Both our listings had been in place for quite some time – maybe a couple of years – and were probably originally setup about the same time.

So perhaps the re-verification was triggered by a “listing age” factor. Both listings had been modified over this period though – one just a few months ago.

Thanks for the url. I knew that i had seen others with the problem but due to an aging brain could not for the life of me remember where.

@Dave R
It is ironic that they didn’t stop running the ads…but now that I have more examples of it happening relatively spontaneously.

What’s interesting is that this client uses their local business listings to show AdWords local business ads too. Google continues to show the local business ads but no longer shows the business listings. Go figure.

DR

http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/maps/thread?tid=15da0d201d22b790&hl=en

Maps Guide Cecelia replied stating that “There may be a technical issue here.” She was then kind enough to email us and confirm the account details, suggesting that if we trigger the postcard verification they would then approve the listings from their end. Sadly that was the last we heard from Cecelia or anyone at Google on the issue, and the postcards arrived this week. We’ve since entered the codes from the postcards and the listings have now been reinstated.

Still curious as to what may have caused this initially, and what if anything can be done to avoid a repeat of this in the future.

I have not done any posts about it.

For the most part, the best practice currently is to claim a business into their own LBC as it does work better with Adwords and ultimately gives the client more control over their listing.

Most of the ones I have in the LBC have been there for a very long time, long before there was even a best practice or locally targeted adwords or concerns client control of their own listing. It was a time when it was thought that Google was moving towards an agency model for the LBC about and there were no guidance from Google on the matter.

Also many of these listings are personal friends or long time acquaintances that really want nothing to do with the LBC with whom I have long standing relations. They are perfectly happy with me managing the listings for them.

Nowadays I typically open a new Google account for new LBC entries.

That all being said, managing LBC listings in multiple accounts is complicated, confusing and time consuming. They are a growing pain to set up and more work to access. Everybody develops their own work flow but they are not in the least friendly to an agency workflow. Since I typically control the mail server for many of my clients I can work around some of the limitations and still create the account with an email at their domain.

There are still benefits to having a single login and view of the information and occasionally I will still put a small client into my LBC.

Ideally Google will get their act together and provide some multi level access so that there are fewer compromises.

I’d be very interested to hear your thoughts on including those SME business listings in *your* LBC account vs creating their own account for them that they ‘own’

Do you have any existing posts about this? If not, would you mind expanding on this in a future post?

I was under the impression it was best (for them) to have their own acount – which would then tie in with their own webmaster tools etc
But you obviously have a large number of accounts under your own banner…

thanks in advance for listening

mike

The ROI in many business is very good, that’s for sure. As more businesses realize this it will become more difficult for the early adopters…

The ability to hijack listings which was at a peak early last year, has been severely restricted by Google. I would be curious if you have or know of specific techniques to allow the hijacking without the involvement of the owner (ie social engineering)…

@Jim

Ah the pleasures of Google Maps…

Does make me wonder tho…..I did note that one client now has “missing” stats…were there just last Monday but now all that shows for them is a hyphen….

Hmm…more google-ness to wonder about….sigh!

Jim