In part two (see part one here) with Mike Blumenthal we started off talking about reviews and review attributes. He doesn’t believe SEOs understand how important reviews are. It is not just about getting more good reviews, there is a lot than just that he said. Reviews and those complaints can stay there forever and that is important. Reviews are a way to listen to your customers and you can learn a lot if you listen to those reviews. You can use those reviews as a content driver and a management driver. You can tell your story through reviews kind of like in a partnership with your customers. So you can use those reviews as a content strategy for your business.
We dug a bit into the review attributes that Google Maps has been doing for some time. In short, Google is building out structure for these reviews and they can show you information about your competitors. So these reviews can also be used for competitive intelligence.
Google is investing big time in new features in Google Maps and Local and all those segments but not so much in spam detection, as we said before. Google is emphasizing photos, emersion and transitions directly in Google Local and Google Maps. Google is now controlling the frontend and backend for many order systems stores use now. Google generally partners with companies and then builds their own thing and drops their partners. Be careful if you try to get into local search, Google can quickly tear you down.
You can reach Mike on Twitter at @mblumenthal and via email at [email protected].
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