Google's 'Local Guides' - a big problem for business owners

Google's 'Local Guides' - a big problem for business owners

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Discussion

monthefish

Original Poster:

20,439 posts

230 months

Friday 11th January 2019
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For those who aren't aware, basically Google now gives out 'points' to users for reviews etc, and the more 'points' they collect, the greater virtual honour is bestowed upon them and they attain titles such as 'local guide' etc. i.e. They become a 'somebody' in the virtual world.

The fundamental flaw in this is that there's no obligation or requirement for reviewers to have actually visited the places -or used the services - of those they review. They can just select a business at random, write a review (good, bad or mediocre) and get points for this.

The major problem with this is that there is seems to be an increasing number of weird, sad people who just want to collect points by doing scores of reviews of places they've never visited, which Google rewards them for. Sadly, these reviews are often amongst only a handful of other reviews of that business/service meaning they affect the overall rating quite significantly.

There's one reviewer I spotted 'Johnny Groats' who's a 'Local Guide · Level 10' and has given 5575 reviews. He gave a review of Ducati Glasgow of 3 stars with the comment "vroom, vroom" rolleyes


Has anyone been affected by this yet? (i.e. a random, unfounded review of their business)

Edited by monthefish on Friday 11th January 16:17

anonymous-user

53 months

Friday 11th January 2019
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No and do people really pay attention to Google reviews? I dont.




Evoluzione

10,345 posts

242 months

Friday 11th January 2019
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This whole online feedback and review thing has become a bit of a joke and I would hope that any member of the public with or any more than average intelligence will not put too much trust in it.
Ebay: IIRC you could buy positive feedback. Would I choose anyone with 12 million feedback over someone with 50? Nope. In fact I barely look at it, lets face it, Paypal protects us now.

Tripadvisor has the same type of system you've mentioned - the reviewer gets 'bonus points' which essentially mean nothing. I do think that Tripadvisor is generally believable, but you also get some pretty stupid people on there. I read one the other day whereby someone had awarded 1 star because the place they visited was closed!

As for Google reviews, well I run a business and I bought from another business. They sent the wrong item and refused to take it back and refund. PP intervened, read the dialogue, looked at the evidence and refunded me straight away. The vendors action was to leave my business a 1 star rating rolleyes
The other thing with Google (and maybe Tripadvisor too) is that once someone puts you on there you can't remove it.

KrazyIvan

4,341 posts

174 months

Friday 11th January 2019
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Not really but when I have seen a place with a number of reviews I look at what's written rather than the score.

ashleyman

6,963 posts

98 months

Friday 11th January 2019
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I read the reviews rather than look at the scores.

As a business owner I’ve always wondered if reviews could be removed if they’re fake or whatever.

eliot

11,364 posts

253 months

Friday 11th January 2019
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Pigdoguk said:
No and do people really pay attention to Google reviews? I dont.
Aye

PF62

3,575 posts

172 months

Friday 11th January 2019
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monthefish said:
Has anyone been affected by this yet? (i.e. a random, unfounded review of their business)
https://support.google.com/business/answer/4596773?hl=en-GB

and

https://support.google.com/business/answer/4596773...

"Only post content based on your experience or questions about experiences at the specific location. Maps is not meant to be a forum for general political, social commentary or personal rants. Content that doesn't meet this standard will be removed."

monthefish

Original Poster:

20,439 posts

230 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
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Pigdoguk said:
do people really pay attention to Google reviews? I dont.
Yes, many do.

Like others who've posted, if I've got time, I'll look beyond the scores and read the reviews but not everyone will take that next step. Most will just glance at the google+ panel on the RHS of the screen, see the score and not delve any deeper.


Evoluzione said:
This whole online feedback and review thing has become a bit of a joke and I would hope that any member of the public with or any more than average intelligence will not put too much trust in it.
Yes, but the issue is that there's a large percentage of the public without much intelligence.

Evoluzione said:
The other thing with Google (and maybe Tripadvisor too) is that once someone puts you on there you can't remove it.
ashleyman said:
As a business owner I’ve always wondered if reviews could be removed if they’re fake or whatever.
In theory, yes you can have them removed, but actually getting it done is nigh on impossible (and that's assuming you can actually identify the person).
Google have no interest in policing it at all, despite what they may claim.

FWIW, we had a single bad (fictitious) review which was put on by one of these nutters, which took our 5 star score down to 4.9, but I manged to get it removed 'by other means', but it may me realise how vulnerable business owners are.

meehaja

607 posts

107 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
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We've had this quite a bit. Our PR team are quick to pick up and respond to reviews etc. If its a bad review we can usually work with the customer to resolve their issue, or at least take some learning form it and improve things where required.

However, we get a lot of reviews by people that just politically disagree with our business, have never been customers, but feel the urge to down vote, leve bad (clearly made up) reviews and sometimes just bizarre rants.

We're big enough for it to not really matter on google, but on other platforms it can be an issue and I fully see, how for a small business it could be a problem.

as an aside, I left a google review once, on a garage when I bought a 2nd hand car, before handing over cash i noticed that there was no spare wheel/ jack etc and asked for a wheel to be added, which it was. It was only year or so later when i got a puncture I found that the spare was A:16 inch rim and too small to get round the disc.
B: 5x112 and my car was 5X100.

I left a 1star review and it is still the garages only review!

Buzz84

1,138 posts

148 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
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Its the same on the Amazon Q&A section of an items listings - someone will post questions about the item then there will be several answers normally along the lines of "sorry i don't know i bought it as a gift for someone else ". its a complete waste of time and they can only be posting to gain more virtual kudos.

Evanivitch

19,803 posts

121 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
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I know a holiday lodge/cottages that gets angry 1* reviews because people have seen it on Four in a Bed and didn't like the attitude of the owner.

The fact the show gets repeated over 5 years from the original showing, and it was heavily edited, doesn't seem to have done the owners too much harm!

Si1295

362 posts

140 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
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monthefish said:
Has anyone been affected by this yet? (i.e. a random, unfounded review of their business)
Yes, 1 star review left for one of my businesses which reads "A bit confused!. I went to a lovely park next door to the garage". The local guide in question reviewed something like 40 places in a week. As you've said Google aren't interested in policing it, it was reported at the time (1 month ago) and it's still there affecting our local pack ranking.

untakenname

4,953 posts

191 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
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I read the reviews before using an establishment, you can easily tell the users that have genuine grievances and also the fake positive reviews as well.



Johnnytheboy

24,498 posts

185 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
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On Google Maps one of my competitors has single 1 star review from what sounds like the nightmare customer.

My firm has a single 5 star review posted by someone referring to a different branch of our parent company. hehe

bga

8,134 posts

250 months

Sunday 13th January 2019
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ashleyman said:
As a business owner I’ve always wondered if reviews could be removed if they’re fake or whatever.
I used to do a lot of reviews on Tripadvisor and did a few hundred during a period where I travelled a lot for work.

I gave a handful of 1-star reviews during that time and they all got removed so some sites must have that mechanism.

Sheepshanks

32,530 posts

118 months

Sunday 13th January 2019
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bga said:
I used to do a lot of reviews on Tripadvisor and did a few hundred during a period where I travelled a lot for work.

I gave a handful of 1-star reviews during that time and they all got removed so some sites must have that mechanism.
I know someone who runs a country house hotel and they get quite a lot of fake negative reviews - it’s common with hotels apparently. Tripadvisor will remove them.

cptsideways

13,535 posts

251 months

Sunday 13th January 2019
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I use Google reviews all the time for pubs & eateries that I'm not familiar with, as I travel a lot for work everywhere at times, I'm always seeking the lovely little homely pubs out of the way. I will always take a glance at general comments, dismiss the odd bad one & read through the lines.

I can see the problem! I think I am classed as a local guide & will often write a good review of places I have great experiences at, I'll only write a bad one if it was dismal though. I'm no review/blogger/writer though, I just do it as a favour to the smaller independent business's that I really appreciate.

Have also suggested to some if they have no reviews to ask customers who've liked their place to write one, it definitely helps! If I had a local pub I'm proud of in my village (I dont) then I would do my best to support them as really appreciate these little gems around our country. My Google maps has the ones I like starred, must be getting on for a hundred by now.



untakenname

4,953 posts

191 months

Sunday 13th January 2019
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Oddly enough I got an email in the early hours of this morning about my contributions as a Google guide


Most of them are for providing answers to a friends business, people seem incapable of reading information these days and so ask questions instead.

Overall I think google guides are good, I had one flagged where the establishment wanted it removed, had booked a table for four and despite not being very busy the food was brought out in a staggered fashion so that each person had finished their meal before the next persons had arrived which was just shoddy service.
I gave 2 stars and the owner complained so google asked for more info which I provided and they left the review in place.

You can see why companies don't like it as when someone does something stupid (member of staff in uniform assaults someone, deliberately brake checks in a company van etc...) and it goes viral so people leave them 1 star reviews.

Sheepshanks

32,530 posts

118 months

Sunday 13th January 2019
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untakenname said:
....deliberately brake checks in a company van etc...
The plumber we use has something like that - he's not happy about it, and responded which I'm never sure is a good idea. I don't think he's tried to get it taken down.

cashmax

1,099 posts

239 months

Sunday 13th January 2019
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Anything is better than that shocking shower of ste Trustpilot.