Well, it looks like the new Google Places Google+ Local has been up for a couple days. I haven’t gotten a chance to play around much yet, but hopefully will soon. I did get a chance to check out observations from David Mihm. Another post I found really interesting was a Q&A from Mike Blumenthal. Two questions and answers I really liked:
To me, this is fantastic news. I’ve never been a fan of companies or individuals leaving fake reviews just to try to help either their own or their client’s placement. Plus, users are smart and see right through this kind of thing.
So, I dug around just a bit and went to my profile which I admittedly never update. They let me know that any review I make is from my real name. I like this. It just makes sense.
Very intuitive. Next, a real example:
Hit Continue? You see something like this.
Again, I like this. If I was to have a change of heart regarding a business I’ve purchased from, not letting the public see the review is an option.
Now it’s time to confirm and publish:
That’s it. Here’s an example of a review:
Many others have noted about the more prominence of Zagat. I did notice my rating changed just a bit. When I initially gave it a review it was for four out of five stars. Now that they are using a 0-3 rating, it changed just a bit. I’m not going to worry about the small things, though.
What are your thoughts on the new review system? We’d love to hear them.
Hi Paul, I am humbled by your well-thought and highly graphic post which made for very interesting reading! I too like the idea of the real names for reviews. I have been searching the net for ways that I can help our small business clients see that social media is worthy. (I’m a little far from Minnesota, I work out of Australia for Think Big Online.) Many of our customers are old-school small biz owners and they don’t understand the power of social. http://www.thinkbigonline.com.au/why-twitter-facebook-and-google-are-must-haves-in-your-seo-arsenal/ Even though they don’t understand social, they claim that it’s all fake. I think Google+ Local will take a step toward better review sites by using real names and real accounts. As the reputation gets better, my clients will see more value. Thanks for that, Alisa
Thanks for your input, Alisa. It sounds like we’re in agreement that having public names giving honest public reviews is a good thing.
I admittedly don’t know how it is in Australia. Here, there are so many reviews by anonymous people, mostly faceless/pretend-name profiles who give only one five-star (now three-star) reviews to local businesses beyond the point that it’s obvious that they’re fake.
There are certain industries who are very guilty of this. I won’t mention which ones.
I’m guilty of not using Google+ as much as I probably should. Hopefully, I’ll have more input in the near future.