Google Review Removed - Anyone Seeing An Increase In Review Being Removed?

[Tim Colling]

In the past 24 hours, we are seeing a significant increase in reviews being removed from one of our clients. They had 65 reviews yesterday, and today 15 of those have been removed. Fourteen removed reviews were 4- or 5-star reviews, and one was a 1-star.

We wrote a custom app that monitors our clients' Google Business Profiles and notifies us with the details of any reviews that are removed. That app runs every 24 hours, and we're seeing more reviews being removed one at a time but 15 out of 65 is a major escalation.

I can't help but wonder whether someone is targeting these clients with a malicious campaign to remove their favorable reviews.

Does anyone have anything similar happening right now with their clients?

 

[mblumenthal]

In the past 24 hours, we are seeing a significant increase in reviews being removed from one of our clients. They had 65 reviews yesterday, and today 15 of those have been removed. Fourteen removed reviews were 4- or 5-star reviews, and one was a 1-star.

We wrote a custom app that monitors our clients' Google Business Profiles and notifies us with the details of any reviews that are removed. That app runs every 24 hours, and we're seeing more reviews being removed one at a time but 15 out of 65 is a major escalation.

I can't help but wonder whether someone is targeting these clients with a malicious campaign to remove their favorable reviews.

Does anyone have anything similar happening right now with their clients?

I follow reports of review takedowns in the forum and we see these types of reports periodically. Nothing extraordinary at the moment though. Usually the large take downs seem to be in a case by case basis when the filter washes through.

It is conceivable that someone filed a report that caused Google to look harder but it would have still been necessary to go through Google’s processes, rules and grading.

It point out though why you need to keep a record of existing review content and reviewers so you can escalate if need be.

 

[mblumenthal]

Many months I tabulate the total forum complaints about missing reviews.

I just did a mid month check and over halfway through the month there are 113 reports of missing reviews. This is consistent with the past year or so when it has been running 200-250 a month.

 

[mblumenthal]

1- With missing reviews the best thing to do is track all incoming reviews and when they go missing request that Google restore them. If new clients are leaving reviews that are not showing then ask them for a screen shot of the review so that their efforts don't go to waste. See A Guide: Why Are My Reviews Missing on Google? for details.

2- If you read the article you referenced you will see that a few reviews (10 or so) impact ranking but beyond that have no measurable ranking result. That being said NearMedia's current consumer search behavior research clearly shows that conversions are directly impacted by review volume with some frequency.

 

[Tim Colling]

Here is the "review audit" graphs for this location, from the excellent GMB Everywhere app.

 

[keyserholiday]

I looked closely at the firm engaging in fake reviews and three locations. Google removed the profile accounts leaving reviews and converted the profiles to "A Google User," and the count will get updated tomorrow.

 

[JoyHawkins]

I don't know how widespread it is. I haven't seen any drops from clients of ours yet.

 

[mblumenthal]

From where I sit, there is no indication that anything has changed.

The large number of reviews removed from this particular location seems to reflect the episodic google assessment of older reviews as the filter works its way through each listing. I am guessing that Google looks at these older listings in order of their perception of review abuses in the category.

As this review "flyby" uses the new filter, a bunch of reviews surpass the threshold needed for takedown. And go poof.

I am quite sure that these reviews are real but false positives where real reviews are ID'd as fake is a real and unpleasant side affect of Google's new review spam filters.

 

[keyserholiday]

So are we seeing reviews being removed in masses?

I am unable to corroborate it.

 

[JS Girard]

Past ten review, it is review freshness that impact rankings, maintaining review freshness will naturally drive review numbers up, but this is a side effect.

Google seems significantly more likely to block ratings (reviews without text) at the moment. Editing these reviews (as was noted on these very forums) has a very high chance of making them show again. I've tested this just last week with a three-months old review by a coworker that was not showing. Add a little commentary and it's showing up now. A client just asked for my help fixing reviews not showing and I had to put my foot as these where individuals leaving no-comment reviews for 10-some franchises at a time (I saw the screenshots), but I did notice these were ratings and not actual reviews.

Speaking of, we talk about "reviews", but google use two different terms: "reviews" and "ratings". Indeed, if you look at user profiles, only reviews with text are counted as "reviews:

To us Local SEOs, that user has left 41 reviews, but to Google, only 28 are part of that category.

 

[JoyHawkins]

@keyserholiday you seeing this?

 

[localboss]

Nothing rare in here

 

[keyserholiday]

In the past 24 hours, we are seeing a significant increase in reviews being removed from one of our clients. They had 65 reviews yesterday, and today 15 of those have been removed. Fourteen removed reviews were 4- or 5-star reviews, and one was a 1-star.

We wrote a custom app that monitors our clients' Google Business Profiles and notifies us with the details of any reviews that are removed. That app runs every 24 hours, and we're seeing more reviews being removed one at a time but 15 out of 65 is a major escalation.

I can't help but wonder whether someone is targeting these clients with a malicious campaign to remove their favorable reviews.

Does anyone have anything similar happening right now with their clients?

The last time this happened, it took Google a day to update the review counts. I wonder if the reviews were removed on Sunday, and you are seeing the update count today.

 

[Kaycie Smith]

In the past 24 hours, we are seeing a significant increase in reviews being removed from one of our clients. They had 65 reviews yesterday, and today 15 of those have been removed. Fourteen removed reviews were 4- or 5-star reviews, and one was a 1-star.

We wrote a custom app that monitors our clients' Google Business Profiles and notifies us with the details of any reviews that are removed. That app runs every 24 hours, and we're seeing more reviews being removed one at a time but 15 out of 65 is a major escalation.

I can't help but wonder whether someone is targeting these clients with a malicious campaign to remove their favorable reviews.

Does anyone have anything similar happening right now with their clients?

I'm checking now- thanks for the heads up! Sounds like your app is pretty awesome! Also, I remember a few years back Google did this to any reviews left using Birdeye. The review platform was pre-populating 5 stars so Google removed any that came in through Birdeye.

 

[Tim Colling]

It point out though why you need to keep a record of existing review content and reviewers so you can escalate if need be.

Thanks, @mblumenthal
That's why we created the app!

 

[Tim Colling]

The last time this happened, it took Google a day to update the review counts. I wonder if the reviews were removed on Sunday, and you are seeing the update count today.

Thanks, @keyserholiday. With our app, we keep track of the actual reviews, not just the counts. It reports to us when a review actually disappears.

 

[keyserholiday]

I'm checking now- thanks for the heads up! Sounds like your app is pretty awesome! Also, I remember a few years back Google did this to any reviews left using Birdeye. The review platform was pre-populating 5 stars so Google removed any that came in through Birdeye.

Birdeye lost reviews twice.

 

[mblumenthal]

I would be curious:
What category(ies) are the businesses?
Are reviewers remote to the busines?
Are you using the Google URL?
How long has it taken to get to 65?

 

[keyserholiday]

Here are the locations for one person buying fake reviews for all their locations. The counts should be higher. I will check again tomorrow.

 

[Tim Colling]

I would be curious:
What category(ies) are the businesses?

Home health care service, Disability services and support organization, Home help, Home help service agency, Hospice, Mental health service, Nursing agency, Senior citizen center, Aged care

Are reviewers remote to the busines?

Yes

Are you using the Google URL?

Our app uses the Google Business Profile API, but I didn't write it, our developer wrote it. It works only with Google Business Profiles to which we have access.

How long has it taken to get to 65?

nine years or so