If you “Suggest an edit“To report a business that is spamming Google Maps, your standard procedure might look something like this: You only send one report per Google business profile violation, and you wait for Google to approve or reject it before doing anything else. This is not a bad SOP, and often it is good enough.

But impatience can be a virtue – at least if you measure success by how many of your Google Maps anti-spam reports are approved or how quickly they are approved. Google ignores some forms of repetition. Other types of repetition seem to make Google sit up and take notice.

Spam protection on Google Maps is a small part of it the work I do this for clients, but it is an important part (as I have described many times). In my efforts to thin the herd, I noticed it two things that seem to be happening more often than before:

1. I report a problem (usually a fake GBP page or address) and after processing is pending for a few days or weeks, I report the same issue again and sometimes it gets approved the second time. Same company, same processing, same person reporting it.

2. I report a GBP page that shouldn’t exist, and if the change was rejected or not approved quickly (within a few hours or maybe a few days), I create a second report, but this time give a different reason for it the request for removal. In many cases, Your second amendment may ask Google to approve the first amendment, or Google may only approve the second amendment. 6 of one, half a dozen of the other.

What surprises me is not that Google accepted, rejected or delayed It’s more about how easily you can get Google to reconsider. Not always, but often you can turn a no or a maybe into a yes. (Of course, I’m assuming you have a solid basis for suggesting the change you suggest.)

Through my experienceIf other people report a Google Maps party error, it can increase the likelihood of approval, and the same goes for filling out the form Redress Form. One or both of these steps should be part of your anti-spam routine if competitor card spam is a major problem in your market. So I suggest you add a second pass to your routine as well (more on that in a moment).

You and I agree that this is all a hassle. It’s a shame you have to spend any time on this topic at all, let alone potentially having to go through the competition’s spam again. The harsh reality is that Google crowdsources its quality control. If you don’t report a problem on someone’s GBP page, it’s unlikely that Google will know about it or even consider it a problem. The consequence of this is that you get in touch a problemInstead of three different problems, Google assumes that there is only one problem and that everything else is fine. Only the problem you reported seems to be noticed. I think that’s part of what’s going on here. It’s a very literal response from Google, kind of like asking someone “Can you tell me what time it is?” and that person answers “Yes.”

So what do I suggest to you? In addition to patrol cards in the way I suggest, Consider 3 new SOPs:

1. Make a “Change Proposal.” every clear problem You’re looking at a competitor’s GBP page. If it’s a trivial GBP page, report it as “offensive, harmful or misleading.” If this site also uses a home address, report it as “Not open to the public.” If the name contains filled-in keywords, enter the correct company name. Google won’t ignore one change just because you’ve submitted others. On the contrary, Google will tend to agree with you here something when you have told him about every problem you see.

2. When reporting a GBP page that Google should remove, suggest various reasons for removal. If “Offensive, Harmful, or Misleading” didn’t displace a page with fake addresses, try “Not Open to the Public” or another issue that roughly applies.

3. Try again or try something else if the edit has been “pending” for a long time. In other words, don’t confuse a pending edit with a rejection. If you reported a problem a month ago and you knowledge You’re right, try again. If possible, have someone else follow suit. There’s a good chance it will work.

Do these additional steps work every time? NO. Not close. But they could encourage Google to do the right thing 20% ​​of the time instead of 10% of the time. Sometimes the difference is between lying in the dirt and being found by customers in the Google Maps 3-pack one lousy competitor who is only superior to you because of deceit. You may be able to select this one competitor first.