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We are back with another episode of the Whitespark Local Update, where our host Darren Shaw and special guest Claudia Tomina discuss:
๐ฅ Reputation Arm
Creators and Guests
What is The Whitespark Local Update?
The Whitespark Local Update is the go-to podcast for Local SEOs and Marketers who want to stay ahead of the curve in local search and the local visibility space.
Join industry experts Claire Carlile and Darren Shaw for a lively, insightful roundup of their carefully curated selection of top โmust-readโ and โmust-watchโ links, including news, trends, and can't-miss resources.
[Darren Shaw]
Welcome to another episode of the Whitespark Local Update with me, Darren Shaw.
[Claudia Tomina]
And with me, Claudia Tomina.
[Darren Shaw]
Look, it's Claudia Tomina. Welcome to our special guest, Claudia. Claire is out this week, so I thought we'd bring in a special guest, and who better than the person we talk about the most on this podcast, Claudia Tomina.
So now you get a full episode of Claudia's Brilliance. So welcome, Claudia.
[Claudia Tomina]
I am super happy to be here, Darren. Thank you so much for the invite.
[Darren Shaw]
Yeah, totally. It was immediate. I was like, oh, Claire's not gonna be around to record.
I'm like, I know exactly who I would like to invite to be the guest host today. Claudia, tell us just quickly a little bit about you and your business and how you help.
[Claudia Tomina]
My business is Reputation Arm. We help people manage their Google Business Profiles at scale, generate new reviews, and I'm also in the Google Forums, helping businesses troubleshoot all things Google Business Profiles.
[Darren Shaw]
You're Platinum, or did you get to Diamond yet?
[Claudia Tomina]
No, I'm just Platinum.
[Darren Shaw]
Just Platinum.
[Claudia Tomina]
Diamond just takes so much time. I don't know if I'll ever make it, but you never know.
[Darren Shaw]
Well, you're already investing a lot of time. It's a good question. How many hours per week do you think you put into the forum?
[Claudia Tomina]
You know what? I honestly don't know, because I get emails, and then I just respond, so it could be like 10 minutes in one day, and then if I'm really behind, and I know I'm lagging, I have to dedicate a good 30 minutes to an hour one day, and then that whole week, it's like another 20 minutes, because I'm managing those threads. I like quality over quantity on my threads.
[Darren Shaw]
Right, yeah.
[Claudia Tomina]
Like, I won't abandon you if I help you on your thread.
[Darren Shaw]
Right. Anyone who gets Claudia, you're very lucky. All right, well, on this podcast, we talk about the latest happenings in local search, and so Claudia has prepared some of the things that she picked up on.
So what's your first link?
[Claudia Tomina]
Okay, my first link was actually brought to my attention by another product expert. Her name is Bambi, and she brought to my attention that Google updated their policies on identity change. So the first thing I thought about is like local ranking factors and the age of your Google business profile and how it's like a ranking factor, and I used to really think that way.
I don't anymore, actually. I don't think it's much of a ranking factor, but Google is now documenting that if you change your business name or if the business changes significantly, you should mark that business as closed and start a new Google business profile.
[Darren Shaw]
This is huge. Oh my God.
[Claudia Tomina]
So change of ownership, you really gotta think about it, and it actually makes a ton of sense because with AI, like know before you go and things like that, and they're looking at past reviews, you won't want that old data to be surfaced.
[Darren Shaw]
Totally, I know, and that's actually a real, that's a problem, right? Like business changes ownership, you do not wanna lose those reviews. So I always, Google will tell you you're supposed to shut down the profile and make a new one, but I'm like, don't do that.
You definitely wanna maintain your reviews. And so are they enforcing this? That's the question.
[Claudia Tomina]
Yeah, actually she shared a screenshot with me and now like if you suggest an edit on Maps for a business name, it'll ask you, are you fixing the name or are you reporting change of business?
[Darren Shaw]
So what if you were just did a DBA to get some keywords in your business name? Is that a case where Google is gonna push you to?
[Claudia Tomina]
No, no, I wouldn't call that an identity change, but I would think it was more of like, change of ownership type stuff.
[Darren Shaw]
Okay, my immediate take on this is if someone came to me and they're like, hey, we've just acquired a new business, Google's telling us to shut down the old profile and make a new one. I would still wanna steer them somehow into not doing that. Would you agree with that as like just a strategy?
[Claudia Tomina]
Honestly, I would look at the reviews because if a lot of reviews have the old business owner's name or the business name and they're changing the name, you're gonna confuse AI. So I don't know if I would go down that route.
[Darren Shaw]
I guess, yeah, so it depends on the reviews.
[Claudia Tomina]
Right.
[Darren Shaw]
I think I'm probably still gonna advise people to try and keep the listing if they can. Losing those reviews is just like awful.
[Claudia Tomina]
I know, I know, but like review recency, like it's like, who cares about the number? It's like, as long as you get that steady cadence.
[Darren Shaw]
Well, the number still matters, particularly I think for- For converting. Exactly, getting the click, right? So if you, let's say you've managed to rank in the local pack, most of your competition has 300 reviews and you got six, you're not gonna get the clicks, right?
[Claudia Tomina]
Yeah, yeah. Especially service-based businesses.
[Darren Shaw]
Exactly, yeah. Oh, that's interesting. Geez, I don't love that.
I don't like that update. Okay, well, my first link is from someone we know so well here on the local update. It's from you, Claudia.
I wanna talk about your article. Yes, of course. What's a Whitespark Local update without a Claudia article?
[Claudia Tomina]
I made sure to publish it just for you.
[Darren Shaw]
So this one, very interesting. I thought you did a great job on this, as you always do. Your article is titled, Why Are My Google Reviews Disappearing?
What Businesses Need to Know About Google's New Review Policies and Algorithm Updates. So what you're addressing in this article is great. You're talking about, it's weird to be speaking to you in reference to the article I'm covering.
So the thing that, a few things that I noticed in this. So you're basically talking about how we're seeing Google adjusting their algorithm, working on filtering, using AI to properly try and solve this massive fake review issue and all kinds of other review, questionable review stuff and detecting review fraud, questionable reviews, right? So good job for Google.
I'm really happy actually to see that they're doing something, right? So that's fantastic, yes.
[Claudia Tomina]
I think everybody is like, the sentiment is like, oh, finally Google's doing something about it, but they haven't hit this vertical yet. Why has the lawyers not hit yet?
[Darren Shaw]
Yeah, they're next.
[Claudia Tomina]
They're next.
[Darren Shaw]
I know, the lawyers are some of the worst for sure. I was gonna ask you, because you talk about in this article, you say the following data is based from 22 locations under the same brand. And so then you present a bunch of data.
Tell me a little bit about where this data comes from. Is this out of your software, Reputation Arm?
[Claudia Tomina]
Yes. So we track deleted reviews. So I just filtered on all the deleted reviews, but then I took it brand by brand, just because certain verticals, like I wanna get a better understanding.
And I fed it to Claude and Claude gave me all the different patterns and connections. And it was just super interesting.
[Darren Shaw]
Yeah, well, that's what the article is. The article is great, because you're identifying these core patterns that are happening, which helps us to really understand a little bit more about how Google is doing all of this filtering. So the five different patterns that can be identified.
[Claudia Tomina]
But a lot of it too, I have to say, is being in the forums and reading what people are saying. And then my own clients too, coming to me and saying like, this review didn't post. And then I asked follow-up questions.
And it's always like, I used a QR code.
[Darren Shaw]
You're the one that's advocating against QR codes. A little bit of being like, well, be careful.
[Claudia Tomina]
I mean, because everything links back to a QR code. Like, okay, if you're on-premise, that's against Google policy. Well, if you're on-premise, you're scanning a QR code.
[Darren Shaw]
Tell me about that policy. On-premise review is against policy?
[Claudia Tomina]
Yeah, so Google specifically says, and it's linked in the blog to the Google policy. And it specifically says, you should not be asking for reviews on-premise. And I have the most perfect example.
I have a friend of mine that went to one of these, like one of the businesses, the 22 locations I documented. And he texted me while he was there and he said, they're using QR codes in the business. And he was laughing because it's my husband's company.
So that's why he texted me. So a week later, I noticed his review got deleted. And so I messaged him and said, what did you do?
Did you edit it? And he's like, I scanned the link tree, which was a QR code to the review link. And he said, I did edit my review and posted it.
He was in the building when he did it and the review got deleted. So I do mention that a ton of edited reviews are getting removed.
[Darren Shaw]
Interesting, yeah.
[Claudia Tomina]
I referenced like four different product experts in the article that shared the same information. And basically we're all noticing edited reviews, reviews with employee names, there's a lot.
[Darren Shaw]
In the article, you talk about a few things that I thought were quite interesting. One is, you just kind of mentioned that, watch out for large spikes from the same location. So that's like, if you have the QR code and everyone's leaving a review.
Now that's interesting though, because I get the QR code at a restaurant, but I don't leave a review in the restaurant. I usually take it home and then I'll maybe review later, right?
[Claudia Tomina]
So then you're not scanning the QR code.
[Darren Shaw]
Oh, like a sign in the restaurant rather than a card that you take. Oh, that's true. Right.
[Claudia Tomina]
Unless it's on the receipt. I don't know, I have to test that. Like if the QR code's on a receipt and you go home, is it more likely to stick?
[Darren Shaw]
That's actually a really good point. Like if you think of something like, let's say a chiropractic office and they've got a sign at their desk that says, oh, leave us a review on Google and there's a QR code. A lot of people will do it while they're sitting in the waiting room.
Or like a dentist, I've actually seen that at my dentist office. And so that's where you could run into trouble where these reviews get pulled down.
[Claudia Tomina]
Yes.
[Darren Shaw]
You talk about the pre-review filter. I thought this was very interesting in the article. A reviewer who has never searched for the business on Maps, never viewed the profile, never tapped the call button, never clicked through to the website via the GBP looks like a low trust signal to the algorithm.
There's no prior relationship between their account and that listing. And that makes- So much sense. Yeah.
Except for some cases, like I was just thinking about this because I read that and I thought about the review I left yesterday because we had a plumber come out to repair our sump pumps. And at the end of the call, gave me the review card. I was so happy to see it too.
He was like, would you leave us a review on Google? He gives us this card. I was like, yes, you're doing it right, man.
And so, but the interesting thing is that I went and I left the review, but I had no engagement with the GBP. My wife called. So my wife- Looked them up, called them up, scheduled the appointment, told me they were coming in the morning.
And I interacted with the guy and I got them all set up and he did the job. I think he did a great job. And I did leave him a review, but I was thinking about that in relation to this because I never interacted with a Google business profile.
[Claudia Tomina]
Did you leave the review using the QR code?
[Darren Shaw]
No, I just Googled their brand name.
[Claudia Tomina]
Oh, you Googled the brand name. See?
[Darren Shaw]
Don't spoil it yet. I was gonna ask you this question. You said something in this article and I was like, ding, what a light bulb moment.
This is so smart and I can't believe it. I love this tip. So what should they do?
Instead of this going directly to the review section, what should they do instead?
[Claudia Tomina]
Yeah, so like when I, and the campaigns we do, we're not using the review link Google leaves. We use the place ID.
[Darren Shaw]
Okay.
[Claudia Tomina]
So it's a branded search. So all you gotta do is make it so it's a branded search with the QR code, but still the on-premise could still be a thing, but you can kind of like bypass the like non-engagement theory that I have. I mean, and like, I make sure to say that these are, this is my theory.
Like this is not documented. I wanna say this, like this is not documented stuff because people message me sometimes and they're like, I don't think you're right about the QR code. And I'm like, look, I'm not saying everyone who uses a QR code, they're not gonna get the review published.
I mean, a local guide with like, that leaves like 80 different reviews. Maybe Google trusts them and they'll publish that review with no engagement. So, I mean, we don't know.
This is just based on like patterns and things that I've seen in the field and what customers are telling me, what I've learned in the forums, what other product experts have shared with me. And I just compiled it into one nice blog post for everybody to read.
[Darren Shaw]
It's a great post. You should definitely go read it. I just wanna iterate that I think your tip is brilliant that instead of these QR codes going directly to the review, they go to a branded search.
It's like, oh, please leave this review on Google. It goes to Google search.
[Claudia Tomina]
It's like navigational boost and you get the review, like no brainer.
[Darren Shaw]
I love that tip. Very smart. Great article.
Thank you. Thank you. All right, what do you got next?
[Claudia Tomina]
Okay, so my next link kind of disappeared from LinkedIn right before the podcast, but I'm still gonna mention it. I won't say who posted it because maybe there was a reason why they deleted it, but the post said something about the API returning review replies going into pending rejected or an approved state. And I just thought it was interesting because I wanted to make sure that I incorporated, if a reply gets rejected, I wanna make sure that my users know that the reply got rejected.
And it makes sense because with AI tools now and people are like replying in mass, like I wonder how Google's reacting if you use the tool that reply to 20 or 30 reviews all at one time with AI, all in the same second. Like, I don't think that's healthy for anybody to do and you could get rejected. You can end up having issues on your Google business profile because I was in the forum and somebody said to me, I can't get new reviews, I'm being blocked.
I did use a tool that replied to 100 reviews at one time. Do you think that triggered it? I'm like, I don't know, but it's very interesting.
[Darren Shaw]
It is very interesting. I would not be surprised if Google's trying to do this. I think that the post, I saw the same post you're talking about and it makes perfect sense that Google is now like watching the replies.
They weren't really caring before. Anyone could just publish replies and Google wasn't looking at them, but now they have to go through an approval process via the API, which is new.
[Claudia Tomina]
Well, same way they check the reviews, they're gonna check the responses now and they wanna get rid of like AI slop, I guess.
[Darren Shaw]
Yeah, totally. My next article is from Amy Jarenka. Hi, Amy.
You did an interesting post that I caught on the Rickety Rue blog where it was more of like a case study. It was like how a topic entity update increased AI visibility 10%. The thing I thought that was interesting about this is everyone's like wondering how do we optimize for AI?
It was like, okay, well, AI search is important. We gotta start thinking about this. And so this was interesting to me because you talk a little bit about how you did it.
And so how they did it in this case, which I was found useful, was it was just content reorganization. They created a new category page. So we'll call it a service page maybe.
And then they reorganized a bunch of legacy blog content that was already there that was kind of talking about that topic, reorganized all of that to support the page. Now, I wish I had a little bit more detail on exactly what they did, but the thing that I found interesting was that just by taking some content and sort of repurposing blog content, they were able to see a lift in AI visibility. They're using a tool called WAKAY, which stands for What AI Knows About You.
That tool is actually really good. It's the one that I tend to use and tend to like for understanding AI and optimizing for AI.
[Claudia Tomina]
But I thought it was pretty good. The next one is Alex Asandrian. It's not a LinkedIn post or anything.
It was his newsletter. It came into my inbox right before this podcast and I loved it and I threw it in. And basically he's talking about how Google rolled out what people are saying.
And so it's pulling in live discussions from Reddit, YouTube Shorts, and X. He makes some really good points talking about how like YouTube and Reddit are totally mandatory now and video is the new long form. And then his last point, which I loved, was just authenticity is literally a ranking factor now.
[Darren Shaw]
The trouble for agencies is it means like, okay, we're having a hard enough time getting our clients to help us write content for your website. Now we're gonna help you make YouTube videos. It's a whole nother level, right?
[Claudia Tomina]
The bar's been elevated. I keep hearing that and it is.
[Darren Shaw]
We have to do it. Yeah, totally. My final link is from the wonderful Miriam Ellis.
So she did a deep dive on the four GBP playbooks that Lisa Lansman and Google launched, which is really nice because they're just like four small businesses to help you understand what's important with your Google business profiles, how to optimize them, and then they've made these guides for four different industries. And so the nice thing about Miriam's post is that she's just kind of distilled the most interesting things from a local search veteran. So it's just kind of like, here's what I found very fascinating about these playbooks.
And so there were 30 incredible stats in those playbooks and Miriam has pulled them all out and put them into a list. And some of the ones that I thought were very interesting was businesses with complete Google business profiles get seven times more clicks. I'm not gonna cite any sources for these stats.
I'm like, I don't know, it's in the guide. Businesses that add photos to their Google business profiles receive 42% more requests for driving directions. Isn't that interesting?
She talks about a study from Uberall where Crate and Barrel saw a 31% increase in Google map views, a 6% increase in Google search views, and increased foot traffic by regularly adding Google posts. What? That's interesting, because everyone talks about how Google posts aren't a direct ranking factor.
I always talk about how they're a very important conversion factor and it's like free advertising on your Google business profile, so do them anyways. But this is very interesting from Uberall to see real stats behind some, like a lift, right? You take a brand that's not doing posts that has multiple locations, like Crate and Barrel, roll out a Google post strategy, and there you go, you get some great benefit.
I think Google posts, especially the multi-location, untapped opportunity for a lot of these businesses.
[Claudia Tomina]
They're looking at your Google business profile longer. That's what I tell people. Like, you have to post so that they actually stay on your Google business profile.
[Darren Shaw]
Yeah, same thing with photos, right? You get more time on the profile. You give people more content to look at.
It's just like further consideration of your business. It's just like, why would you not do it? I don't understand people that are against Google posts.
Yeah. Yeah. One more stat.
67% of people prefer communicating by messaging versus calling or emailing. And that's huge. 67%, I don't know.
I guess I fall into that 67%.
[Claudia Tomina]
But it doesn't work with every category. I don't know.
[Darren Shaw]
Yeah, which categories do you think are better suited to a phone call?
[Claudia Tomina]
I think your individual plumber, small business owner. But restaurants, they get overwhelmed.
[Darren Shaw]
So restaurant text messaging is too much because there's too many messages?
[Claudia Tomina]
I've tested it, and they couldn't handle it. I mean, their Google business profiles, they're really busy, too. They get like 2,000, 3,000 calls a month.
So, I mean, and just to throw in another messaging avenue, it's too much.
[Darren Shaw]
I think that makes sense, too, because the only reason for someone to call or message a business is, can I make a reservation for this date?
[Claudia Tomina]
For a large party.
[Darren Shaw]
Exactly, and it's like, don't? Just use OpenTable? Don't bug us?
[Claudia Tomina]
Well, yeah, don't call us. Book on OpenTable, right? But a lot of people don't take large reservations for big parties.
They make them call, because then, I don't know, maybe they want a card on file or something.
[Darren Shaw]
Or like special events and that kind of stuff, right?
[Claudia Tomina]
Yeah, well, then they have to call.
[Darren Shaw]
Yeah, but then I think if you put the messaging on, then you start getting all the other ones, and then it's like, no, we don't want the little.
[Claudia Tomina]
Well, then there's spam, too. There's a lot of spam.
[Darren Shaw]
Miriam also talks about Google's advice on optimizing. Every single one of these playbooks talks about writing a good Google business profile description. And so the description field on the Google business profile has always been a non-ranking factor.
Doesn't impact ranking. Go ahead, stick some keywords in there. You will not improve your rankings for those keywords.
So I've always known that in the local pack in Maps results, but things are a bit different now because we have AI results, and AI is looking for information about your business. So if you say something about your business in your Google business description, it actually could now increase your visibility. Google business profile description optimization, it was kind of a throwaway for me, but now I'm actually a little bit more thoughtful about it.
And I think there is great value in writing a very good description, trying to take advantage of really describing what your business is, the different services it provides, how long you've been in business, what makes you stand apart from your competition. Like all of those things, I actually think a business profile description optimization has become more important than it ever was in the past because of AI.
[Claudia Tomina]
Yes, Maps uses descriptions specifically, I've seen it. So, and your photos, everything. So like everything's a ranking factor now.
Have fun next year when you do the ranking factors.
[Darren Shaw]
I gotta put like a note when I ask people to score, be like, well, we do have the AI ranking factors as like another column that you score the factors on, so.
[Claudia Tomina]
Yeah.
[Darren Shaw]
Well, did we do it? Did we cover all three of our links?
[Claudia Tomina]
I think we went over time. We are over time.
[Darren Shaw]
Oh, it was just, it just flew by. It was so easy to chat with you. It was fun.
Thanks for joining us, Claudia.
[Claudia Tomina]
Thank you for having me. Yeah. Anytime you need a fill-in, call me, I'm your girl.
[Darren Shaw]
Leave us a review on Apple Podcast, please. That's the most valuable thing you could do. We would appreciate it.
If you like podcasts, go leave us a review there. And yeah, we'll see you next week. Bye everybody.
Bye.