Understanding Google My Business & Local Search
Entries Written By Mike Blumenthal
Google Places Updates Guidelines Updates on PO Box Policy
Google has announced in the forums that they will update the Guideline to explicitly ban the use of PO Boxes in both line 1 and 2 of the address fields. P.O. Boxes (and their UPS equivalent) have long been banned by Google for their use in the primary street address line of a listing. This came about …
Positive Only Review Services Come Under Scrutiny in Main Stream Media
Bruce from Aim Marketing in Denver pointed out an article and an investigative news report that highlights a positive review only service posting positive reviews on behalf of their client’s customers . Essentially the Denver based service surveyed the clients post sale for a number of Denver businesses and posted 4 star and higher reviews …
Basic Places Practices Update: How do you claim an owner-verified listing?
A common issue that arises in the forums is the business owner that is unable to change or enhance their listing because they no longer have access to the account that it is in, perhaps because they lost the password , the employee that had claimed the listing is no longer employed or they had …
Google and Your Business Wrapup – May 15, 2012
Vanessa Schneider, the Community Manager for the Google Places Forum, has taken the initiative to record a video series summarizing key points that have arisen in the Google Places forums during the previous week. (Note to Google management if you are reading this: GIVE THAT WOMAN A RAISE! She is the best thing to happen …
29Prime – Would you Buy a Used Car From These Guys Let Alone SEO?
This is a cautionary tale to 29Prime’s remaining 8000 clients. If this company abuses their own Google Places listing imagine what they might be doing in your name. Let me be upfront with my bias.. 29Prime is not one of my favorite companies. And I have in the past commented on their abuse of Google Place’s …
Upcoming Getlisted Local University in Syracuse
Would love to see you at our next Getlisted Local University! May 22 – Local University: Syracuse will take place on May 22, 2012 from 8am – 12pm OR 1pm – 5pm at Driver’s Village in Cicero. Your choice of identical 4 hours sessions. Besides the regular speakers (David Mihm, Mary Bowling, Will Scott and myself) the event also includes …
Minor Change to Review Presentation on the Places Page
Google has changed the date information attached to a review and switched from the actual date created to a rough estimate of when it was created. The actual date is still visible if you click through to the reviewer. The change seems to create a greater visual sense of whether reviews are coming in over …
Google Places Rolls Out New Offers Program and Interface
Google Places is now rolling out a new Offers creation program in the Places Dashboard to accompany the new Google Maps for Android. The product is significantly more robust than the current product and offers a range of creation options. There is an overview and FAQ available the Offers introduction page. It is now live …
Google Places Rolls Out Updated Bulk Upload Tool
Google Places has rolled out a new Google Places Bulk Upload Tool. From the Google SMB Blog: We’ve made many improvements and now enable the following actions: Edit one or more of your listings’ data at once Search through your listings, filtering by specific information or for listings with errors Upload new listings using a …
“We Currently Do Not Support This Location” Bug Should Be Fixed But The Message Will Persist for Some
The snafu with the Places index that caused an inordinate number of accounts to suffer the dreaded “We Currently Do Not Support This Location” report for a listing should be fixed by now. But some users may find that they have moved from purgatory into Dante’s circles of hell. Vanessa noted in the forums that …
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