Suspension - First one in a long time

[Tim Colling]

Interesting. I DID change the URL on the first one that got suspended, and I *think* I changed the UTM tag on the second one that got suspended.

Google is hard to work with when they behave like this.

 

[JoyHawkins]

I was told by phone support today (45 min) on hold that my listing had been suspended due to my UTM tracking on one of my URLs. It has been around two weeks till we heard back on other issues

There is nothing about using UTM codes that is against guidelines. I have also added tons to clients in the last couple weeks with no issues. Phone support has been known to give out bad answers/advice and this sounds like more of that.

 

[Conor Treacy]

I honestly can't remember the last time that we received a suspension on GMB - several years for sure.

• On Friday (6/21) a client granted us with management access to their GMB
• On Monday (6/24) we updated the URL from http to https

Instant suspension for Quality Violations.

Fun times to be had by all!

 

[pauieee]

This is legit. After you got suspended, then the waiting game begins.

 

[Chaddow]

Hello All

They said that URL must have a "set number of characters" and they wanted me to send it to the main TLD for a site with 40,000 pages rather than the location page for a specific location ( had no issue with the other 200+ GMBs for this brand going to location, pages it is the first time I have heard this in years of managing GMB listings

Which makes me think it is bad advice as @JoyHawkins says from one operator

To resolve the issue I removed the UTM tracking and the person on the other end fixed the issue, then a couple of hours later I added the UTM back in and there was no problem

Since this update / suspensions / increase time for support requests has started all the clients where I have seen issues have been integrated with my agency dashboard which makes me agree with what @Rich Owings is thinking

 

[Rich Owings]

@Chaddow that brings up an interesting point... How many of you who have seen suspensions, have had them happen when changes were made via (a) an agency dashboard account, (b) your non-agency dashboard account, or (c) the business owner's account?

 

[Chaddow]

Hello @Rich Owings

In my case it has either been B or non and suspensions/ errors have happened without me changing anything

 

[JoyHawkins]

We do all our edits in the agency dashboard and haven't received any suspensions in the last month. We also make sure not to submit multiple edits at once though.

 

[Chaddow]

A colleague of mine has told me this morning that 6 of our listings within our agency dashboard have been unpublished within the last 24 hours and another has been marked as permanently closed

We have gone in and resolved these issues this afternoon but we checked it at the end of Monday and our account had no error in it at that time , all very much up in the air at the moment for everyone it seems

 

[Tim Colling]

Two points of clarification, at least for my two suspensions:
1) I have not received any acknowledgement from Google about filing requests for reconsideration
2) Both occurred after I made edits via our Agency dashboard.

 

[Rich Owings]

We had our first SEObeersAsheville meetup last night and one of the attendees told me he's recently gotten suspensions when logging in and making changes via the owner's account. Unfortunately I neglected to ask him if he made multiple edits (I blame the beer for that!).

 

[Rich Owings]

Another question... Does adding several secondary categories count as multiple edits?

 

[JoyHawkins]

@Rich Owings - no because you would add them all at once and hit save. I've found it gets triggered when you move to several different fields and submit edits.

 

[Tim Colling]

@JoyHawkins should I be concerned about Google not having responded to our suspension repeal form submissions with a case number or anything?

 

[JoyHawkins]

@Tim Colling - usually you get some type of auto response when you fill in the form. How long has it been since you sent it?

 

[Tim Colling]

Over a week on the first one. The day before I started this thread. I'd better re-submit it, I suppose.

Thanks, Joy!

 

[JoyHawkins]

I would resubmit. Confirm if you get an auto-response this time. If not, I'll let Google know something else is broken

 

[HoosierBuff]

I have resubmitted, and the only notification I received was a notice asking me NOT re-submit (which is better than nothing!)

 

[Tim Colling]

@JoyHawkins Thank you

I resubmitted the first one and received this response:

Thank you for contacting Google My Business team.

We see that you’ve recently contacted us regarding the same business listing. For easy follow up on your queries on a particular business listing, we encourage business owners to maintain a single communication thread per business listing. All you have to do is reply on an existing email thread with your query, and we’ll be happy to help.

However, I don't think I received any initial response. I'll go back and check, though.

 

[Tim Colling]

Nope: we never received a response to the initial request, nor did we receive a notice of the suspension in the first place.

Sadly, it's beginning to be a close call between Google and Yelp as to which is the more high-handed, arbitrary and capricious in the way it treats businesses.