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Paid Google My Business Listings?

I saw this pop up this week:
https://www.searchenginejournal.com...er-premium-features-for-a-monthly-fee/305461/

Can't say I am surprised that Google wants to get into the "pay us to keep competitor listings off of your page" game.

Really like when companies offer surveys, and ask you how much you would pay for a service. :dunno:
Bro... that was their ploy from the beginning. Those fuckers do nothing without money in mind. They gonna' trap yer asses!

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Wasn't Google doing something like this with some previous version of Google business? I believe it played in with your Paid Search account. I could be wrong but I thought there was something like this before.

What sticks out to me is
  • Get leads from competitor profiles
I'm not sure how this would work but I don't like it. I guess if you are a paying client it would prevent others from buying your listing and being able to capture leads from it, strong arming a business to at least get on one of the packages...
 
Wasn't Google doing something like this with some previous version of Google business? I believe it played in with your Paid Search account. I could be wrong but I thought there was something like this before.

What sticks out to me is
  • Get leads from competitor profiles
I'm not sure how this would work but I don't like it. I guess if you are a paying client it would prevent others from buying your listing and being able to capture leads from it, strong arming a business to at least get on one of the packages...

That's the AutoTrader/Cars.com model, so why wouldn't Google copy it as well?
 
Bro... that was their ploy from the beginning. Those fuckers do nothing without money in mind. They gonna' trap yer asses!

I don't mind paying if it produces results that make sense. And of course it's about the money. What else would it be for? For the greater good of humankind?

How long before they allow/encourage dealers to list their inventory?
 
@ChrisR someone hacked the shit out of GMB for apartments with physical locations. Funny!

Revenue SPAM Created by Google Maps for Google Ads
https://onlineownership.com/revenue-spam-created-by-google-maps-for-google-ads/

Google Maps announced that you could now find Holiday Lets on Google Maps (they have been working on this since 2017). What is particularly scary about these revenue spam listings is that there is no way to police them, either through “Suggest Edit” or via the Google My Business Spam report.

These listings are created by Google Maps via OTA (Online Travel Agents) APIs and the only way to Book them is via an OTA – who happens to pay for the privilege via Hotel Ads.

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Could you imagine if auto heads pushing inventory got in through a system like this?
 
They bring up good points here: https://searchengineland.com/should-we-be-paying-for-google-my-business-features-316602

Google has a serious problem with GMB spam. Although processes are in place to technically prevent it, they are utterly toothless, leading to a situation that’s just getting worse and worse and leading to a lot of faith lost in the legitimacy of Google Local listings.

Now take a look at some of those features in the survey list: Verified reviews, Google Guarantee, Background check, Verified licenses and Verified bookings.

That’s a lot of features designed to boost trust in business listings. In fact, features centered around trust and verification make up 25% of all those listed, and knowing the current state of Google My Business, it’s not hard to see why.

Even the most cynical of those wondering what steps Google might take to tackle spam would likely be hard-pressed to say “monetize it,” but that looks suspiciously like what’s going on with these trust features, at least if Google charges for them.

Yelp has already gone down this route with its “Verified” badge and, depending on who you listen to, the veracity of these badges is either bulletproof or up for debate. What’s not really up for debate is that Yelp is monetizing a lack of trust in certain business types by charging to vouch for them.

And so it is with Google, though with deeper consequences. Faced with a spam problem getting out of control, they seem to be charging businesses to highlight their legitimacy and trustworthiness rather than investing in better spam removal technology.
 
One more...

Google bringing call intelligence and automation to SMBs, for $39 per month
The virtual agent builds upon existing technology and represents a new direction in local monetization for Google.
https://searchengineland.com/google...nd-automation-to-smbs-for-39-per-month-316272

This weekend Google surveyed small business owners about their interest in monthly subscription bundles of enhanced services through GMB. CallJoy could easily have been among them.

If CallJoy works as advertised it could be a very valuable service to understaffed small businesses. It could also result in more conversions and revenue for SMBs. As Google points out in its post, “nearly half of small business calls go unanswered because owners are just too busy or assume the caller is another spammer.”

As suggested by the GMB survey, it’s probably also a preview of new, non-advertising services for SMBs that Google will monetize on a subscription basis.

 
Surprisingly enough 99% of dealers are still not utilizing Google posts, and posting frequently throughout the week, captivating your Google maps audience which procures about 50% of all of your traffic to your websites and dealership. Every sales and fixed up offer should be on Google posts. And over the past two years my Google post Garnered tens of thousands of views, with rich content that is sticky, and does things no other advertising medium is capable of. I just think it's useless to have a Google my business listing if you're not using posts, which are free.