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Stay up to date with the latest news impacting your business listings on Google Business Profile, Apple Maps and more.

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March 4, 2024   /
Restaurants and Hospitality  /  Google Business Profile 
In a recent update, Google has mandated that all third-party food providers such as UberEats, Skipthedishes, and Grubhub, include a dedicated opt-out landing page within the Google Business Profile (GBP) dashboard. This page must clearly outline the steps a merchant can follow to disconnect their GBP from any booking, waitlist, or food ordering application. Google documents have been updated with...
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March 4, 2024   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Google Local Service Ads (LSA), also known as Google Guaranteed Ads, are at the top of the results page above the local pack and are an advertising product intended for service area businesses. Their intent is to promote trusted and immediately accessible contractors, plumbers, repairmen, and other local service providers. There was however a vulnerability in this ad space that...
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March 4, 2024   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Google has begun to rollout a new AI-Powered Local Business Search for select local guides in the U.S. More than a test, soft launches such as these are given to a smaller group of users to confirm functionality, the kinks ironed out before programs see mass adoption. Once the new AI Local Business Search is proven to work through this...
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March 4, 2024   /
All industries  /   Algorithm Update 
Europe’s Digital Markets Act (DMA) is beginning its implementation within Google, Amazon, Facebook, and other major tech gatekeepers. The purpose of this act is for tech companies to avoid “self-preferencing”, meaning that they cannot intentionally give their own service and product offerings greater exposure than those of competing businesses. What this means for a consumer that is researching something like smart...
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March 4, 2024   /
All industries  /   Algorithm Update 
Starting in late January and flowing into February, a bug occurred with Google’s driving directions metric. Many business listings saw a significant increase in this KPI seemingly without reason. Google initially made the following comment on the issue: “Starting in January 2024, you might see fewer direction requests. This is because Google is making updates to better protect people’s privacy...
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January 29, 2024   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
In the typical “Promote, Launch, Abandon” cycle that is prevalent in the tech world, Google is shutting down its once incredibly convenient auto-generated websites. These websites will stop working on 1 March 2024 and will only redirect to a Google Business Profile listing until 10 June 2024. After that, anyone who tries to go to that listing will get a...
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January 29, 2024   /
Restaurants and Hospitality  /  Google Business Profile 
Google has been testing out a new local search box titled “Nearby events and deals.” The title is rather self-explanatory but what is important to note is where Google pulls this information from. Google relies heavily on its first-party software, meaning that this new feature will pull almost entirely from Google Business Profiles. This means if businesses want to be...
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January 29, 2024   /
All industries  /   Algorithm Update 
A recent paper from the Leipzig University, Bauhaus-Universität Weimar and ScaDS.AI in Germany revealed that not only are there increased issues with Google search but also Bing and DuckDuckGo. The study looked at 7,392 unique search queries, generally in the product reviews category, where they scrapped the search results every two weeks between 26 October 2022, and 19 September 2023....
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January 29, 2024   /
All industries  /   Algorithm Update 
Circle to Search: Google launched its “Reverse Image Search” functionality in 2011. This impressive piece of technology allowed users to seek out an images origin as well as finding other places online where that identical image was posted. Through over a decade of development, Reverse Image Search now allows users to find images with similar but not identical content. Google’s...
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January 29, 2024   /
All industries  /   Algorithm Update 
Google started 2024 off strong with a highly impactful Local Ranking Algorithm Update in the first week of January. This is not a named update with specific goals in mind, but we saw far higher ranking volatility with this routine tweak than seen from similar ones in months prior. Whenever Google updates its search ranking algorithms, it means that your...
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January 23, 2024   /
Restaurants and Hospitality  /  Google Business Profile 
Google seems to be testing allowing searchers to “heart” and other emoji reactions a photo in the local search results. This can be a way for Google to learn if the images uploaded to the hotel listing is useful to searchers and maybe also help searchers interact with the Google local search results more.
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January 23, 2024   /
Restaurants and Hospitality  /  Google Business Profile 
Google is testing showing a justification (or label) for local restaurant listings within Google Search and Google Maps that says “serves vegetarian dishes” with a green leaf icon.
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January 23, 2024   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Google struggled to contain a massive spam attack that took place over the last two weeks of December. Many spam domains ranked for hundreds of thousands of keywords each, an indication that the scale of the attack easily reached into the millions of keyword phrases.
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January 23, 2024   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Before creating your Google Business Profile listing, make sure you are using the right language. If not, it may cause serious issues for you in the long run where the services will be wrong and will appear in that language. A Local Search Forum thread highlights this issue where the language entered for one Google Business Listing was in Ukrainian....
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January 23, 2024   /
All industries  /   Restaurants and Hospitality  /  Algorithm Update 
The Local SEO world is ablaze with a new report, which DAC and our clients already held as common knowledge. This report showed that hours impact local pack rankings, a lot. When Google builds a SERP, the time of day is important, and Google likes to show businesses that are open at the time of the search.
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December 6, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Google Maps experimented with allowing users to follow individual businesses. This meant alerts for Google Posts, events, and other major updates for the local listing. Google is now taking that a step further by allowing users to not only follow specific businesses but to tailor their search experience to their personal topics of interest. Some users will begin to see...
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December 6, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Service area businesses have often had a problem with verifying their businesses on Google. As typical verification methods require pictures of signage and other aspects of a physical location, those that travel to their clients do not readily possess the tools to verify who they are. This has also resulted in a lot of industries dealing with rampant spam, fake...
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December 6, 2023   /
All industries  /   Algorithm Update 
Google wrote “On October 5, we found a bug with how our October 2023 core update was applied to Discover. As of October 31, we fixed the bug. Some sites may see an increase in Discover-related traffic, as a result of this bug fix,” Following the announcement of this bug fix, Google announced a different algorithm update, this one intent...
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December 5, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
A month can’t go by without Google updating the available attributes to assign a Google Business Profile. Such an astounding success since they were made commonplace in 2020, Google now sees the feature as a necessity for every Maps listing to utilise. The first of this month’s batch are types you’d expect, a few meant for specific industries and then...
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December 5, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Google Maps expanded AI features for route preview, visual search, and electric vehicle charging. These AI features are currently live in the U.S, France, Germany, Japan, and the U.K. Highlights of this update include:  Immersive View feature that shows detailed 3D previews of routes on Google Maps.  The Maps Lens tool using AI and AR is expanding to over 50 more cities...
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November 6, 2023   /
All industries  /   Algorithm Update 
A slew of updates for Google occurred in Q3 and the during the start of Q4. Google saw recent completion of its October 2023 core update. This happened concurrently with the October 2023 spam update and only weeks after Google finished rolling out the August 2023 and September 2023 core updates. October’s update saw several bugs occur, including a massive...
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November 6, 2023   /
All industrie 
Apple Maps is a mapping service developed by Apple Inc. It was first introduced in 2012 as a replacement for Google Maps on iOS devices. Since then, Apple has continuously worked to improve its mapping service, adding features, and enhancing accuracy, leading to a full relaunch in 2023. “Apple Business Connect” is Apple’s answer to Google Business Profiles. To have...
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November 6, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Online listings for medical professionals saw massive updates in the past three years. Telehealth and online appointment booking made commonplace due to the pandemic. While the need for these services has calmed since their peak, there are certain services that are now expected by modern users. One feature that all listings are expected to contain is the ability to book...
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November 6, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Google has added two new attributes for businesses listed in Google Business Profiles. These attributes are “identifies as disabled-owned” and “identifies as Indigenous-owned.” Google said, “When businesses choose to identify as disabled-owned and/or Indigenous-owned in their Business Profile, the attribute will appear on their listings in Maps and Search. This update builds on our existing business attributes, including Asian-owned, Black-owned, Latino-owned,...
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November 6, 2023   /
Restaurants and Hospitality  /  Google Business Profile 
Google began a test in letting its users set permanent food preferences in their profiles. Using the gear icon within your map settings, users will be able to choose several options related to personal taste and/or dietary restrictions. This would be a convenient filtering option for users but indicates greater necessity for businesses to give data to Google. Google listings...
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October 16, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
While businesses in the gaming, cannabis, tobacco, and adult entertainment industries are legal in the areas where they operate, strict regulation of their content has made it difficult to promote their services online. Google however is now behaving more amicably towards adult-oriented businesses, adding new lines under the “adult-themed content” section of their terms of service. Where once a listing...
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October 16, 2023   /
Google Business Profile  /  Healthcare 
Google seems to add new attributes to is listings every month. Just in August the new “Pets Allowed” attribute went live and now in September, Google is adding the attributes for “Nursing Rooms” and “Children Allowed.” Businesses intended for a long stay, such as airports, would find it a necessity to specify if they have rooms for mothers to feed...
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October 16, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
In a small test within the US, Google has begun showing third-party reviews along with its usual Google reviews. This is the first time in over a decade since Google has done this for non-hotel listings. It does not seem that Google would wish for all business types to replicate the unique profile style of the hospitality industry, but this...
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October 16, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Few millennials answer their phones and a large portion of that issue stems from the rampant abuse of robocalls. Businesses don’t have the luxury of ignoring when their phone rings however and when the spam calls come in, someone will be on the other end of the line listening to the annoying message. Larger issues than wasted time are occurring...
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August 31, 2023   /
Ratings and Review 
Google often generates an “editorial summary” on the top of listings, a short two sentence description of what the business can offer a customer. This summary pulls from reviews, the business’s website, and the business’s own owner description to try to succinctly explain the organization. It’s essentially written by AI. While these summaries are often mediocre, Google attributes that to...
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August 31, 2023   /
Ratings and Review 
When a business receives enough reviews on Google, users examining those reviews will start to see keywords available to filter feedback by topic. This section is called “Place Topics”. The top of a business’s review section will show commonly mentioned features such as customer service, individual products, or other unique aspects of the business. Along with this type of filtration,...
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August 31, 2023   /
Google Business Profile 
A new attribute now exists in Google Business Profile under the heading “Pets”. Business owners can now specify if dogs are allowed inside and/or outside their business establishment. This follows a slew of attributes that Google has released over the past two years such as veteran-owned or LGBTQ+ friendly, and the multitude of recycling and environmental indicators. These attributes often...
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August 31, 2023   /
Google Business Profile 
In a gradual rollout, Google is now allowing businesses to add links to their social media directly on their business profiles. Businesses can add their Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, TikTok, (X) Twitter, YouTube, and other social media platforms to their listings on both search and Maps. While businesses can only add one link per platform, Google allows for the same...
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July 28, 2023   /
All industries  /   Algorithm Update 
Along with Google’s expansion into AI Search Generative Experiences, Bing announced several new features in Bing Search, Chat, and the Edge sidebar. The features include AI-generated buying guides, AI-generated review summaries, new price match monitors, and the ability to upload images into Chat for a visual search. Buying Guides: Bing now incorporates AI with user’s purchase profiles to suggest categories...
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July 28, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile  /  Algorithm Update 
Google introduced a new Search Generative Experience, that being a search engine results page that incorporates AI elements. What someone will notice with these generative experiences is that they show above everything else. The section for the local 3 pack is also expanded to include a 5 pack. DAC has also discovered that ranking for this generative local pack follows...
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July 28, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
It’s shown time and time again that including all the categories you can on your Google Business Profile will give a substantive increase to your rankings. As one of the simplest and yet most impactful optimization methods a business can undergo, there is no reason why a listing shouldn’t utilize this feature. Even a slight boost in rankings can lead...
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July 28, 2023   /
All industries  /   Algorithm Update 
Canadian news organizations will see a significant fall in search and social media traffic from July onward. The Online News Act, also known as Bill C-18, limits the ability of third-party platforms to display the content of Canadian news articles, without either guiding users to the news outlet for full information or otherwise paying a “link tax” as compensation. The...
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June 28, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
It is well known that offering incentives for reviews such as discounts, gift cards, or giveaways goes against Google’s terms of service. This is being emphasized further by Google stating that charitable donations also go against these terms. Google specified that donations would fall under the fake engagement policy, which reads, “Paying, incentivizing or encouraging the posting of content that...
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June 28, 2023   /
 
It is well known that offering incentives for reviews such as discounts, gift cards, or giveaways goes against Google’s terms of service. This is being emphasized further by Google stating that charitable donations also go against these terms. Google specified that donations would fall under the fake engagement policy, which reads, “Paying, incentivizing or encouraging the posting of content that...
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June 28, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
It may seem obvious that failing to specify a physical address will impact your business listings, but Google itself has misled users with its policies. Google’s own guidelines state: “Important: If you don’t serve customers at your business address, do not enter an address under the “Info” tab in Business Profile Manager. Leave the “business location” field blank.” Service area...
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June 28, 2023   /
All industries  /   Algorithm Update 
Spam is overbearing for Google, especially with AI such as ChatGPT increasing the volume and undetectability of the problem. With Google’s automatic systems consistently failing to prevent spam (only 20% of it was removed in 2022), it falls on business owners to manually remove the content that is costing them leads. To assist in this manual process, Google released a...
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June 28, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Google constantly struggles against spam. In October of last year, it specifically targeted the search engine optimizations spammers use to outrank legitimate businesses. In February, Google then tried to purge listing and review spam, but accidentally removed legitimate content in the process. The problem has only grown worse with Google admitting that its attempts only managed to block 20% of...
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28 May 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile  /  Algorithm Update 
Google has been testing placing the “services” tab as the first action displayed when users interact with when viewing a local listing. This tab offers a quick look into what a business can provide a customer without them needing to navigate a business’s website. A house painter for example could list services such as “fence painting” or other such tasks...
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28 May 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile  /  Algorithm Update 
Over the past 90 days, instances of the local pack have been severely reduced in local search results. What was assumed a bug has sparked a different theory given its persistent presence and lack of response from Google. A change that appears to lower the quality of search results may be a test by Google to understand the impact of...
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May 28, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile  /  Algorithm Update 
Google is now able to show your businesses address in multiple languages within Google Maps and in the Google local search results. Google previously only displayed addresses into the translated language of the user but now show the user’s local language as well as the exact address. While this may not be relevant for many businesses, for those in travel...
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May 28, 2023   /
All industries  /   Ratings and Reviews  /  Algorithm Update 
Yelp has launched three new features which it claims are to “transform the user experience and boost engagement.” While the platform has been failing to find success outside its initial niche of restaurant reviews, Yelp is hoping that at least one of these new features will help change that. Yelp Guaranteed: A satisfaction guarantee program for quotes from Home Service professionals....
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May 28, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
The trend of Google calling business location to confirm hours of operations continues but Google has now begun a second method of verifying more than just hours. Along with calls, Google is now texting businesses when their listed number is capable of receiving messages. This is verifying not only hours of operation but other aspects of the business profile which...
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April 28, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
While LPM is almost always about organic and free traffic to your listings, there is occasionally paid ad news substantive enough to warrant its inclusion. Google has recently launched Online-Conversion Local Ads, a subset of the Online Local Ads (OLA). This new ad format allows for business owners to promote products or services relevant to specific locations, not something that...
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April 28, 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
The Google March 2023 broad core update completed its rollout after 13 days. Starting on March 15th and finishing March 28th, we are now seeing the effects of this update through April. While the changes from many core updates are imperceptible and only general SEO best practices can be used to comply with them, this latest update appears to target...
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28 April 2023   /
All industries  /   Ratings and Review 
In a completely unsurprising use case for AI, bad actors are using tools such as ChatGPT to generate fake reviews on Google. The platform already had a spam problem, but now fake lead-stealing listings will appear more legitimate, and honest businesses will be plagued with even more defamatory material. Google already struggled with removing spam on their platform, only blocking...
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28 April 2023   /
Travel  /  Google Business Profile 
Google announced three new features for Google travel including a new story format for hotel bookings, price guarantees for some flights and discover tools for locations. Hotel rooms can be viewed like Stories now Google introduced a swipeable story format when looking at hotel properties or other places to stay. Users can tap through photos of the hotel and get...
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31 March 2023   /
All industries  /   All industries  /   Algorithm Updates  /  Algorithm Update 
Google implemented the first broad core update of 2023. The generality of it left it with the name “March 2023 broad core update.” It began on March 15, 2023, at about 10:30 am ET and will take about two weeks to roll out. Whenever Google updates its search ranking algorithms, it means that your site can do better or worse...
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31 March 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Bug 1: GBP services display incorrect pricing (sometimes free) Services have become a big part of Google Business Profiles. General business categories such as “painters” love the ability to rank for far more specific queries such as “fence painting” and that is made possible by including all their standard and custom services within their profile. Services have the option to...
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31 March 2023   /
Restaurants and Hospitality  /  Ratings and Review 
Google now lets some reviewers leave reviews specifically recommending dishes from the restaurant where they ate. Frequently mentioned dishes will fill automatically but diners can manually add any food or dish they wish to recommend. This comes as an obvious boon to restaurant owners as specifying menu items in their reviews, Google posts, and elsewhere helps their listings rank when users...
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31 March 2023   /
All industries  /   Ratings and Review 
With Google aiming to be the top review platform in every category, it is now also discouraging adding embedded reviews from non-Google sources. Google’s John Mueller was asked if it would help with web rankings in Google to embed reviews from sites like Facebook, Bing, Yelp, etc., on your website and John stated bluntly that it would not. Google wishes...
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31 March 2023   /
All industries  /   Ratings and Review 
Google has updated the Google Maps User Contributed Content Policy around prohibited and restricted content. Specifically, Google updated the definition of personal information under the Civil discourse section and fake engagement under the Deceptive content section. The personal information section has been expanded greatly to include: “Do not distribute or post personal information without consent. Personal information is defined as information that applies to...
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28 February 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
It is well known that having a robust Google Business Profile will positively impact rankings. The idea that any aspect that can be filled in, should be filled in, remains true. However, one aspect of profiles that has seen an uncharacteristically high change to how it affects rankings is Google Services. In a study conducted this past month, it was...
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28 February 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Comparing year over year metrics is a very important process for businesses. Seeing your growth over time is a great measure of how your business is performing. For businesses that also work with seasonality, comparing year over year is the only viable way to compare metrics. Google however is changing their GBP Insights for views. Comparing that KPI for any...
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28 February 2023   /
Automotive  /  Google Business Profile 
In a niche update but one that is very impactful for ones within that industry, Google is opening up its local car inventory beta to all US vehicle dealerships. This means that car and other vehicle inventories will be able to show up straight in the Google Business Profile. For users searching for a specific make or model, this can...
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28 February 2023   /
All industries  /   Algorithm Update 
During a recent livestream in Paris, Google announced a number of features coming to Google Lens, Google Translate, and most important to Local Presence Management, Google Maps. Google has deemed the AI that is bringing improvements to these platforms as Google Bard, it’s answer to ChatGPT.  Google is rolling out new Map features for electric vehicles, glanceable directions, immersive views,...
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31 January 2023   /
Restaurants and Hospitality  /  Algorithm Update 
Some restaurants have included a “Join Waitlist” button on their Google listings through third party “Reserve with Google” partners. It now appears that Google includes a secondary button that allows users to “Check Wait Times”, without implying they are looking to commit to any type of waitlist. The previous join button would be followed up by questions such as “party...
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31 January 2023   /
All industries  /   Google Business Profile 
Through changes made to the Google Business Profile API, mainly the deprecation schedule, we have learned of large alterations to what metrics Google listings will be able to report in the near future. As of February 20th, 2023, Google will no longer give data on the following:  Search Count   Discovery   Direct   Branded   Photo Views    Photo Count   Google Local Post View...
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31 January 2023   /
All industries  /   Ratings and Review 
Every month comes with new review updates from Google. With them looking to become the premier review platform for every type of business from restaurants to lawyers, it is not a surprise that Google is now encouraging users to add even more substantive information to their feedback. There are currently new data fields available for some users when leaving reviews...
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31 January 2023   /
All industries  /   Ratings and Review 
Many a business owner have noticed their total review counts going down in February. This is due to a tried and partially failed attempt at Google purging spam and other reviews that went against their terms of service. Google has been overzealous in this latest attempt however and over the past month, many legitimate and positive reviews have been disappearing...
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