Category: Google Maps

Google may be testing (or it might be a bug) removing reviews from the local knowledge panel in the search results. It seems so weird that I am thinking this is a weird bug, but who knows. Darcy Burk posted this on Twitter with screen shots showing t…

Google announced it is now limiting the number of service areas a business can list to no more than 20. Google wrote in the Google Ads Help page “service area businesses are now limited to having a maximum of 20 service areas per business.”

Earlier this year Google added short names as an option for businesses in Google My Business. So if you wanted to give someone a quick way to see your business on Google Maps you would send them g.page/[yourcustomname]. Now this short name shows in the…

The Google My Business app is testing allowing business owners communicate with its customers not just through text but also through photos. Some business owners can now send photos to customers who message them via Google Maps and Google Local.
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Google My Business seems to be testing a new feature to help business owners respond to reviews left by customers in Google Maps. Cordell Crowley posted this GIF of it in action in the Local Search Forums, where Google is auto-suggesting replies for r…

When you saw a review from a “Google User” in your Google My Business listings, a local review from a user who has not set up a real Google account, you were able to hover your cursor over that name and it would show you an abridged version of the emai…

Blake Denman received one of those local Google spam calls while at PubCon and Joy Hawkins was with him. Greg Gifford recorded the call and shared the video with everyone. It is pretty funny.

There are reports from some schools that they cannot display reviews from its parent body or others on Google Maps and Google My Business. Joy Hawkins said in the Local Search Forums “Reviews left for schools in Canada were not showing up yesterday bu…

Many local SEOs are noticing that the Google Local Q&A or Google My Business Questions and Answers feature is buggy. Some are saying the Q&As are going missing and disappearing.

Google is now letting you search by photos or search photos of places – Google is testing both terminologies – for local results. This was spotted back in August but then Mike Blumenthal spotted it last week and it seems to be available to all for som…

Andy Simpson posted an example of a business listing in Google Maps that shows animated GIFs for some of its business photos. So I guess you can upload animated GIFs to your Google My Business profile and those on mobile looking at your local listing …

Google announced that you can now make some edits to Google My Business listings as an unverified business owner within Google My Business. Google said “Business owners will be able to suggest edits to some core business information directly from thei…

In July 2017 Google launched a messaging feature within the Google My Business platform. One of the options was to respond to messages via SMS, a text message. That is going away on November 15th and you will only be able to manages the messages via t…

Joy Hawkins posted in the Local Search Forums that there is a new Google My Business form to opt out of online orders on Google. I cannot tell you how many times Google shows me an option to order online for restaurants and I go through the process an…

Via Tim Capper, you can now check to see if your business is verified with Google My Business. To do so, go to this URL, make sure your email is associated with the Google My Business and go through the steps.

So we have a dozen or so Google web search rank checking tools that tell us if they pick up on Google algorithm or ranking fluctuations. But we don’t have much when it comes to local ranking changes. BrightLocal has just released a tool it named Local…

Last week we reported that the pagination feature for the Google Maps local results went away. Well, now it appears to be back. Some are seeing the old user interface for pagination, but I am seeing a new more slim version.

Recently, I guess the past couple of weeks or so, the Google Discover feed started showing restaurants you might be interested in. This is obviously important if you help local restaurants with their Google My Business listings.

Google has made a small change to the Google My Business Guidelines explaining and clarifying the roles of practitioners. Joy Hawkins posted in the Local Search Forums that the line that was added was “Sales associates or lead generation agents for cor…

If you go to Google Maps, search for a service in a locale, Google will not let you go to page two of those results. Instead, Google will just stop showing you results and ask you to “see web results” for more. Previously, Google would let you click t…