Google made several changes to Business Profiles this month, and a few of them can affect whether customers can find you, trust you, and call you. None of them take long to deal with, but you do need to know about them.
Here are the three I'd pay attention to, and what to do about each one.
1. You have four days to reject suggested edits
Anyone can suggest an edit to your Business Profile: a customer, a competitor, or an automated data source. Google's help documentation now says that when a suggested edit needs your review, you have four days after being notified to accept or reject it.
If you don't respond in time, Google may publish the edit anyway if other information it finds online seems to support it. That could mean the wrong hours, a changed category, or even a different phone number showing up on your profile without you approving it.
- Make sure Google's emails reach you. Check which email address manages your profile, and that notifications aren't going to spam or an old inbox.
- Check your profile regularly for pending updates from Google, not just when you get an email.
- Make your website match your profile. Google uses other public information to decide whether an edit looks correct. If your website shows the same name, address, phone number, and hours as your profile, bad edits are less likely to stick.
Treat an email from Google about your Business Profile the way you'd treat a bill: open it the same day. Four days goes by fast, especially over a weekend.
2. Google is emailing owners about spikes in spam reviews
Business owners have started getting emails from Google saying it detected a spike in spam reviews on their profile and removed them so they don't affect the rating. According to those reports, Google may also pause new reviews, ratings, and photos on the profile for a few days while it deals with the problem. Google hasn't officially announced this, but owners have shared the emails publicly.
Protecting your rating from fake reviews is a good thing. The catch is that a sudden burst of real reviews, like a new business asking every past customer at once, can look like fake reviews to an automated filter.
- If you get this email, don't panic. Your rating is being protected, not penalized.
- Hold off on review requests during a pause, so customers aren't frustrated when they can't leave one.
- Ask for reviews steadily, as part of how you finish every job, rather than in big bursts.
- Never buy reviews or offer rewards for them. Google's policies also ban setting staff review quotas and asking customers to mention employees by name.
3. Local Service Ads may show your Business Profile number
If you run Google Local Services Ads, advertisers have noticed that some ads are now showing the phone number from the Business Profile instead of the Google Ads tracking number, even when the account is set to use the Google Ads number.
Customers can still call you, but if you rely on that tracking number to see which calls came from your ads, your reports may undercount the leads your ads are actually bringing in.
- Double-check the phone number on your Business Profile. It may now be the number your ad customers see.
- Compare your call records with the leads report in Local Services Ads, and watch for sudden drops that don't match how busy you actually are.
- Ask callers how they found you as a simple backup to tracking numbers.
The bigger picture
Your Business Profile isn't just a listing anymore. It's one of the main sources Google uses for Search, Maps, and its AI answers. Each of these changes points the same way: keep your profile accurate, check it often, and grow your reviews honestly.
If you'd rather not keep track of all this yourself, I manage Google Business Profiles for clients: monitoring suggested edits, keeping information consistent, responding to reviews, and making sure your profile keeps bringing in calls.
