Some Features & Functions on Google are Delayed or Temporarily Suspended
Many businesses are implementing changes to their business, processes and opening hours, switching to remote work, and delivering their products and services online. Customers are increasingly searching online for up-to-date information about the status of local businesses, and their first stop is often the Google My Business Profile for the business.
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Temporary COVID-19 Updates in Google My Business
- Businesses can mark their listings as “temporarily closed” You can confirm that your business is closed and then reopen it when you are fully operational again. Alternatively, you can use Special Hours to indicate that your business is closed right now.
- Restaurants, grocery stores, and breweries are now allowed to add “Delivery Available” or “Take Away” to their business name.
- Review functionality has been disabled. New reviews will not be published. A user can write a review, but it will not be published publicly and it will only be visible to the user in their contributions section on Maps. The likelihood of these reviews being published once Google enables the review feature is slim.
- Business owners cannot respond to reviews. Pause any of your automated emails going out to customers asking for reviews on Google until this feature is available again.
- 🔻 A new Covid-19 Google Post type is now available.🔻This is where you should post related updates.
- Questions & Answers have been temporarily removed. Any new and any previously added Q&A’s from business owners and users are no longer published on the Business Profile. The functionality has been removed by Google until further notice.
- Critical health-related businesses get priority. The Google My Business support team has reduced capacity, so any business edits that require review before publication will notice a lag.
- New listings and verifications are delayed. Suggested Edits to published business listings are now delayed. Photos that are added by users are not being published at this time.
- Most edits made in the Google My Business dashboard are pending. Things outside of hours, attributes, and business descriptions are not being prioritized.
- GMB phone support and chat support no longer work. The only way to contact GMB is to send an email.
This awesome Post about Google My Business from LocalU is being updated Daily.
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Temporary COVID-19 Updates in Yelp
Stay tuned to the Yelp Blog for additional updates. Be sure to review/suspend Yelp Ad Budgets accordingly.
- COVID-19 Messaging is now available! When you log into your Yelp business listing, they will prompt you to make updates. Yelp is much better at this stuff than Google is.
- Delivery / Take Out services may be available in your business category
HERE ARE SOME RECENT ANNOUNCEMENTS
Yelp’s COVID-19 Response and Support for Local Businesses
Updating your Yelp page: changes in hours, temporary closures, and take-out/delivery options
Jeffrey Magner
Local SEO Strategist
Jeffrey Magner has been focused on Local SEO since 2008 and has worked directly with thousands of small business clients. Jeffrey founded Trumpet Local Media in Boulder, Colorado as a local SEO agency that was sold to Ramblin Jackson in 2013. Bighorn Local SEO has offices in Portland and Sisters, Oregon and offers monthly packages focusing on marketing strategy for local business owners. Our actual testimonials show how some of our clients feel about working with us.
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