Alright let me explain.
Full disclosure we used to do GMB reviews until 2023 and stopped around the March of 2024.
Firstly you need to be aware of the fact that you are gaming the system.
When you are trying to game a 3rd party platform. They are going to hit back.
The difference here is. Google controls both the mails, and the GMB platform.
They get you from both side. They either go after the mail citing various reasons or go after the reviews directly.
Now the pricing. It's a free market. The market decides the price right?
Now let me break down the costs:
1. Cost of an aged emails that are really clean with clean activities: 3-5 USD
2. Cost of SMS to reactivate an aged mail: 30-60 cents
3. Cost of proxy: 1-2 USD (assuming 10 minutes is spent per login)
4. Cost of VA: 40-70 cents per review
Now the hidden costs.
Costs to test method, cost of emails that were beyond recovery and cost of tools. Am not adding these.
I understand its upsetting sometimes.
But please be aware if one could manage to get a review to stick for even a month and knew it was so easy, wouldn't they all hire a VA at 2 USD hourly just to easily post it. People outsource these services for the very reason that majority cannot even get a review to stick for a day.
Don't throw around the word scammer so loosely.
Now let me give you some tips.
1. Never believe if someone says lifetime warranty or even 6 months
2. Any realiable seller with experience won't do more 30 days. Especially someone who has been around the block and seen multiple updates.
3. Google comes out with updates every now and then, their core update usually wipes out 30-60% reviews, other minor updates around 10-20%.
4. Don't buy reviews before an update.
https://status.search.google.com/products/rGHU1u87FJnkP6W2GwMi/history
Track here and avoid buying before a core update. You have 3-4 months before every update.
Let me tell you something that I usually tell my clients.
When buying reviews be very watchful and factor the cost to drops. Don't buy Unless you are ready to loose all the reviews. Unless you are able to rank quick and make your moneys worth within a few weeks of buying reviews don't do it.
It only works with niches that are low hanging, high payout or for the ones that churn and burn.
If you are a regular full time brick and mortar business that plans to stay with the same listing forever then look at generating real reviews from your customers. Offer them incentives, and discounts to post a review.
Though we can practically do reviews for our own businesses that I own (local ones and retail outlets) none of our real businesses have even one fake review, i haven't done anything to even remove the 5% of our 1 star reviews. It's a long game and that's how it should be if you are building a real business.
Reviews, and blackhat SEO is mostly done if you are into lead generation, rank and rent, or looking at reselling the leads.
Just my 2 cents.
