As you know, I am addicted to following and answering questions in the Google Places forums. My penchant for the foibles of others and Google is insatiable. This posting is why I just keep going back for more.
Someone uploaded pictures of poo on my business listing and I can’t get them off!!!
Topic of your question (reviews, categories, duplicate listing, etc.): VERY innappropriate Photos
Your business name as it is in your Google Places account: Jeff DiBlasi State Farm Insurance
Your business type/category (e.g. photographer, hospital, etc.): Auto Insurance
URL(s) if applicable: http://maps.google.com/maps/place?q=lansdowne+pa+state+farm&hl=en&cid=12400822114645752135
Someone put REALLY inappropriate photos of pictures of poo on my business listing. I’ve discovered this business is currently claimed in 2 accounts and NEITHER account have these photos but it says “from the owner” on them. I need these off my listing ASAP. I’ve posted on other threads and reported the photos several times and I’m at a loss of what to do. This is severely damaging to the company’s reputation and it’s been weeks since I first reported them.
Here is a screen shot of the Places Page. Sure enough there IS poo on his Places Page and according to Google it was put there by the owner (click to view larger 
). Take a gander at the categories while you are there.
Update 1:45: Commenter Joe has noted that Google has sent in the cleaning crew and cleaned up the shit issue for Jeff’s Place as of 1:45 EST. They can work quickly when need be.
Update: 3:00: I just got off the phone with the State Farm office in Lansdown and apparently someone from Google actually picked up the phone and called Jeff DiBlasi’s earlier in the day. Not only can they work quickly but they seem to know how a phone works.
Update: 5:00: I just checked their Places listing and the categories have been fixed as well.
His listings is so heavily merged with other stuff – it has 11 categories – and that is his main problem.
Comment by Plamen (68 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 4:38 am
@Plamen
While I do think it is merged with another record, I think the other record is his record. To me the likely scenario is that the record was previously claimed into another account. Access to the account is still available to the prankster where they added the photos and the very odd categories.
Some of the others seem too random to be random: Off Track Betting Agency, Air Traffic Control Tower, Gambling Instructor, Dried Flower Shop. Usually with a random merge the phone and or url is different.
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 7:04 am
see that too…go here — http://forum.dealerrefresh.com/f43/you-guys-sh-t-1890.html — to see what this car dealership has on their Places page…
LOL!
Jim
Comment by Jim Rudnick (164 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 8:23 am
His business is also only open from midnight to 12:30am Mondays, apparently.
Comment by Joe (30 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 10:22 am
Wow, now that’s pretty crappy!
Great post, Mike. One of the downsides to this whole “web 2.0″ thing, for sure.
Comment by Scott Dodge (6 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 10:22 am
I’ve always thought that official Google customer service was akin to being in the toilet….but this is absurd. At this point we are going to start seeing suggestions for care and improvement in this journal: http://bit.ly/iZus02
Comment by earlpearl (784 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 10:43 am
I was going to blog this today too, but I saw you working on it last night.
If this was my biz or my client’s I would be LIVID if I could not get Google to fix it.
There are more ‘shitty’ pics on page 2 of images. Looks to me like the work of a previous shady SEO company upset that the client ended their contract or something.
This is an extreme example of how frustrating it is when a hidden merged dupe somewhere still has partial control over the listing, which happens all the time and causes all kinds of problems.
I wish Google could make it so that only data from the most recently claimed listing was active. That would solve so many problems!
Comment by Linda Buquet (293 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 11:30 am
@Linda
Yes giving precedence to the most recently claimed and possibly requiring reclaiming of previously claimed would help.
It would be an even larger improvement if they provided full transparency of the data in their cluster so you could see not just what was on the Places page but could check 3rd party sources for accuracy.
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 11:36 am
Mike, could you update your post to encourage people to “Report Inappropriate Photo” on this guy’s places page?
Enough flags may help him out.
Comment by Lauren R (21 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 11:42 am
Yeesh, that’s just not good for anyone. I’m hoping he’s looking for an SEO as I type this! I wonder if he’s seen a jump in business since this story was picked up? I wonder if ‘crappy’ advertising is better than no advertising because come to think of it, if I ever find myself in Lansdowne, PA and I need myself some insurance I guess I know who to call now! Thanks!
Comment by Mark Matthews (1 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 12:59 pm
Google just cleaned up the poop.
But he’s still listed as “Off Track Betting Agency, Air Traffic Control Tower, Gambling Instructor, Dried Flower Shop”
Comment by Joe (30 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 1:48 pm
@Mike, so the secret to getting fast action on Google Places is to place photos of poo on your Places page?
Comment by John (52 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 2:33 pm
HAHAHAHAHAHA.
Oh Mike. I started laughing the second I saw the title of this post and haven’t stopped. I am super glad you covered this one.
Comment by Mike Ramsey (93 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 2:50 pm
@John
I think the secret might be to get some poo on your places page and then shine a very bright light on it
@Mike
I am very glad that I made your day. It certainly made mine when I saw the past last night.
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 3:00 pm
[...] Mike’s post today entitled Some Days Are Shittier Than Others: Someone uploaded pictures of poo on my business listing and I can’t get them [...]
Pingback by Google Places Cuts The Crap With A Hand Job… — June 24, 2011 @ 3:00 pm
Mike:
In so far as Google was pretty quick on the draw in fixing this poop problem they probably deserve one of these world famous certificates: http://www.pooperoni.com/blog/?p=36
Comment by earlpearl (784 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 3:57 pm
This is pretty powerful info. Next time I need Google to take action on a place page, I’ll just upload some pics of poo. “Hey, I’ve got poo on my page! While you at it, can you please take care of these duplicate listings? Kthnxbai.”
Comment by Darren Shaw (12 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 4:57 pm
FYI The categories are now fixed as well
Comment by Mike Blumenthal (1962 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 5:18 pm
This was the hardest I’ve ever laughed while reading up on Google Local.
Comment by Joe (30 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 6:28 pm
Aside from being hilarious (for everyone except the poor State Farm agent) this shines a light on some loop holes in Places. We all know how important it is to be listed in the right categories. Now you know how to get more than the limit of 5. And if 10 photos and 5 videos aren’t enough for you, well, you get the picture.
I wonder how long it will take (or even if) Google will close this loop hole. It will be a sad day when/if they do – I’ve been using this trick to get extra categories/photos/videos for some time now, with pretty good results.
C’est la vie!
Comment by Jim Gianoglio (43 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 9:50 pm
@Jim
This “behavior” of allowing a listing to be claimed into more than one account (have you ever tried more than 2?) has been around for a long time. One wonders whether it is a remnant of a bad system design, a kludge to just allow for the specific use case of a lost password or the inkling of some future multi-user feature. Regardless because of it’s “semi-hidden” nature and weird implementation it is not a blessing and can be abused as you noted. Even when it isn’t abuse it causes lots of confusion about the source of photos, errant categories and who has the “right” to respond to reviews.
Nothing increased visibility into the cluster via the dashboard wouldn’t solve.
Comment by Mike (2500 comments) — June 24, 2011 @ 10:39 pm
Finally something to smile about with Google Places….
Comment by Dan Lee (11 comments) — June 27, 2011 @ 6:50 pm
Hey Mike,
Thank you so much for bringing light to this situation! I was the one who posted that on the forum and it was incredibly frustrating because we had posted on the forum before and got no response. I didn’t give up and kept creating threads and putting the word “poo” in the title of my thread apparently got it noticed!
Comment by Joy (5 comments) — June 30, 2011 @ 10:50 am
Hello all! Special thanks to Mike for bringing some attention to this situation. First, Mike, I am sorry I was not able to speak with you last week as I was out of town.
So, with this situation, I cancelled my contract with a Company, and conveniently a few days later, these pictures appeared on my site. And of course, they claimed innocence and that they never received the cancellation either. My new company was working with google to get rid of these pictures. It took 4 contact points for them to finally respond. You can see they are removed, but looks like everything is getting worked out, but was not easy and my site was unfortunately “blessed” with these great pictures for a few weeks.
mike, feel free to call my office if you like.
Comment by Jeff DiBlasi (1 comments) — June 30, 2011 @ 4:43 pm
[...] page are necessary to prevent (or perhaps mitigate) disaster. You never know when a competitor, an ex-employee, an unethical SEO or a prankster might just deface the page. And of course you no have idea when [...]
Pingback by Google Places Reputation Management: From G to X Rated in No Time Flat | Understanding Google Maps & Local Search — October 21, 2011 @ 11:12 am
[...] capability has long been an abused on Google Places and the feature has migrated over to the new Google+Local Page. In Places there was an option to [...]
Pingback by Google+Local Retains Community Image Upload But is Missing a Way to Report Abuses | Understanding Google Places & Local Search — May 31, 2012 @ 10:30 am