How to integrate reviews from 3rd party sites onto service company website in order to get review rich snippet in SERPS ?

[leves]

Im looking to add reviews schema to a website so that the site gets the reviews rich snippet in the SERP results.

The site in question has the majority of its reviews from GMB c. 20 reviews. And from Houzz c. 25 reviews.

I was looking at this plugin to add the reviews schema - Schema & Structured Data plugin for WordPress & AMP as i already use this plugin for the local business schema.

I was reading about Google's rules on integrating 3rd party site schema into your site (eg. adding GMB and Houzz reviews onto my site) - i was reading this - Google Updates Schema Review Guidelines - Again - GatherUp - article, which seems to state that "Sites must collect ratings information directly from users and not from other sites."

Ive also heard that you have to add a dynamic link to the 3rd party review sites on your site, eg. a widget showing 20 5* Google reviews.

In summary im a bit stuck as to how to proceed as the above information all seems to be conflicting. Would appreciate any input on the matter.

 

[Conor Treacy]

For us, we don't like to rely on the 3rd parties and potential reviews that could mention competitors or negativity. If the content is going on the client's site, we like to have control of that content.

To that extent, we manually copy and paste the reviews onto the website, mark it up with Schema, and then we post a link back to the source so a visitor can validate that the review was real. Not using a 3rd party widget/script also reduces the load on the website.

 

[Gesundheit]

For us, we don't like to rely on the 3rd parties and potential reviews that could mention competitors or negativity. If the content is going on the client's site, we like to have control of that content.

To that extent, we manually copy and paste the reviews onto the website, mark it up with Schema, and then we post a link back to the source so a visitor can validate that the review was real. Not using a 3rd party widget/script also reduces the load on the website.

I was considering doing this as well but was informed by a colleague that it is against Google's TOS to repost review content. I had presumed that it was normal to copy/paste reviews and list aggregate star ratings, and then use schema to markup that rating.

Based on section 2a of this doc, am I corrrect in understanding that is not allowed?

Prohibited Conduct. Your compliance with this Section 2 is a condition of your license to use Google Maps/Google Earth. When using Google Maps/Google Earth, you may not (or allow those acting on your behalf to):​

​

1. redistribute or sell any part of Google Maps/Google Earth or create a new product or service based on Google Maps/Google Earth (unless you use the Google Maps/Google Earth APIs in accordance with their terms of service);

 

[Conor Treacy]

I'm not sure that's the same thing. I believe they're talking about creating a new tool. Let's suppose you create an interactive map where you can measure the square footage of a roof. You can't use Google maps unless you use their API.

I don't think this applies to reviews as such. Does anyone have official answers from Google?

 

[JeffClevelandTN]

I'm not sure that's the same thing. I believe they're talking about creating a new tool. Let's suppose you create an interactive map where you can measure the square footage of a roof. You can't use Google maps unless you use their API.

I don't think this applies to reviews as such. Does anyone have official answers from Google?

Hey @Conor Treacy!

So....I assumed that it "must" be OK as Google's API allows you to pull reviews and also there are so many Wordpress plug-ins that were created specifically for the purpose of using Google reviews in a nice carousel on your own or a client's website. Also, many FB business pages will use selective Google reviews to create a FB post. To be totally transparent, our company has also done this for our clients: show reviews on their websites using a plug-in that will pull reviews from Google (and other sources such as Trip Advisor, Yelp, etc), and also we'll create a nice looking FB post using the copy from a user's Google review.

However after reading this post, I thought maybe my assumption was incorrect and it was worth investigating further. Surely Google would have a doc or something out there that would clearly spell-out whether this practice is allowed or denied. After spending some time researching, there are a ton of non-authoritative sites that seemed to regurgitate the same info. That being said, for the most part, the answer was consistent: the reviews belong to Google and the reviewer. If you want to reuse reviews, you should obtain the permission of the reviewer first.

After doing further digging, I finally found someone that I trust, the "Godfather of local search" Mike Blumenthal who covered this topic but it has been just shy of 8 years ago. All those other websites seem to be referring back to his original blog post from 2014: Using Google Reviews On Your Website

TLDR; according to Google: “Google reviews content is authored by our users. We would suggest that business owners ask for permission from the author of the content before re-using the review on a business’s website or elsewhere. Usage of the Google brand itself is covered by these permissions: Brand Resource Center.”

Which means we'll need to be rethinking our use of reposting Google reviews on websites.

Would be super nice to hear from @CarrieHill or "maybe" she could pass this over to Mike .

 

[Conor Treacy]

@JeffClevelandTN so a copy and paste (with permission from the reviewer) seems to cover the base. I know the logos are always something I'm weary of using. Even in a blog post about the Search Console I'm always hesitant to use their logo for fear of it sounding like an endorsement. The post may be educational about how to use "X" within, but because we use a sales pitch at the end, we go into a gray area.

I know it's an old post, but I doubt things have changed much on Google policy.

 

[Gesundheit]

My gut tells me that y'all are correct regarding approval from the reviewer.

My remaining question: what does this mean for schema markup of aggregated reviews? If I have 50 reviews on my GBP averaging to a 4.5/5 rating, can I put 4.5 stars on my landing page and mark that up accordingly? (To be specific, I'm asking this for a service, rather than the rating of a product.)

I feel like I've seen this done regularly on multiple sites*, and with static (ie not dynamically updated) source code. This feels fishy to me, but the alternative seems to be only being able to markup reviews that are generated on the page itself and then dynamically updating the source code - which feels a bit too complicated for most users who would benefit from the strategy.


*I'm not prepared to to prove this out right now; purely anecdotal.

 

[JeffClevelandTN]

I feel like I've seen this done regularly on multiple sites*, and with static (ie not dynamically updated) source code. This feels fishy to me, but the alternative seems to be only being able to markup reviews that are generated on the page itself and then dynamically updating the source code - which feels a bit too complicated for most users who would benefit from the strategy.

We don't do a lot of specialized schema markup as we have not found much, if any, SEO benefit. However, I do understand your desire to hopefully have your review stars showing up on a SERP result. Whenever we are looking to do any schema markup that we are unfamiliar with, it has been beneficial to take a look at what Schema Apps website has to say. In the case of review schema, they spell it out pretty clearly. Here are a couple items I grabbed from this page:

• You should only markup content visible on your website.
• Make sure the reviews and ratings being marked up are clearly visible on the page for users to see.

Hope this is helpful

 

[Conor Treacy]

@Gesundheit I also don't do much when it comes to the stars on normal services, but we do use it on products all the time - but those are dynamically updated.

Going on what @JeffClevelandTN found about the "make sure the ratings... are clearly visible" I think this opens a whole new door. You could cherry-pick in the reviews using a slider, showing "X" at a time - then paste the aggregate star rating based on "X" reviews. So if you have 50 reviews, you could load 35 (all 5-star) and display that you have 35 5-star reviews. That could be added manually without issue.

 

[Gesundheit]

SEO Roundtable just posted an interaction with John Mueller this morning that I think really lays all of this to rest (at least for me!).

Google: Embedding Local Reviews Collected By Third Parties Does Not Help With Web Search Rankings

Google's John Mueller was asked if it would help with web rankings in Google to embed reviews from sites like Facebook, Bing, Google, etc., on your website. John said no, not for web search, and he al

www.seroundtable.com

Dacey Hill asked, "Is there any benefit for any local business website if their GMB/Bing/Facebook reviews are embedded or shown through API on the web pages instead of the static reviews without validation?"

John replied, "Not really, at least not for search. Also, if you do that for other reasons, make sure not to use structured data markup on reviews not collected on your site."