Google Places Optimization and Local SEO Blog

I was recently quoted a few times in an Infoworld story about the lack of Google Places support. Google: The big baby that won’t grow up While I’m quick to report on major Google Places problems, I try to be equally quick to give credit where credit is due and acknowledge their attempts to improve the platform.

Google just launched a new level of support for Google Places users. It’s not a full on phone support option which is still sorely needed, but it sounds like it may be a couple steps up from the “report a problem” option that was previously the only way to get help. I’m anxious to try it on some of my problem listings to see how the response is. (More details below the video.)

THANKS to the Google Places team for hearing our pleas!

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I just coined a new term. “Red Hat” Local SEO. As everyone knows “Black Hat” and “Gray Hat” are where you break or skirt the boundaries of Google guidelines. I don’t do that. However I do take every ethical advantage to make my clients listings not only rank, but stand out from their competition.

“Red Hat” = Smart, Bright, Bold Optimization! Red hat optimization involves thinking outside the box, discovering and utilizing advanced techniques that help make a listing stand out and give conversion rates a boost. Here’s a great example of something I’ve been doing for awhile and just decided to share.

Here’s the Place page for a Dentist I recently took from #16 to #2 on Google for all his main keywords. (Using some ninja Red Hat ON-SITE SEO techniques.) Note he only has 1 Google review which does not look good. BUT he has over 100 reviews on a Dental review site Google was not counting in the algo. So all those great reviews don’t show on his Place page at all.

CLICK IMAGE TO VIEW FULL SIZE

That one little red hat technique provides several important benefits:

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Was just quoted in the media again about Google Places and wanted to share. But 1st, in case you missed it, on September 5th the New York Times reported on a major Google Places problem that I gave them the story lead on and researched for them. It was about the problem of viable businesses being easily marked as “This Business is Permanently Closed” on Google Places. There is no Google verification, it happens quickly and is being used as a competitive tactic.

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I’m working on some unique tip-filled posts but in the meantime wanted to share some great posts with some good tips from others. When I curate my Google Places news channel @Scoop.it some days I find little of interest. But the past few days there has been a ton of good info so wanted to spread the word.

Google appears to be crowdsourcing website verification on Place pages now. Hope a competitor can’t nuke your website as easily as they can mark your business as permanently closed.

Just noticed this today. On many Place Pages, if you click the link to the web site and then go back to the Place page, there will be a yellow box asking “Is this the right website for this Place?” The answers are Yes, No, Don’t Know. (See screenshot below).

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The New York Times interviewed me recently about a Google Places problem I’ve blogged about a couple times. I helped David Segal, the reporter, with that story, which still could go to print. Then I asked him if he’d like a Google Places story lead about a another problem that is negatively impacting small businesses and proceeded to fill him in on the following issue.

Of course the story hit Monday, while I was off on an unplugged vacation. Just got back and even though it’s late, thought I’d share for anyone that missed it.

See Google update on this issue below.

Closed, Says Google, but Shops’ Signs Say Open – New York Times

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Have some new free Google Places software to share with you guys. I tested this a couple weeks ago and discovered it was malfunctioning due to the past GP update, so report the problems to them and have been waiting for them to fix it. The new version just came out yesterday. They also incorporated other feedback and improved some of the functionality, so it works much better now.

This is a super lightweight app that can help you quickly analyze a specific Google Places market. It would also be helpful for analysing why a particular client was not ranking and to find out at a glance what the top 7 competitors in that market ARE doing that helped them get to the top.

One feature I really like is that you can add a specific Google Places CID for comparison against the top 7 results. So if you are talking to a potential new client who is stuck down on page 3, you can get a quick snapshot of what it takes to rank in that market.

CLICK IMAGE For Full Size Screen Shot that Shows All the Fields
Link to Video Instructions & Free Download Below

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There is a new type of competitive sabotage on Google Places that’s making the rounds and it can be totally devastating to small businesses.

There has been a huge increase in the number of reports that viable businesses are being marked as PERMANENTLY CLOSED on Google Places. Some users in the forum report it happens to them numerous times per week and they have to check their Place page several times per day and constantly fight to get Google to remove the bright yellow PERMANENTLY CLOSED sign from their listing.

There are probably shady companies offering a new service billed as an easy way to “Nuke Your Competitors off the 1st Page of Google.”

BTW this sad story has a happy ending, because Google listened and implemented one change that will help. Read on for breaking news about how Google listened, took our advice and implemented change.

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Find out what people want and GIVE IT to them! I believe it was Napoleon Hill that originally said that. I apply the same principle to Google Places and local search optimization. Find out what Google LIKES and GIVE IT to her!

So let’s dissect a VERY interesting search result to find out WHY Google likes this listing enough to give it a HUGE ONE BOX for a competitive search term. And while we’re at it let’s try to figure out why this local Dentist got all these EXPANDED local sitelinks too, shall we?

I DOUBT THIS LISTING WILL BE LIVE FOR VERY LONG. So let’s reverse engineer it while we can. I think/hope it’s a temporary anomaly because I may have a new client I would need to get ranked in this market for this search term and right now this Dentist has it locked up all to herself! There are some good lessons to be learned from this listing, so I wanted to share. See SCREEN SHOT BELOW.

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Following are some Google Places updates, bug reports and fixes. I have also observed a number of changes lately, some fairly minor, however if your Google Places listing is affected by one of these issues it may be a big deal. So I wanted to share what I’ve observed. Confirm if you are seeing any of these things.

NEW – SHORT LINK FOR PLACE PAGES – The long awaited short URL for Places pages is finally here. I just discovered it last night. Maybe it’s been there for awhile and I just noticed, but I don’t recall anyone else blogging about it, so I think it’s new.

REVIEWS – YELP TOTALLY REMOVED? – From some limited research I’ve done, it appears Yelp is no longer listed at all in reviews from around the web. Does that mean they are not counted in the algo either or have they just been removed from view? Not sure yet. My market does not really rely on Yelp reviews so I have not dug too deeply. But check for yourself and tell me if you find any. I did some restaurant searches in major cities because restaurants tend to have lots of Yelp reviews. Zip. Zilch. Nada. I also checked some recent SERP screenshots that WERE showing Yelp reviews a couple weeks ago. Now they are not. (Are they having another fight?)

BUG – WEB SITE MISSING FROM PLACE PAGE & SERPS – A large number of users are reporting that their web site is missing even though it’s listed in the dashboard. So double check your listings. I think the last update tweaked something in the URL structure and if you added www. without the http: then your URL stopped displaying. (My guess, but that appears to be the case.)

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If you have missing Google Places descriptions or info that is not updating or think you are in the Google Places new listing sandbox and wonder how long you’ll be there – you’ll want to read on.

One of the big questions that keeps coming up about the July 21st Google Places update is why did descriptions disappear? Everyone thought it was a bug. Google employees confirmed it was an “issue” and was being worked on. Vanessa confirmed in the forum that descriptions were not removed as a result of the update. I started a thread on July 6th about the missing description bug. Weeks have gone by, descriptions continue to go missing, but we’ve been unable to get an update from Google on the Google Places forum.

Well I just got an answer from Googler Joel Headley in one of my Google+ streams about the missing descriptions problem. He also confirms the current length of the Google Places update cycle – which is MUCH longer than people realize. Wanted to share the info, since I doubt many people will see Joel’s comments hidden in my +stream.

Below is a link to my Google +stream where I air concerns about many of the recent Google Places bugs and problems. Joel has commented 4 times so far with some important insights. I’ve only copied a few snippets, you need to head over to read the whole stream.

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If working with Google Places ever makes you want to just totally pull your hair out, join the club. It’s a big club. Sorry, didn’t intend for this to be dump on Google Places week, but I had to share a post Mike Blumenthal just made at Google+.

If you ever have a client (and you will) who says: “I simply can’t believe a company as big as Google has this many bugs, maybe it was something you did wrong.” OR “I can’t believe a company as big as Google has no support and takes WEEKS to fix problems like this.” OR “I thought a competitor hijacked or sabotaged our listing – you are telling me Google did this to us?” Then you’ll find that Mike’s post will be a good one to have handy in your bookmarks.

Need to vent about Google Places? Head to the link below and vent away or vent here. Google will read this, so if you have problems you want to bring to light, head over and add your 2 cents! I added a copy of my fave Google Places pet peeves below.

25 (err… 250?) things I hate about Google Places. – Mike Blumenthal

“Danny Sullivan wrote a piece 5 years ago called “25 Things I hate About Google” and revisited his pain points again this year.

It’s OUR turn now. You have the floor. Pile on! I am giving you permission to vent your frustrations.

I would like you to add your favorite things to hate about Google Places.

Thanks Mike for giving us permission to vent! Below is list of are some of my “most hated.”

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Instead of putting a big red review button on Place pages, Google needs to have a big red button that says “BETA! Warning – use at your own risk and do not rely on Google listing accuracy or up-time for your business!”

What other company on earth can tell customers, “Sorry we had a ‘hiccup’. Your business may recover in 6 – 10 weeks.” SERIOUSLY! Who can get away with that? Free service or no, Google Places needs to get it’s act together! (Important info about GP update cycles, critical theories about bugs, the Places “sandbox”, pending review and more toward bottom of this long post.)

UPDATE: 8/11 Google replies to this post. Full update, bottom of this page.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. This is the current state of Google Places for Business right now, IMHO! (A little SNARKY, but TRUE!)

CLICK TO SEE GOOGLE PLACES PROBLEMS – FULL SIZE

Note this is not just a rant, although rant I surely will! There are some important insights in this post about the inner workings of Google Places, info about current bugs that affect numerous listings and critical info you need to understand about the Google Places update and database refresh cycle.

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I usually blog about Google Places SEO tips, changes with Google Places and problems with Google Places.

But today I just wanted to remind everyone how important it is to focus on the end user experience when you do Google Places SEO. If you keep the end user in mind and always strive to use best practice methods, you’ll be ahead of the game – in spite of any algo tweaks or major updates she sends our way.

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What do you do when Google loses an entire city in the blended search results? Is it a SERPs issue? A Places issue? A Maps issue? Where do I report it? (Read on and you’ll see it’s not an easy question to answer.) I’m just going to talk out loud as I try to work through this problem. PLUS I’m blogging this problems because I’ve had better luck getting Google’s attention on bugs by blogging and tweeting, than using ‘report a problem’ or the Google help forums, so here goes. (I know it’s sort of a convoluted way to get help, but then again Google’s help system or lack thereof is pretty convoluted!)

Google has a major bug when it comes to city names that are located in more than one state. I’ll give 4 examples today because companies in these cities are having problems and need help. These cities are largely missing from Google.

MISSING IN ACTION – 1st up – Farmington, CT. I have a new client in Farmington, CT and am just starting to optimize her Place page. But wondering how I can get her to rank since Google shows Farmington, NM results when you search for any business in Farmington, CT. Google LOST this city! Poor client, poor me. What are we to do?

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The recent Google Places update has caused businesses to re-evaluate their review strategy. I’ve been commenting bits and pieces of my online review strategy recommendation here and there to correct bad info/assumptions/decisions ever since the big Google Places update hit last week. I’ve been talking to a LOT of Dentists for example, who are saying they plan to drop important review services and focus all their energy on getting Google Places reviews. I tell them this is a bad strategy.

I’ve had people (mainly Dentists) ask me if I could write a big huge detailed article about review strategies and why I say it’s still important to diversify. Dentists have been asking me for this, due to my Tuesday post about the whole DemandForce review issue.

In a nutshell I’ll share just a very brief overview of my thoughts. Don’t have time to write a book about it right now. But then I’m going to share a detailed article that REALLY explains online review strategies well and parallels my thoughts on the matter.

I still STRONGLY believe the best review strategy is to diversify and spread reviews over 3 – 4 authority review sites. (Which ones depend in part on your market). That’s the strategy I recommend in my building patient reviews training I offer my Dental clients. In spite of this latest Google update, that’s the strategy I will continue to recommend.

Google VERY OFTEN loses their own reviews. Go to the forum and you’ll see hundreds of small businesses crying that they spent YEARS building up Google reviews and had all their reviews in Google’s basket and Google lost them all – HUNDREDS sometimes.

If you put all your eggs in Google’s basket and she eats them, then you are screwed as far as the algo goes.

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I’m trying hard to build up the community spirit around here and want to reward valued contributors that take the time to share their insights with my readers. So I finally added CommentLuv!

If you comment here, you will not only get a dofollow link back to your site but you also automagically get an ANCHOR TEXT LINK to your most recent blog post. If you register, you can choose from any of your 10 last posts, so you can highlight the post you think will be of most interest to other Catalyst readers.

To show you what your CommentLuv blog links will look like, and in honor of the launch of CommentLuv, I want to share our 1st CommentLuv comment from my good friend and associate, Miriam Ellis. Click to see what the CommentLuv can do for your comments here at Catalyst. Hover over the heart icon in my post right below it and you’ll see it can show how many clicks and links to other posts you’ve commented on too.

So if you blog about Google Places, local SEO, SEO or Internet marketing – share here and share often and you’ll get some link luv!

Spammy or meaningless posts will not see the light of day or get any link love but good comments and regular posters will be rewarded with CommentLuv!

For once I am not going to write a book in this blog post, because Google already did! So I’ll let her do the talking!

WATCH the high impact Google Video below, but think LOCAL!
Think of YOUR local business OR your client’s company.
Powerful stuff! Free eBook below the vid.

Zero Moment of Truth – Google Video

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Although the big July 21st Google Places update affected ALL 3rd party review sources, the most talked about was DemandForce. DemandForce offers a valuable practice-building service to Dentists. (And other industries, but they are most well known in Dental.) Adding patient reviews to Google Places is a FREE VALUE-ADD, not their core service. Many DemandForce Dentists had 200+ patient reviews which helped those Dentists rank high in Google. Lots of Dentists signed up with DF primarily to boost reviews and Google rankings. Now Google has removed all those review, so it has many concerned.

The DemandForce review model is often questioned, criticized and IMO usually totally misunderstood. (I’m a DF Partner, full disclosure below.) Not my mission to defend or explain it all in this post. Just trying to give a brief overview before I launch into the main point. (Although I share thoughts/advice about DF below.)

One of my Dentist’s informed me yesterday that DemandForce had blogged a response to the Google update. So I wanted to share it here. It also includes a template Dentists can use to get direct Google reviews. IT WORKS! See comment from another one of my Dentists below the image and quote.

An Update Regarding Recent Google Places Page Formatting Changes
Late last week, Google made yet another update to its Google Places Pages. We’d like to take this opportunity to explain these changes and review the suite of world-class reputational marketing tools that Demandforce offers to help our customers increase the value of their online reputation.

Reputation Builder was introduced earlier this year as a way for our customers to draw on their active customer base and encourage activity on a variety of other social ecosystems where the business may want to do some work. These emails, just like all other email and text communications sent through our system, are always free for Demandforce Customers to send. A great way to increase the number of native reviews on Google is to execute a Reputation Builder for Google Places campaign. To the left is a sample of what the Google Places message looks like.

Evidently that template works. One of my Dentists wrote:
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I’ve been involved in lots of online conversions since Thursday’s major Google Places update. I’ve also done tons of research and have read some really important points made by Google employees as well as industry pros.  Here is a summary of important updates and insights from the last 4 days.

OVERVIEW – KEY CHANGES FROM THIS UPDATE – 3rd party reviews removed from review count in the SERPS and in the reviews from around the web section of Place page. Citations removed – no more “more about this place section. More details section removed. Service area radius removed. Email removed. Write a review and upload a photo button much more prominent.

THE ALGO & THE RANKINGS – Linda’s opinion and brief summary:

From what I can tell this was ONLY a front end cosmetic change NOT a back end change that affects the algo or ranking and most pros agree.

In some quick ranking checks I’ve done, it appears the lack of 3rd party reviews showing up in the count and lack of citations on the Place page, DID NOT affect rankings. Not in the rankings I’ve checked anyway. Regardless of how many 3rd reviews were removed from the COUNT everyone’s ranking stayed the same. I’ve checked tons of Dentists for example that had over 200 reviews and 300 citations due to DemandForce, that dropped to 5 Google reviews. They still rank on page 1 where they did before.

So from what I’m seeing right now anyway, this does not devalue 3rd party reviews or citations. Even though they don’t show, they are still counted in the back end!

Plus the additional details no longer show on the Place page but Vanessa says they still weigh into the algo. (More on that below).

THE RANKINGS & THE SERPS – I’ve heard reports from one pro that’s seeing merged SERP displays that went from 7 listings to 3, which hurts # 4-7 by pushing them to the 2nd page. One search term I’m following did go from 7 merged listings to 5. I’m also seeing a big increase in 7 Pack style listings – even for core search terms.

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