Pete
Member
- Joined
- Apr 19, 2019
- Messages
- 28
- Reaction score
- 2
For months, we dominated the local 3 listings. We work hard to please our customers, we have a real location, we respond to the few complaints that we have received, we embrace moral and ethical business conduct and we strive to be a good community member. Our link profile seems to be legit and we contribute content to quality blogs and post regularly on our GMB profile. We have nearly 3 times as many 5-star reviews on GMB than our closest competitor. However, we have dropped out of the local pick 3 while witnessing much weaker competition take the top positions. By weaker competition, I mean sites you really need to see to believe. They are bad and their content is atrocious.
The top spot consists of a business that hasn’t had a review in months. However, they have had a few customers ask questions. But I am suspicious of those questions. The questions must be a ranking factor. We are a larger business and have been around much longer and have never had a single question asked. My gut feeling is that those questions were posted for the sole purpose of gaming the GMB system. A review of their link profile shows that 85-95% percent of the links to their site should sound spam alarms and make Google’s crawlers overheat. They really are that bad.
The second spot is occupied by a site with incredibly weak content. In fact, when I show it to SEO consultants, they become puzzled. The site barely has anything that that could be considered content and user experience is awful. Most people can’t understand why anyone would promote a business like this and they only have a few reviews.
Finally, the third position switches between a site with poor reviews and and a well-known GMB violator with virtual offices in every major U.S. city. The worst part is that they are posting fake reviews. A simple search reveals that they are a virtual office and the suite number has 40 different tenants. Some of the fake reviews include comments about how beautiful their office space is and how friendly their employees are. Keep in mind, this is a virtual office and they have no employees at this location.
To further complicate the matter, all these companies are located outside of the center of the city. We are in the center of the city. So just to recap.
We have 3 times more 5-star reviews than any competitor
We are located closer to the centroid than any competitor
We have a real location
We post articles on GMB much more regularly
We have a decent link profile, that is much less spammy than our competitors
For weeks, I have been trying to figure out what we have done wrong. We have not received any messages about being in violation of the GMB terms. I would really appreciate some expert advice. Our website address is 24hourtranslation.com and a good search example would be "Houston Translation Services" or simply "translation services" if you live in Houston.
The top spot consists of a business that hasn’t had a review in months. However, they have had a few customers ask questions. But I am suspicious of those questions. The questions must be a ranking factor. We are a larger business and have been around much longer and have never had a single question asked. My gut feeling is that those questions were posted for the sole purpose of gaming the GMB system. A review of their link profile shows that 85-95% percent of the links to their site should sound spam alarms and make Google’s crawlers overheat. They really are that bad.
The second spot is occupied by a site with incredibly weak content. In fact, when I show it to SEO consultants, they become puzzled. The site barely has anything that that could be considered content and user experience is awful. Most people can’t understand why anyone would promote a business like this and they only have a few reviews.
Finally, the third position switches between a site with poor reviews and and a well-known GMB violator with virtual offices in every major U.S. city. The worst part is that they are posting fake reviews. A simple search reveals that they are a virtual office and the suite number has 40 different tenants. Some of the fake reviews include comments about how beautiful their office space is and how friendly their employees are. Keep in mind, this is a virtual office and they have no employees at this location.
To further complicate the matter, all these companies are located outside of the center of the city. We are in the center of the city. So just to recap.
We have 3 times more 5-star reviews than any competitor
We are located closer to the centroid than any competitor
We have a real location
We post articles on GMB much more regularly
We have a decent link profile, that is much less spammy than our competitors
For weeks, I have been trying to figure out what we have done wrong. We have not received any messages about being in violation of the GMB terms. I would really appreciate some expert advice. Our website address is 24hourtranslation.com and a good search example would be "Houston Translation Services" or simply "translation services" if you live in Houston.
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