Google places negative review nightmare.

[Trojan12]

Hi Guys,

I have a question and hope experts can point me in the right direction.

here is the issue, My company is very small and runs for the past 3 years. I got lot of competitors in my business. Some of them went on lengths to put up negative reviews about my business in the form of blogs and also writing bad reviews in my Google places review place.

I'm not an expert in SEO or reputation management but wondering,

1. How to get the deliberate negative comments removed from Google places.
2. How to populate my company blog so it takes over the negative blogs in serp?

I tried reporting it to Google and they wont answer (I'm surprised ) And any legal proceeding would cost me so much money which I can't afford as I'm a small business owner. I also tried negotiating with the competitors but no luck

Thanks for your expert views.

 

[asi_av]

write more review and "push" down the bad one

 

[Trojan12]

First of all thank you for your reply.

Yes its something I considered. I tried to get my customers to write some reviews but then again I don't want to open that channel up in case my competitors use it to add more negative reviews. The current reviews are already killing my business.

What If I remove my Google places listing? Will it get rid of the reviews from the SERP ?

Update: To the kind gentleman who PM'D me I'm sorry the forum is not letting me reply to your PM as I don't have 15 posts. If you can PM your email I will be happy to drop you an email.

Thanks mate.

 

[angelas111]

you can try reporting especially malicious ones to google. i have done so in the past and got them to remove a couple of them. but otherwise you just need to have good ones piled on so it buries them.

 

[cruzino]

If I were in your position I would either;
1. Hire someone to post a bunch of reviews to push down the negative ones
or
2. Send out an email to all existing customers offering a chance of winning one of your best products/services or some other product (iPad, etc) in exchange for writing a google review.

Posting the reviews on your own could be quite tedious if you haven't done it before.

 

[ADHD-Dude]

Identify the competition and write your own review, symmetric war

 

[fistor]

man i feel for you... i had that same thing going on..

what i did was :

i tried to find out who the hell it was... i couldnt tell who exactly it was..
so what i basicly did was fu**ing negative review all my competitors... several times (atleast 10x each). i asked my friends to do the same ;p

they stopped after i think 2months.

after i saw they stopped it, i stopped too

 

[Trojan12]

Hi Guys, seriously appreciate your help. Here is the deal, I need a good technical solution on how to get rid of the comments.

1. I don't want to fake any reviews.
2. I don't want to put good reviews on top to suppress the bad once cause people will be always looking at the bad reviews first. Besides if I put too many good reviews it doesn't look real. I don't want to dig my own grave.
3. I can't offer people a chance to win something in return for a review. Its not very feasible.
4. I don't want to put up bad reviews about competitors as then I would go down to their levels as well right? I know I'm a moralfag but then again I want to make a honest living.
5. I tried reporting the reviews to Google but they never did a thing about it. Not even a acknowledgement email.

Is there any way the listing can be removed from Google places? I need some technical advise guys. I know you guys are the best in the business.

Cheers

 

[TZ2011]

Even if you remove listing it will be available in google cashe for a long time, so at least something from your "I don't want" list have to be used. Anyway, here on forum you can find one book about reputation management, I remember it, one month ago somebody posted the link, try to find it and read, maybe some ideas comes up.

 

[cantle]

1. I don't want to fake any reviews.
2. I don't want to put good reviews on top to suppress the bad once cause people will be always looking at the bad reviews first. Besides if I put too many good reviews it doesn't look real. I don't want to dig my own grave.
4. I don't want to put up bad reviews about competitors as then I would go down to their levels as well right? I know I'm a moralfag but then again I want to make a honest living.

Cheers

Lol... You know your on a Black Hat SEO forum right ?

 

[Trojan12]

Even if you remove listing it will be available in google cashe for a long time, so at least something from your "I don't want" list have to be used. Anyway, here on forum you can find one book about reputation management, I remember it, one month ago somebody posted the link, try to find it and read, maybe some ideas comes up.

Thanks for your reply. It's not by choice "I don't want to" do the above things. I think its for the best. You are probably right by saying the reviews wont go away.

Guess I have no other solutions then.

Ill search for the rep management book you recommended. Thanks.

Thanks everyone for your help

 

[Trojan12]

Lol... You know your on a Black Hat SEO forum right ?

Yeah lol but posted under "White hat section"

Maybe Its time I get to the black hat side ?

 

[Dan Free]

1. I don't want to fake any reviews.
2. I don't want to put good reviews on top to suppress the bad once cause people will be always looking at the bad reviews first. Besides if I put too many good reviews it doesn't look real. I don't want to dig my own grave.
3. I can't offer people a chance to win something in return for a review. Its not very feasible.
4. I don't want to put up bad reviews about competitors as then I would go down to their levels as well right? I know I'm a moralfag but then again I want to make a honest living.
5. I tried reporting the reviews to Google but they never did a thing about it. Not even a acknowledgement email.
6. Is there any way the listing can be removed from Google places? I need some technical advise guys. I know you guys are the best in the business.

Cheers

1. This is good.

2. Most people will not go beyond the first page of reviews. A few bad reviews make one look real because you can not please everyone.

3. How about some sort of discount for a repeat customer who give a review.

4. O.K.

5. Sometimes these things take time. Sometimes they don't work.

6. I have read that if you are in the U.K., there is a slander law that will enable you to get a review removed. Anyplace else probably not.

So bury the bad reviews with good ones. Drip feed them (over time not all at once so they look natural).

 

[fistor]

Ok, so i understand you dont want to be a bad boy etc. etc.

but come on, its not like you started it - THEY did !
plus, you are doing business bro ! you will lose customers to this; so start doing something !

you can:

a.) get real and negative review him/her/them massivly
b.) atleast fake some positive reviews (slooooowly!)

c.) this is the walt disney romantic white knight route:
comment on those negative reviews; tell them you "need" their billing number (or any number they should have, if they were real customers) so you can assist them. you might even want to say you are willing to refund etc.

they obviously cant provide any real numbers. they prolly wont even answer.

after a week or 2 you comment again. just make sure to point out, that you are now very sure this is a fake review, since you gave them plenty of time to reply; but they didnt.

 

[MeetTheVirus]

White Hat Version:

• Create a website that funnels through bad reviews and good reviews.
  
• Good reviews link directly to google places, bad reviews go to your inbox.
  
• Tell all your customers to visit your website and leave a review. You give all your customers your website that you created.
  
• Watch the good reviews flow through.

Black Hat Version:

• Buy a geo located VPN
  
• Create Fake reviews geo located to your practice, make sure to drip feed SLOW and use your accounts to also leave reviews for other business in the area.
  
• Profite

 

[Trojan12]

Ok, so i understand you dont want to be a bad boy etc. etc.

but come on, its not like you started it - THEY did !
plus, you are doing business bro ! you will lose customers to this; so start doing something !

you can:

a.) get real and negative review him/her/them massivly
b.) atleast fake some positive reviews (slooooowly!)

c.) this is the walt disney romantic white knight route:
comment on those negative reviews; tell them you "need" their billing number (or any number they should have, if they were real customers) so you can assist them. you might even want to say you are willing to refund etc.

they obviously cant provide any real numbers. they prolly wont even answer.

after a week or 2 you comment again. just make sure to point out, that you are now very sure this is a fake review, since you gave them plenty of time to reply; but they didnt.

That's an eye opener bro. Thanks. Will take your advise.

 

[Trojan12]

White Hat Version:

• Create a website that funnels through bad reviews and good reviews.
• Good reviews link directly to google places, bad reviews go to your inbox.
• Tell all your customers to visit your website and leave a review. You give all your customers your website that you created.
• Watch the good reviews flow through.

Black Hat Version:

• Buy a geo located VPN
• Create Fake reviews geo located to your practice, make sure to drip feed SLOW and use your accounts to also leave reviews for other business in the area.
• Profite

I will look into VPN solution and get this rolling..

Guys please note I can't reply to any PM as I don't have 15 posts.

 

[kegnum]

Give a discount for people that post good reviews online. Hopefully over time they will outweigh the bad. <--- totally whitehat

 

[bwman]

Read 7878's thread.

It basically goes into details on what meethevirus said under ''whitehat''

http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackh.../354896-22-letters-17-000-profit-3-weeks.html

Read this thread, you'll surely know what to do

 

[codejack36]

Ok, so i understand you dont want to be a bad boy etc. etc.

but come on, its not like you started it - THEY did !
plus, you are doing business bro ! you will lose customers to this; so start doing something !

you can:

a.) get real and negative review him/her/them massivly
b.) atleast fake some positive reviews (slooooowly!)

c.) this is the walt disney romantic white knight route:
comment on those negative reviews; tell them you "need" their billing number (or any number they should have, if they were real customers) so you can assist them. you might even want to say you are willing to refund etc.

they obviously cant provide any real numbers. they prolly wont even answer.

after a week or 2 you comment again. just make sure to point out, that you are now very sure this is a fake review, since you gave them plenty of time to reply; but they didnt.

This is good advise.

After you have replied to them and still you have no reply back, contact Google and they will remove them.