Are You a Victim of Spam Closing Your Google Places Listings?

In the past few months, I have had a few clients' Google Places business listings permanently closed for no apparent reason.  Very frustrating for both me and my clients.  Not only were they closed,  they also lost their page #1 maps listing.  In one case, we have been unable to recover the page one listing, which is a great loss for their online exposure, especially since they are in a major metro area.  Even though they are still one page one in the organic ranking,  the maps area is important for visibility.

Read what happens in this NY Times article.  Google is speaking up in response to the article.  This is what Google has to say with a written apology to businesses affected.  In short, Google has a problem with their Google Places setup and spamming has become a problem for some businesses. It is great they are addressing the problem as quickly as they can, but that  doesn't help the businesses who were affected.

Since Google and Google Places is a free service, there is not much you can do when problems arise with your listing other than to report the problem and troubleshoot afterwards.

I have said this often before, but it warrants saying it again…  Check your Google Places listings on a regular basis to ensure everything is running smoothly.  If problems like these occur, your online exposure can be compromised. Other problems I have found with my clients the past few months with all the recent updates include:

• Practices who lost page ranking in maps area, on further inspection in reports area, I found they were unverified and needed to be verified again.
• Website addresses City, ST, and zip are missing, even though they are listed on back end.
• Uploaded photos are missing

Google is constantly updating this area to keep up with latest trends and problems are to be expected when trying to manage millions of businesses online.  Be proactive to assure you don't  fall victim to a problem. Stay on top of it at least every 2 weeks.  Once the problem is discovered and corrected, it could take weeks to regain your previous status, and in some cases longer.

If you are experiencing a problem in your Google Places listing,  contact me to help resolve the problem at 877-285-5611 or email mk@orthopreneur.com.

Have you fallen victim to lost information on Google?  How did you fix it?  Leave a comment below.