mYfAVE'StOYOU: Lost Your Google Reviews? Take A Proactive Stance!

Posted by MiriamEllis

Apart from a local business profile completely disappearing from Google's local index, few things cause more frustration and heartache than lost reviews. Unfortunately, lost reviews are one of the problems most frequently reported by local business owners, creating stormy weather in this whole region of Google land. Have you or your clients recently experienced an uptick in lost reviews? This post is for you!

Lost reviews are almost as old as Google's entrance into Local. As early as 2006, Local SEO extraordinaire, Mike Blumenthal, began writing about the important role reviews appeared to be playing in local rankings, and in 2007 about a sudden loss of reviews and suspicion of a review filter. This saga has continued month by month over the past 6 years, with countless reviews disappearing into a black hole and bewildered business owners begging for answers.

I now present to you: the #1 link you need to have if you've lost your reviews!

This will take you to a thread in the Google and Your Business Forum in which Mike Blumenthal is attempting to have all lost review complaints consolidated into one place. It is suspected that Google has either implemented a new filter or done an upgrade to an old one, causing many reviews (including totally legitimate ones) to be lost. Mike states:

"Let's consolidate the issues into this ONE huge post and see if we can get someone from Google to monitor all of these cases... If you are in, I will do what I can to get more Google eyes looking at this issue."

As a Top Contributor to the Google and Your Business Forum, Mike has the ability to communicate directly with Google staff, so this is the best place on the web to document your lost reviews in hopes of taking effective action. Fair warning: don't hold your breath on this. You may or may not see your reviews reappear, but at the very least you will be making yourself heard and signaling to Google the seriousness of the current issue, hopefully generating better future outcomes if not a return of specific reviews you have just lost. I'm encouraging you to take a proactive stance on an issue that has a genuine effect on millions of businesses. There are already more than 99 posts on that thread. Keep them coming!

Between August 6- 16, Google staffer Jade W. has provided several responses on the thread which I recommend you read in full. Consolidated, the responses include:

"Soliciting reviews is suspect behavior for our systems, so please please please make sure your reviews are legitimate and left by your customers of their own accord...The majority of the reviews cases that I have investigated from the forum and other channels are reviews being taken down for suspicious reviewing behavior...

It's fine if you reach out to customers to ask them to review, but I do not recommend that you do this in waves. If you want to reach out to legit customers and ask them to review, I recommend you contact them immediately after you have done business with them. ...In our ideas, the "ideal" review is by a customer who writes a review of a place completely by his or her own accord, on mobile during the experience or at home after. This would mimic the regular flow of the business. On the other hand, some SEO companies that resort to spam reviews to deliver "results" would exhibit different behavior."

As I understand it, Jade W. is indicating that the majority of reviews being removed are for 'suspicious behavior' and she mentions types of solicitations of reviews and also 'waves' of reviews. Local SEOs and business owners who have been following the review issue for years will almost certainly recall that Google has not only solicited reviews in the past, but also authorized the use of review stations in December 2011.

It would appear that if you followed Google's lead on this and ran a contest to solicit reviews (thereby generating a wave of incoming reviews) or set up a review station in your shop to solicit reviews, you could be in danger of losing those reviews. Not trying to be a smart aleck here, but I honestly don't believe I will be alone in seeing a bit of irony in this scenario.

If Google has now decided that legitimate reviews don't come in waves, I hope they will read the comment in the same forum thread from Top Contributor Linda Buquet of Catalyst eMarketing. Here is an excerpt:

"Here's a common example that I think often happens and is totally legit. This could be a local store, restaurant, Dentist, or whatever...Monthly email newsletter goes out. At bottom it says "Check out all our great reviews on Google and please leave us one if you have any feedback to share"...Then due to that newsletter going out to all customers, they may get a bunch of reviews all at once. Then next month another big rush."

I have to agree with Linda on this. There are so many instances that could generate waves of interest and, thus, waves of reviews. How about a blowout sale at a store, a special foodie event at a restaurant, or a high profile news piece on a local business? In the 17th century, Issac Newton and Christiaan Huygens had conflicting theories as to whether light is a wave or a particle. Eventually, the theory of wave-particle duality was postulated to support the idea that all particles have a wave-like nature and vice versa. I find this applicable to the review scenario. Legitimate reviews can come along one-by-one, but it's easy to think of lots of instances in which they could legitimately come in waves.

Honestly, what Newton and Huygens think, what you, and what I think isn't really this issue here. The issue depends on what Google is thinking and how their thoughts are going to directly affect your business' ability to hang onto the reviews you get. Right now, Google is indicating that they have become suspicious of waves. Good to know.

So, if you've taken step one of reporting your lost reviews on the Google thread linked to above, here's an interesting second step to take. I recommend reading Joy Hawkins' article on avoiding the review filter. Joy is careful to note that her test is small and that she is only sharing a theory, but that the usage of a mobile device when leaving a review apparently enabled Joy to get two formerly 'lost' reviews to appear. It would be great if some of the Local SEOs reading this article could take this ball and run a little further with it, creating a larger test. Can your clients solicit reviews that 'stick' by utilizing a mobile device for the transaction? I'd love to know!

For my third resource, I will again cite a Mike Blumenthal post (which he's actually published and then re-published because of the recent upsurge in lost reviews): What Should You Tell A Client When Google Loses Their Reviews- A 4 Part Plan. Two things are especially noteworthy in this post: 1) a warning to the auto industry that they are under keen scrutiny right now for heavy spamming, and 2) encouragement to copy any reviews that you do receive. In case they disappear in future, you'll have a copy and can post the 'lost' review to your website as a testimonial, salvaging at least some of the power you have to share with others your good name in your community.

My personal position in all this is one of empathy. I know you work hard for your reviews. More importantly, I know how hard you work to run a business that offers such excellent service that you generate good feelings amongst your customers. It's a genuine loss when documentation of your satisfaction rate vanishes through no fault of your own.

I understand that it can be hard for Google (or anyone) to tell whether a review is legitimately earned, or if money has changed hands in exchange for a positive false review, but I encourage Google to treat this issue with the seriousness it deserves. Every day, countless business owners are spending their valuable time trying to educate themselves about the Google system that has so much power over the fate of their businesses. They are taking this very seriously, and most are trying to play by the rules. This effort should be rewarded with transparency and fair treatment, and it's totally up to Google to provide this, since they are calling the shots.

If you've recently lost reviews, post the details in the Google and Your Business Forum thread linked to in this post.

In Sum

Be aware that Google appears to have become suspicious of waves of reviews. Getting reviews slowly may be good insurance against loss.
It's always been a best practice to diversify in your review gathering efforts. If you let your customers pick their favorite review platform rather than guiding them towards Google, you will end up with a more diverse profile. If this means reviews come to you through Google more slowly, it appears that this may actually be a good thing.
You might like to try soliciting reviews on mobile devices, per Joy Hawkins' experiment, to see if they 'stick.'
Know that you're not alone. Lots of businesses are experiencing lost reviews now, and if you're in the auto dealership industry, there appears to be heavy scrutiny going on.
Create a document on your computer to save any review you see come in. If it disappears tomorrow, you can still get some leverage out if by using the saved copy as a testimonial on your website.

I hope this article has empowered you to proactively participate in this issue and has brought you up-to-date on the latest news on this front. Leave your comments or other advice below!

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