Google reviews are a popular topic. People get extremely heated over them. Of course, a lot of folks are passionate when Google refuses to remove negative reviews, removes their positive reviews, or when they suspect their competitor has fake reviews. In the past year, I have seen a major increase in review extortion cases. When …

One of the biggest misconceptions is the extent to which a business can remove or prevent negative reviews. The other day, I saw a colleague’s post about a development program that upset them. They chose to ask people to leave negative reviews on their Google Business Profile (GBP). I advised them that their review and …

On Tuesday, February 17, 2026, Brad Wetherall held an AMA on Sterling Sky’s subreddit. Disclaimer: The agency I worked for hired Brad to become their COO. I had switched from being a full-time employee to a contractor. I only had one interaction with Brad, and that was the meeting when I was advised that I …

I have been monitoring the Google reviews for several of the Brandon J Broderick, Personal Injury Attorney at Law, Google Business Profiles (GBPs). Back in December 2023, Google not only removed tons of reviews but also prevented the GBPs from getting new reviews for months. So has Brandon J Broderick decided to clean up their …

A business reached out asking for help removing a negative review. Upon reviewing the review text and the reviewer’s profile, I didn’t see any evidence warranting the removal of the review. The reviewer in question only posted three reviews and one rating. Google is giving them credit for two reviews and one rating. Currently, only …

Google has updated its Maps User Generated Content (UGC) policy. Thank you, Google Business Product Expert (GBP PE), Claudia Tomina, for alerting me to this updated policy. The new policy prevents businesses from requiring or pressuring users to leave ratings or write reviews while on the premises. This policy sounds great in theory, but how will Google …

If you are a garage door repair business or a consumer looking for a garage door repair company in or around Santa Cruz, then you need to know who Aptos Best Garage Door Repair company is. Aptos Best Garage Door Repair is a new Google Business Profile (GBP) listing. I say this is a new …

Since 2021, the folks at BrightLocal have been publishing their data on online reviews. This year, there is a new section on fake reviews. The data strongly suggests that not only are consumers wary of fake reviews, but they also want to see penalties for businesses that engage in them. Since I began studying and …

There is chatter online that Google performed a sweep and removed Google Business Profile (GBP) reviews last week. The first post was posted on January, 19th, 2026. At first, people did not see anything out of the ordinary, but then more people began to see their reviews being removed. New posts mentioned that they, too, …