Google made a significant change in the search results page layout over the last 7 days that removes the powerful advantage that they'd bestowed upon local businesses for about 10 years. Today, I'll dive into the details of those changes.
A Little Background
Google created their original Local Business database in the early 2000s and has morphed it through many permutations with names like Places, Maps, and Local. Today, they call it "Google My Business" or just GMB for short. Having your business... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
Online referrals are starting to make an impact on local businesses, but not in the way we all expected them to. A few years ago, the buzz within the online marketing community was that social networks would become a referral engine for people to ask advice through. Facebook even attempted to create a new type of social search engine to capture that referral service. Google also struggled with the idea that the internet would become a big referral engine, and they tried to capture a piece of it through Google+.
In this edition of Throwback Thursday, I have to report some news which saddens me. It relates to how your business websites reviews appear; or rather; no longer appear in Google search results.
In October 2014, I wrote this Nugget explaining how to use Google My Business to find and reply to online reviews that are not part of the Google system. In other words, customer reviews that are ... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
In this edition of the Daily Golden Nugget, I'll show you how you can use the interface within your Google My Business account to monitor your business reviews from around the internet.
This is the 3rd part of a multi-part series on using and editing your business account through the new Google My Business interface. Part 1 of this series was a basic orientation of Google My Business and Part 2 went into details of VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
Yesterday, we gave you our three month research study results to illustrate how online user generated content is out there, and potentially damaging until you lock it down.
InsiderPages, Yahoo Local, and CitySearch are the top 3 review sites you should worry about. Let's look at a case study to show exactly what you need to pay attention to.
We randomly searched InsiderPages.com for all jewelry stores within 20 miles of our office to find a good example.
We found: 188 jewelers with 5 star reviews from 1 or more reviewers. 178 jewelers with 4 star reviews, mostly from a single reviewer. 52 with 3 star reviews, many from 2 or more reviewers. 13 with 2 star reviews from 1 or more reviewers. 20 with 1 start reviews from 1 or more reviewers.
"...articles are easy to follow and seem to have information one can use right away." -Ann, Gallery 4, Hamden CT
"...serious kudos to you. We love your straight talk, pertinent information and plain language. I don't know how many industries have something of jWAG's caliber available, but I learn from the emails every day. Really, really nice work, and very appreciated." -Cheryl Herrick, Global Pathways Jewelry
