Skip to content
Raise a ticket
  • There are no suggestions because the search field is empty.

Guide to Google My Business

TABLE OF CONTENTS

 

Introduction

Ensuring your business stands out in searches and on maps is vital in today's digital era. Enter Google My Business: an online profile for your company that enhances visibility and credibility when potential customers search on Google.

When you search for local businesses, you'll often come across a 'Google knowledge panel' showcasing key information. This panel acts as your business profile, customisable just like any other online platform you might use.


 

What’s the difference between Feefo and Google reviews?

Feefo reviews come directly from verified customers, while Google Reviews can be from anyone, including genuine customers.

 

Where are Google and Feefo reviews in the knowledge panel?

Google reviews are prominently displayed at the top of the panel, showing the overall rating and the number of reviews received. Feefo and other third-party platforms appear in the 'Reviews from the web' section, providing additional insights into your business's reputation.


 

This means 41 people (customers and non customers) have left reviews for the Farnborough based Romans estate agency.


Third party review platforms like us can appear in the ‘Reviews from the web’ section as seen below.



Here you can see Feefo and allAgents featuring. This means that the Farnborough specific branch of Romans estate agents has had 31 reviews from Feefo and 62 from allAgents. 

 

What is the Google My Business Feefo connection?

Once a consumer has left a Feefo review they can click a banner to Google to leave a review, doubling your review presence without triggering duplicate content penalties.

 


What’s the process?

  1. Customer leaves a Feefo review and lands on merchant page.
  2. Clicks ‘Share my review on Google Maps’.
  3. Customer is redirected to the Google interface.
  4. Customer writes and post’s a Google review.

Note, Google redacted access to the api that allows the review to be pre populated.

 

Why do businesses want more Google reviews?

Google reviews significantly impact a business's online reputation and visibility. Having a higher volume of positive reviews improves credibility, increases click-through rates, and boosts search engine optimisation (SEO) performance.

Feefo GMB connection benefits

  • Increase credibility and popularity with more Google reviews.Improve overall review scores by diluting fake or extreme non-customer reviews.
  • Boost click-through rates and conversions by instilling confidence in potential customers.
  • Enhance local SEO performance, particularly on mobile devices.
  • Display both Feefo and Google reviews prominently on search results, bolstering consumer confidence.

Ultimately, it's about shaping a professional and credible image wherever customers find you online.

 

Setup

Merchants can easily enable the Google Maps Share feature in their Feefo settings. Depending on your needs, you can configure the feature at different levels, from enabling it for the entire account to customising it for individual campaigns or branches.

 

Business Details Check

To ensure seamless integration of Feefo reviews in the Knowledge Graph, it's crucial to review and update your business details in the Feefo Hub. Follow these steps to verify and synchronise your information:

  1. Log into your Feefo Hub account and navigate to "Settings."
  2. Select "Business Details."

Add or update your business or brand name, address, and phone number to match your GMB account details precisely.

Mismatched business details may prevent Google from associating your Feefo reviews with the correct GMB page. If your business has multiple branches or locations, create a primary account for your legal company name in the Feefo Hub and then add sub-accounts for each GMB location. Grouping reviews against individual branches is not recommended, but you can showcase all reviews under your primary umbrella/group company name.


 

Example: Easy Estate Agents, a Feefo client, has multiple branches in London, including Vauxhall, London Bridge and Sloane Square. So that the company can correctly feature Feefo reviews in the manner described above, it would have to create a primary account in Feefo Hub for Easy Estate Agents as a main legal entity and add information such as: 

  • Legal or group name 
  • Address
  • Phone number 

 

Next, the company would need to create sub-accounts in the Feefo Hub that match GMB locations for each branch they would like to display reviews for, including relevant branch details e.g. address and phone number. 

Grouping reviews and displaying them against individual branches is not possible as it is against Google guidelines. However, you can group all reviews and showcase them against your primary umbrella/group company name. Following this structure each branch gets their associated reviews displayed in the "Reviews from the web" section .

Once you've completed all of the above, the account structure in the Feefo Hub should look like this: 

- Easy Estate Agents – main account (can be set to 'noindex' and will not appear in Search if requested) 

- Easy Vauxhall Estate Agents (subaccount) 

- Easy Sloane Square Estate Agents (subaccount) 

- Easy London Bridge Estate Agents (subaccount) 

This structure will also have to correctly match your GMB account locations and each branch's details. 


Finally, if your business does not have multiple locations, please make sure that all business details match those recorded in the Feefo Hub and those in your GMB accounts. Even a rogue space in your phone number or any other formatting or spelling issue would prevent your Feefo reviews from appearing in the Knowledge Graph. 

 

Example: 
GMB account     +44 (0)20 7730 1234 
Feefo Hub         +44 (0) 20 7730 1234 

There is an additional space between (0) and 20 in the Feefo Hub entry. 

 

sameAs

To facilitate quicker association between your Feefo merchant page and your brand, consider adding "sameAs" mark-up to your Organisation schema. Though not mandatory, this step can improve the recognition of your Feefo reviews by Google and potentially enhance your page's rankings.

Implement the above steps correctly, and the 'Reviews from the web' section will appear automatically on the relevant GMB pages within a month. Adding "sameAs" will help Google to make the association between your brand and Feefo reviews faster and even can improve the rankings of your Feefo merchant page.

  • For more technical assistance, your developer or SEO team can help implement the "sameAs" attribute correctly. Below are some links to further understand Organisation schema and the "sameAs" attribute:

https://schema.org/Organization 

https://schema.org/sameAs 

The "sameAs" attribute allows you to group all external pages containing your brand information, such as Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and other branded social accounts. This helps Google associate these pages with your brand, ultimately benefiting your Feefo review page's rankings for branded keywords.

Example: 


 

 

 

Enabling the feature

Merchants can self-configure the feature once it has been enabled by a Feefo Support member under:

  1. Login to the Feefo Hub
  2. Click on 'Settings'
  3. Then select 'Advanced Settings' 
  4. Choose 'Extensions'
  5. Then click 'Enable Google Maps Share'

Configuring the feature

There are varying levels of granularity for the number of places you wish to support under an account.

One place for the entire account

  1. Go to 'Campaigns' 
  2. Click 'Default Campaign' (or custom campaign this is to be enabled on) 
  3. Choose 'Campaign Preferences'  
  4. Click 'Share Review to Google Maps'
  5. Check 'Show Share Option'
  6. Enter Place ID – this can be found using this search tool https://developers.google.com/places/place-id
  7. Save Campaign

 

One place per campaign

Create multiple campaigns as needed. For each campaign enable the settings detailed in Enabling the feature section above.

Different places for each transaction

For merchants with lots of branches it might not be viable to create a campaign for each brand

  • Go to 'Campaigns' 
  • Click 'Default Campaign' (or custom campaign this is to be enabled on) 
  • Choose 'Campaign Preferences'  
  • Click 'Share Review to Google Maps'
  • Check 'Show Share Option'
  • Leave Place ID blank OR supply a default Place ID

Within sale submission an additional tag to be added googleplaceid= 

Feefo places set-up

Follow steps in Enabling the feature section to use a single place ID for all store codes or assign different googleplaceid tags to each store code batch as detailed in Different places for each transaction.