Recently, Google made an announcement about scammers and robocalls. Although the main point of the announcement was not intended to do so, this new development has some important aspects about SEOs who administer Google My Business (GMB) listings.
According to announcement, Google is planning to launch a directory of whitelist third parties that manages GMB. Hereunder, Google will promote the new directory to businesses enrolled in the GMB. According to Google this program “will give business owners a directory of trusted partners to choose from when they need help managing their listings.” On the other hand, other non-approved third parties can still manage GMB listings, but they will not be on the approved parties list promoted by Google.
There is still no clear information for those want to be listed in the Google’s approved SEO whitelist. But Google made it clearer by a subsequent announcement, an article published by the title of Making Google My Business Work for Agency and Platform Partners. This article was mainly about an API, but the true importance of the article comes from the information on GMB.
So, according to Google, “agencies, for the first time, will be able to sign up and register for a GMB account.” These registered agencies will have the advantage of “accessing a brand new agency dashboard” designed by Google’s partners. After the launching of GMB Partners program, trusted partners will be able to access to new GMB features, a partner manager and a potential for being listed in GMB website.
Then Google share a sign up form for those to be first get the information when the program is officially started.
Another important development announced by Google with this article was about an anti-spam initiative. Google announced a new complaint form, from which GMB participants can report violations. According to Google, this new form will be used to report third parties violating GMB policies. Here in the announcement a “third party” is described as “an agency that manages business information on GMB for a business they don’t own.” Google’s third party policy applies to any third party that manages a GMB location on behalf of their customers, like a digital marketing agency.
In this form, Google listed eight violations that can a business holder choose from, and also an additional “other” option. This tool is unlikely to be abused since Google requires a business holder to identify itself by their name, address, e-mail, phone number and also a link to Google Maps.
Google has also a support page for GMB Third Party Policies. Being transparent about management fees, the ability to easily end the GMB management service and other disclosures can be listed among these policies.
All in all, all these new developments and programs would be useful for SEO industry, which is bored of scammers. And if you are a third party managing GMB listings for its customers, you’d better follow the updates on Google’s new directory.
Tutus Media, which has provided SEO solutions for many companies across the Europe, has reliable and professional solutions. Working closely with Google developments, Tutus Media can meet all your needs in terms of building a website, Europa SEO optimization, corporate identity and related works.