Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Why does Google return 1 star reviews in local listings as the "most helpful"?
-
I have a client who has recently received two 1 star reviews on Google local (unhappy customer and unhappy customers boyfriend). This is affecting an otherwise flourishing business as these two 1 star reviews are displayed prominently when you search for the brand in Google. They have since received more positive reviews, however Google insists on displaying, what they term, the "most helpful" reviews first.
Why are these 1 star reviews deemed "most helpful"? In all honesty, they aren't even really that helpful, with the latter verging on slanderous. We are in the process of reporting this one as it personally attacks a member of staff, however, whilst we tentatively wait weeks for a response, I wondered if anyone has any idea on how G decides which reviews are "most helpful"? When there is no option for other users to rate these reviews as helpful (such as on play store).
-
It's my pleasure, and good luck with this, Silkstream!
-
Thank you Miriam. As always, you have been most helpful!
-
Hey There,
If memory serves, Google switched to using Most Helpful as the default setting some years ago when they partnered with Zagat. Prior to that, it had been ordered in terms of recency. I am not positive about this, but I believe 'Most Helpful' is determined via an algo that may include a combination of the authority of the reviewer + recency + review language and other factors. In your case, there is some reason that the algo thinks it is helpful for people to see those negative reviews - and I can totally see how much of a pain this is, given that the rest of your reviews are largely positive and you even have more recent, positive reviews.
I'd definitely take a look at the review profiles of the 2 people who left the negative reviews. If they've left lots of other reviews, their authority could be playing a role in this. If the reviews are, indeed, libelous, this post may help you in reporting:
http://www.localsearchforum.com/local-reviews/3931-how-remove-slanderous-google-reviews.html
Sorry not to have more definite information about this, but it's one of those algo-related things that likely puzzles many business owners and about which Google is not very forthcoming.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
I'm wondering if reviews services like yotpo and reviews.io are worth it.
The reviews services advertise that your reviews and stars will be placed in your Google search results and this helps with rankings. Does anyone have experience using Yotpo or Reviews.io with a brick and mortar business? Or, any business for that matter? Thanks,
Reviews and Ratings | | Jarod45660 -
How to Remove Online-Only / B2B Yelp Listing
I advise a regional company on their online marketing efforts. They provide a service across a very large area, and they only have one corporate office. Their product is purchased online, and there is no face-to-face interaction with customers. Customers do not conduct business at their corporate office. Yelp says they are primarily intended for the review of local businesses and their guidelines for adding a business state that they are "l__ess interested in showing online-only, business-to-business (b2b), and direct-seller businesses" and that "if a business page you add is not eligible to be listed on Yelp, it will not be part of our directory". Our business doesn't meet this criteria. So my question is how I would go about requesting that our Yelp remove our listing due to ineligibility? I found an article on Whitespark that discusses this topic and they show some clear examples of online-only businesses that had their Yelp listings removed. Unfortunately, that article doesn't offer an insight on how to go about the process of requesting/triggering removal. Does anyone have experience on how to go about this? Any advice is greatly appreciated.
Reviews and Ratings | | UMoveFree0 -
BazaarVoice Paginated Reviews Not Honoring Canonical & Indexing Multiple Pages
If there are enough reviews on a product page to warrant page 2, 3 etc, BazaarVoice appends the below snippets to each new page of reviews, which are then also indexed, despite BazaarVoice SEO settings that automate a canonical tag (seemingly since the differing reviews on each page are not similar enough to honor the canonical). <cite class="iUh30">?bvstate=pg:2/ct:r</cite> <cite class="iUh30">?bvstate=pg:3/ct:r</cite> It seems Target.com has found a way to hack the BV code to create a dedicated page to view all reviews: https://www.target.com/p/ultra-soft-fitted-sheet-300-thread-count-threshold-153/-/A-13973172?showOnlyReview=true While Ikea.com blocks it in the Robots file (defeats SEO value) - Noindex: */catalog/products/bvroute=Review Noindex: */catalog/products/bvtab Tons of brands apparently have the issue, and you can see more examples if you search "inurl:bvstate=pg" Anyone aware of a solution to this?
Reviews and Ratings | | Eroc2 -
Paying for Reviews Penalty?
Hello, recently came across a company that has been paying people directly for reviews. I of course do not recommend this and realized the ethical implications and even the lawsuits that can come from this, but does Google have a manual penalty for fake reviews or do they just algorithmically discount ones that raise red flags? I have never really had to worry about this in the past. I know you can flag fake reviews to them on an individual basis, but does anyone have history of knowing specific situations where a company was manually punished for doing this? Just curious and I kind of wanted to give them strong documentation to knock it off. Thanks in advance.
Reviews and Ratings | | jeremyskillings0 -
Moving my photography business to another state. Is it possible to transfer Google My Business listing WITHOUT losing my Google Reviews?
A friend of mine is transitioning her photography business to another state. She moved about 5 years ago and consequently lost all of her Google+/Yelp reviews. Having reviews as a photographer is EXTREMELY important for her business reputation. She doesn't want this to happen again. Is it possible to change the location of a Google my Business page and keep the existing reviews? Thanks
Reviews and Ratings | | RosemaryB0 -
Publishing testimonials on your site that are from your Google + (or other review sites page)
Ive got a site with some good Google + Reviews and some other good reviews on other sites that id like to be able to publish on a testimonials page on our website, but im worried about being penalised for duplicate content. Any idea of the best way to get these reviews on to our website, i was thinking about placing the text in as an image, but id prefer to do something semantic if at all possible. (I know that some review sites have javascript widgets you can use to pull in your reviews but for most of the sites we are reviewed on they dont)
Reviews and Ratings | | Sam-P0 -
How can I avoid duplicate content when building a review widget?
My website has a profile page for each of the home improvement contractors who signs up. They accumulate reviews on those pages. I want to build a review widget to display our reviews on our contractors' websites. How can I avoid duplicate content issues for the reviews? Example of a profile page with a few reviews: http://www.thehomefixers.com/members/425/waterheaters-plus-llc.php
Reviews and Ratings | | menachemp0 -
Having Yelp Reviews Removed
Since we all work with Yelp on a local basis, I believe many are aware that if a review is placed by a non customer about a company, Yelp will typically remove them if you show that it isn't valid, etc. We all know they made a show of outing those who posted fake reviews as well. Here is a question I have though: Have any of you been aware of Yelp taking down valid negative reviews for companies? I have just run into this and find it somewhat perplexing. If you know of this, I would love to hear how it happens? Thanks,
Reviews and Ratings | | RobertFisher2