPS or what factors make one local business rank better than another in Google Places then please discuss below too 😉 Ah ! Almost forgot, any feedback on Google Boost use also interesting for us ; although it isn't in France yet Thanks Neil
Image & Video Optimization | | NeilInFrance0