Local Guides Reviewing Your Business

A reviewer with two hundred reviews

A review appears on your Google listing from somebody you do not recognise. Under their name it says Local Guide, and their profile shows reviews of two hundred other places nearby.

They have written about the bakery next door, a dentist, a car wash and a hardware store. Each review is detailed, and most come with photographs.

Yours mentions what they bought, what it cost, how long they waited and where they parked, with a photo of your counter.

Owners tend to wonder whether this is a critic, a competitor or someone working for Google. Usually it is none of those. It is a customer with a hobby.

What a Local Guide is

Local Guides is Google's program for people who add to Google Maps. Anybody can join, and there is no test or vetting.

Members earn points for what they contribute, and the points move them up through levels that come with small perks from Google. They are not paid, and they do not work for Google.

Most review because they enjoy it, the way some people keep a list of every restaurant they have tried. The points turn it into a game.

What they add to your listing

• Reviews, usually longer and more specific than most.
• Star ratings, sometimes without text, which still count in your average.
• Photos of your products, counter, menu board and building.
• Suggested edits to your hours, phone number, category or address.
• New places on the map, occasionally duplicates of yours.

The fourth is the one owners notice last. A suggested edit can change the hours customers see, and an owner who rarely signs in to Google My Business may not spot it for weeks.

Why their reviews carry weight

Mostly with readers. The badge and the review count tell a reader this person reviews everything, so they are unlikely to be the owner's friend or a one-off with a grudge.

Their reviews also tend to be specific, and a specific review is more believable than great service or worst place ever.

How Google weighs them in its rankings is not something it spells out. What is clear is that reviews and photos shape how a listing looks, and that people read them before they decide.

Their photos become your shop window

Photos from customers appear on your listing beside your own, and for some businesses they are the first images people see.

A customer photographs whatever caught their eye: a half-eaten plate, a dim corner, a handwritten sign on the door. If you have added few photos yourself, those are what represent you.

The answer is to add good photos of your own through Google My Business: the shopfront as people approach it, the inside, the products and the people.

Photos that are offensive or show another place can be reported. Unflattering is not grounds for removal, and arguing that it is wastes time.

A worked example

A pierogi maker sells from a small shop with a freezer case and four stools, in a row of units beside a light industrial park. In summer the family also sells at two weekend markets.

In January a Local Guide with several hundred reviews gave the shop three stars.

The pierogi were excellent, she wrote, but the shop was closed at four on a Saturday when Google said it was open until six, and she had driven twenty minutes to get there.

She added a photograph of the locked door, with the real hours on a sign beside it.

Months earlier, someone had suggested new Saturday hours, probably remembering the summer market days, and the change had gone through. The owners had not signed in to Google My Business since the verification postcard arrived.

They corrected the hours, added photos of the freezer case and the menu board, and set a monthly reminder to check the listing.

Then they replied to the review: thanks for the kind words about the food, an apology for the wasted trip, a note that the hours were fixed, and an invitation to come back.

Replying to a Local Guide

Reply the way you would to anyone. Thank them, deal with the specific point, correct facts politely and keep it short.

Do not single them out as a reviewer in your reply, as if they were a critic. The reply is read by the next customer, who wants to see how you treat people.

And never offer anything in return for changing or removing a review. Google's rules forbid rewards for reviews, and someone who has written hundreds of them knows it.

When a guide gets it wrong

Local Guides make mistakes like anyone else: a review meant for a similarly named business down the road, an edit based on old information, a duplicate listing added by someone who could not find yours.

Correct your own details in Google My Business first, since that part you control. Then flag a review that is plainly about another business, and report a duplicate listing.

Where a review is simply wrong about what happened, reply calmly with the facts. That is a separate skill, and worth doing well.

The counter-case

Many businesses will rarely meet a Local Guide. Trades who work at customers' homes and suppliers who sell to other businesses get few visits from people who review everything.

And one Local Guide's review is still one customer's view, however many others they have written.

For a business that customers visit, though, guides are now part of the listing. Reply to them as you would to anyone, and keep the details they check against accurate.

The monthly look

1. Sign in to Google My Business this week.
2. Check hours, phone and category against reality.
3. Add your own photos of the shopfront and products.
4. Reply to recent reviews in the order they came.
5. Flag reviews that describe another business.
6. Set a monthly reminder to check the listing.
7. Never offer rewards in exchange for reviews.

Step six is the one that would have spared the pierogi shop its three stars. Edits arrive without warning, and a monthly look catches them before a customer does.

How reviews, photos and complete details feed into who appears among the three map results is covered in three places in the map results instead of seven.

Frequently asked questions

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