Google Business Profiles seems to have dropped the Q&A feature from businesses in India and some other regions, or at least, a number of them.
Google is testing a new shape and maybe colors for the map pins they use in Google Search and Google Maps. The new shape is less of a pin/diamond shape and more of a circle shape.
Google emailed some local businesses saying it will begin “unifying” booking on Google Business Profiles (GBP) and Local Services Ads (LSA). Google said this will create a “more seamless experience for your clients and their customers.”
Google has posted a notice that the old customer reviews links in Local Service Ads will expire and the Google Business profile link will be what you should use going forward. The notice is in the reviews section within Local Service Ads.
Google is now testing a new user experience for maps in the Google Search local panel section.
Google is a bit delayed with its appeal process for Google Business Profiles. Appeals are now taking seven days or longer, some are saying about 15 days, which is much longer than normal.
Google has updated the local pack, the local results box, in the Google Search results. Now when you click on the results in the local pack, the map slides to the left, behind the local pack listings.
Google Search has a new design for the embedded map you see for both local pack maps and knowledge panel maps. The new map has a more subtle design, with blue roads, not yellow roads and other design differences.
I am hearing reports of some spammers or hackers hijacking some Google Hotel listings by marking some hotels as permanently closed and also changing the phone numbers to WhatsApp numbers. This can be a huge concern for many hotel operators, but I am not sure how widespread the issue is.
Google Business Profiles performance report is no longer showing the “call” tab that shows you statistics and data on searchers who called you from Google Search and Google Maps. I suspect this might be related to the Google Business Profile call history going away, as we reported earlier.