GMB Description Field Changes

[Colan Nielsen]

I just noticed that this help center doc was updated. https://support.google.com/business/answer/6262887

The Introduction/Description field?is no longer editable in Google My Business. It only displays to users in Google+, and may still be edited there. Editing of attributes, coming soon to all Google My Business views, will be an improved way to describe your business to users on Google Search and Maps.?
8/1/2016

Anyone seeing this update live?

 

[Matthew Newman]

No More Descriptions in GMB?

Long time no post!

Is anyone else no longer given the option to have a description in GMB? All accounts that I've checked no longer show a description option in either the main GMB dashboard edit or the bulk/list editing page.

From what I can tell, descriptions that were previously entered in still display on the G+ page itself.

Is Google no longer allowing descriptions? I know Bing also removed the option of descriptions a month or two back.

 

[Linda Buquet]

Re: No More Descriptions in GMB?

Hey Matthew,

Yep. Gone. See this post from Mike for more details:

<a href="http://blumenthals.com/blog/2016/08/02/comatose-google-my-business-description-moved-from-hospital-to-long-term-care-on-path-to-burial/">Comatose Google My Business Description Moved from Hospital to Long Term Care on Path to Burial & Replacement with Attributes</a>

 

[jvaquino]

Re: No More Descriptions in GMB?

It says "It only displays to users in Google+, and may still be edited there" but can't edit it.

 

[whitespark]

Very interesting! That will solve the description field spamming problem, I guess. Not that it ever helped to spam that field, but still.

 

[Linda Buquet]

Hey guys, just to let you know I decided to merge Matt's thread into Colan's so would not have 2 different convos. And moved to Google Local IMPORTANT since this is an official GMB change.

Note the link I put in reply to Matt w/ Mike's post (above) that goes into more details.

 

[Local Web Strategies]

I noticed this the other day.... so sad

 

[James Watt]

@Local web strategies, why are you sad about the change? The description doesn't show anywhere anymore anyway, all it did was give a chance for an ignorant business owner to get themselves flagged for spam.

Of course, I do think there should be more ways for a business owner to control their editorial summary, but that's another topic.

 

[Local Web Strategies]

The description can be used without spamming by those who are not ignorant. It was nice to have a few links to the business's website in the description area. Just my opinion.

 

[James Watt]

It's been at least a year since that description was actually visible anywhere. If you were tracking those links, I'd be surprised if you saw any of them get even a single click in the last year. You could be right that a link to the site from the description had some value, but since the page already links to the site anyway, that's a pretty small drop in the bucket at best.

But hey, even if you're right and this takes a small way for the good businesses to easily distinguish themselves, at least everyone's on the same playing field with the loss. On to the other 99 local SEO tasks...

 

[Yourname]

Is there any way to add these editorial snippets anymore? I've seen them show up in the 3-packs...

 

[Linda Buquet]

Is there any way to add these editorial snippets anymore? I've seen them show up in the 3-packs...

"editorial snippet" were never anything you could add. That's 3rd party comments or description that the algo chooses to add or not.

Did you mean description that the owner writes? Or did you mean the tag line?
Those are not editorial and owner can change them in G+, but not GMB dash.

If you could show an example of what you are referring to, there are lots of snippets Google adds various places. In fact a brand new type was just added today.

 

[Yourname]

"editorial snippet" were never anything you could add. That's 3rd party comments or description that the algo chooses to add or not.

Did you mean description that the owner writes? Or did you mean the tag line?
Those are not editorial and owner can change them in G+, but not GMB dash.

If you could show an example of what you are referring to, there are lots of snippets Google adds various places. In fact a brand new type was just added today.

I could be confusing myself, haha.
Here's a screenshot.

 

[Linda Buquet]

Yes I believe that's an editorial summary, like this:
https://support.google.com/business/answer/6088158?hl=en

"Is there any way to add these editorial snippets anymore?"
So no there is no way for you to add them.