Do you keep getting that dreaded email from Google saying that your Google Business Profile has been suspended or disabled?
You verify it, and it’s good for a short time, and then you get that email AGAIN?
Ugh, it’s so FRUSTRATING! And COSTLY!
Google is verifying your profile in the first place, so it’s (mostly) safe to assume it meets the requirements.
But something in Google’s system is tripping that fine line between being verified and being suspended.
To fix this we need to build Google’s trust in your profile.
How do you do that?
Build Your Google Business Profile’s Trustworthiness with Google
Let’s Start with Edits – Be Gentle!
If your profile has been recently verified or reverified, don’t make any edits for the first two weeks.
During that first two weeks, it’s okay to get reviews. It’s okay if those reviews include photos. But as an owner or manager, just leave the darn thing alone for a little while. It’s more fragile in those first two weeks. Let it age to build some trust with Google.
After two weeks, keep your edits gentle. A change or two a week. Don’t go in at any point and make a bunch of edits all at once. Add a couple of pictures each week. Update hours. Do make regular edits, just not all at once.
Be aware that changes to the name, the address, categories, and sometimes the phone number, often trigger the need to reverify. If you are editing any of those, just be prepared to reverify.
Edits aren’t the only reason for that suspension trigger to be tripped, but being gentle with edits will help build Google’s trust in your management.
Owners and Managers
Did you know that the Google accounts listed as owners or managers of your profile can affect your profile’s status?
Let’s say that someone listed as an owner or manager of your profile does something that Google thinks might be spammy or abusive. It might even be something not at all spammy – like a review placed on another profile that Google is suspicious of for some reason.
That can cause your profile to be suspended.
Keep the number of accounts listed as owners/managers to a very small number. Just yours if you can, or yours and a trusted expert as a manager.
In fact, I would go as far as to recommend you make a Google account for the sole purpose of owning 1) your profile and 2) your site in your Google Search Console. Don’t use that account for writing reviews, suggesting edits, or even sending Gmail. Keep it super clean.
Citations
Citations are an important trust factor.
Citations are online references to your business and website. If you have none, your profile is not as trusted. If you have many, especially from sites that Google trusts, your profile will be substantially more trustworthy.
So how do you get citations?
Joining professional organizations related to your industry is one potential source. Check that they provide publicly available profiles for their members. Online marketing is another potential source. Social media profiles may even help somewhat.
I go into more detail on acquiring citations in the member-only section below this article.
High-Risk Categories
Be aware that there are some business categories that seem to be at a higher risk of suspensions than other categories.
These are categories that tend to be targeted by scammers and spammers, and tend to be categories that are ‘duress’ categories. Categories that consumers tend to contact when under duress and perhaps not taking the time to research and make a sound decision before paying for something.
If you in a high risk category and your profile is an important part of your marketing, it’s really important to build Google’s trust in your profile.
Tying your Profile to your Google Account, Domain, and Website
In the non-member section, I wrote that accounts you list as profile owners and managers can play a role in how much Google trusts your profile.
Now I want to take that to the next level.
The goal here is to build your profile’s trust and authority by tying it together with your account, domain, and website.
First, set up a Google account using an email address on your domain instead of a Gmail address. Yep, a whole new Google account. I have instructions for doing that here.
The email address needs to be on the same domain that you using for your website on your profile. If your website is abc.com, you need to use an abc.com email address, [email protected].
By doing this, we are making your connection to the profile stronger. You’ll have a domain based Google account that matches the domain of the website on your profile.
Next – use that same Google account and become a verified owner of your website in your Google Search Console.
Here’s a quick video example of how to do that.
This way you are strengthening the signals to Google that you are the absolute ruler of your profile. In fact, sometimes by following the above steps before applying for a profile, Google skips the verification process entirely. Instant verification! It’s that strong.
Now you just need to make your new Google account the primary owner of the profile. That’s a bit of a pain, but no biggie. The instructions are here.
Once that is done, you’ve tied your Google account, domain name, and website, to your profile. Awesome!
Building Citations
As I mentioned above, the more (accurate) citations you have, the stronger your profile will be.
But where to get citations?
Crunchbase offers free business profiles.
If you are in the US, the Better Business Bureau also offers free profiles.
If there are any industry associations that have public member profiles and a reasonably priced, join them. Industry profiles can provide a lot of authority.
Many local Chambers of Commerce publish member profiles on their sites. That can be a very strong local signal. We want those local signals.
As you build your citations, be very consistent with your business Name, Address and Phone number (NAP). If you have moved or changed phone numbers in the past, search for those (called a NAP audit) and ask the sites hosting those profiles to update them.
If the profile includes a description, mention local references, such as place names or landmarks. That increases the local signals that Google picks up.
More places to build citations:
Apple Maps, LinkedIn Company Directory, Facebook, Yahoo! Local, Yelp, Bing, Foursquare, Better, Map Quest, YellowPages, Here Maps, Manta, Tomtom, NextDoor, Merchant Circle, JustLanded, Angi (AngiesList), Company, Local, ELocalStoreBoard, BrownBook, Lacartes, ChamberOfCommerce, Spoke, Infobel, YellowBook, HotFrog, YellowBot, EZLocal, Tupalo, BOTW, Cybo, TrepUp, EBusinessPages, ShowmeLocal, Yellow.Place, CallUpContact, Tuugo, N49, IBegin, ParkBench, CitySquares, A Greater Town, ExpressBusinessDirectory, 2FindLocal, Neustar Localeze/, Cylex USA, GoLocal24/7.
Do use your judgement as you build citations. Not all of the links above may apply to your business. Some may have more hoops than you want to jump through (admittedly, Google have lots of hoops to jump through, but it’s the most useful listing of all!). Some may have costs, and some might not respond. Building citations is a bit of a pain but very worth doing to make your profile more powerful (and rank higher)!
That’s a wrap!
What we are doing with all of this is building trust, the end goal is to make your profile unimpeachable.
