Category: Google Maps

There are numerous reports of Google Maps listings, Google My Business listings that have had their suspension removed then seeing all of the reviews they had on their listings vanish. Joy Hawkins at the Local Search Forums wrote “listings that are su…

I am seeing reports of business owners and local SEOs saying they are seeing a new category being added to some of the business listings they manage. The category is called POI Establishment and folks are confused what this is about, espesially because…

You’ve seen the Google local services ads before, they have the Google Guarantee label on them. But when the Google Assistant started showing ads, people asked how does one not pay to show up in the local listings if you need the guarantee label but t…

Google posted on Twitter that within Google My Business you can now highlight and post automatically suggested reviews as customer testimonials. Google said “Google My Business now provides suggested posts to help you showcase positive reviews. These …

A thread at the Local Search Forums has different local SEOs saying different things about how Google Posts helps their local rankings in Google Maps and local. Some say it helps, some say it doesn’t help and some don’t know either way.

Google My Business is rolling out a new feature to let businesses define their short name and URLs within Google My Business. This way you can when you share your short name, customers can enter the short name URL in the browser’s address bar, like “g….

Does your business still have a fax number? I’ll be honest, I spend about $10 per month to have one and I use it maybe once every several months. Did you know Google can list the fax number in your local knowledge panel? They can. Here is one for on…

Google is experimenting with a new dashboard for the Google My Business section. The new dashboard shows larger cover images and photos that you can change for your business.

Last month we reported Google launched a new form to report Google My Business/Google Maps spam. After a few weeks in, local SEOs are reporting how fast you can see action after a spam report is submitted. It seems it currently ranges from 1.5 weeks to…

A few weeks ago I spotted a thread at the Local Search Forums where someone shared a new user interface for the Google My Business Dashboard or a newsih business being verified in GMB. Now Google kind of gamifies the process of completing your Google …

No wonder Google kept turning on the Google Assistant call feature in your Google My Business account – Google just announced that they are rolling out the ability for the Google Assistant to book tables at restaurants in 43 US States.

Google has added a line to the business description guidelines within the Google My Business guidelines basically making it clear that they do not allow the description to contain irrelevant content.

The other week, I had a customer ask me if there is a way to stop Google from asking their customers or visitors to confirm their visits in Google Maps. As far as I know, there is no way to do that from the Google My Business venue end.

Kara from Google announced in the Google My Business Help forums that they’ve updated how reviews work for hotels within the desktop search results. “We’ve updated how Reviews look for hotels on Desktop Google Maps. Now, Desktop Google Maps displays re…

The other week we reported that Google by default has opted in all Google My Business listings to receive calls via the Google Assistant with their Duplex technology. But get this, a local SEO said they went in, removed the opt in (manually opted out) …

Anyone can edit a business listings details on Google Maps and local. So if you have a competitor and you want to close them down, or shut their business hours, or change their web site address or worse, you can do that. The business owner may notice…

Google announced in the Google My Business Help forums that owners of businesses within Google My Business can now reply to reviews directly using Google Maps on desktop. Prior you could do it in Google My Business, in the Google My Business app and in…

Sergey Alakov spotted Google testing or launching, I don’t see it yet, a button in the local panel for “get in line.” It is a waitlist feature that seems to be powered by DineTime for restaurants to enable people to put themselves on a wait list to be…

Google has a setting in Google My Business to allow or disallow hone calls from Google Assistant to your business. It launched as a beta last October and became a setting around then as well in the Google My Business dashboard. Now it seems that all…