/loc/ - Local SEO

the video verification thing is getting ridiculous. just saw someone stuck because they're 500 km away from the client and the owner can't figure out how to film the storefront. even with utility bills and signage photos, google is flagging it as a duplicate listing because of the old entity's email. honestly don't know how you're supposed to fix this without being physically there.

article: https://localsearchforum.com/threads/rejection-on-ownership-transfer-verification-due-to-business-acquisition-missing-custom-domain-email.63443/

i was just thinking about that nightmare where a client leaves and suddenly their phone number is all wrong. apparently it depends on if the provider uses an api connection or just manual submissions.
>the connection ends and listings can revert to old data or even disappear
it's so easy to forget to check this during offboarding. if it's just a continuous data stream, you're basically paying for a temporary fix that vanishes the second the subscription stops. i hate how some of these tools act like they're permanent when they're really just renting the data to us. it's all just an illusion if the provider doesn't use paid insertion. does anyone actually check their api setup before signing a new client?

link: https://www.advicelocal.com/blog/do-business-listings-disappear-service-canceled/

been checking on that cafe client all morning and half their menu items just vanished from the profile overnight. it's not even a sync error with the website or anything. i checked the dashboard and everything looks fine there, but the live listing is totally wiped of the food descriptions.
>the menu is updated via the business profile manager
that was the support guy's exact words before he hung up on me. literally useless useless. it makes no sense when their hours and phone number are still showing up perfectly. i'm sitting here wondering if they're testing some weird automated scraper that's just nuking data. honestly so tired of manual audits becoming a daily thing.

google's adding gluten-free, dairy-free, halal and kosher tags to profiles now. just another way for them to make us manually edit every single menu item in google business profile.
>We want to remove some of this friction and make discovery seamless
it's never seamless. it's just more work for the client or me. plus there's zero verification for the kosher stuff. i'm sure a restaurant will just check the box and hope nobody notices. trustworthy useless way to handle dietary labels without any actual oversight.

found this here: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-business-profiles-dietary-attributes-42281.html

another day of google telling us how to do our jobs. they're pushing these new industry-specific playbooks like we don't already know that photos drive 42% more direction requests. it's all just the same old garbage about keeping profiles complete and updated. ime seeing way too much focus on posts when the real issue is the algorithm tanking visibility for no reason.

full read: https://whitespark.ca/blog/top-takeaways-from-the-new-google-business-profile-playbooks/

google's tweaking the lsa documentation again and it's pretty annoying. they added this 20-second rule where if you don't pick up but the person stays on the line for at least twenty seconds, you're getting charged anyway. basically just another way to bleed our budgets dry. i also noticed they're being way more vague about credits now. they stripped out all those specific examples of what doesn't qualify and replaced it with some vague "automated assessment" nonsense.
>unanswered calls can now be charged if the caller stays connected for more than 20 seconds
it's going to be a nightmare trying to dispute these when the client is clearly just a wrong number or something. plus they're doing this 30-day review thing where they can decide to charge you weeks after the fact. it's like they want us constantly checking our dashboards for ghost charges. anyone else seeing more "charged" statuses on leads that should've been disputed?

found this here: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-local-service-ads-how-leads-work-42259.html

i've been testing adding some user-generated shots to my client's dashboard instead of just professional ones. it's not actually helping the map pack ranking at all lately.

just saw this and it's basically the same old story. google only removes stuff if it breaks their specific rules, not because someone's just being a jerk or lying about the service.
>Google will only remove reviews that violate its policies, not.
it doesn't help my plumber client at all when some random guy leaves a one star because he couldn't find parking. i spent two hours last week trying to flag a fake review for a cafe and got nothing back. honestly feels like a waste of time unless there's actual spam or something blatant. such a headache when you're already dealing with enough client fires.

article: https://www.sterlingsky.ca/how-to-remove-bad-reviews-google/

been stuck doing manual cleanup on this plumbing client all morning. brightlocal's audit tool is way faster for spotting the obvious duplicates but it's basically useless once you get into the weeds with weird edge cases. i tried switching to whitespark for the deep dive because their data feels a bit more reliable for complex listings lately. whitespark catches those tiny formatting errors in the city field that brightlocal just ignores. it takes longer to parse through everything though and honestly the interface is such a headache. it's not like one is clearly better, it's just about how much time you've got to waste. i'm basically just looking for the quickest way to find where the NAP is broken without clicking every single result manually. whitespark gives more detail but brightlocal lets me get back to my coffee faster. whitespark's pricing will make you cry. do you guys stick to one or just swap based on the client budget?

really hate seeing that 5% figure for bots getting blocked at the firewall level. i've got one plumber client on a heavy security setup and if it's tossing GPTBot like this, his whole site might as well be invisible to these new search engines.
>mostly 403s from bot protection

full read: https://localsearchforum.com/threads/checked-2-474-local-business-sites-for-ai-search-readiness-curious-what-youre-seeing-with-clients.63423/