As reported in the New York Times and on Slashdot, small businesses are finding themselves being threatened with receiving negative reviews on their Google for Business Profiles. This is unacceptable behavior. Hopefully Google will be able to combat these ill-intentioned reviews with innovations in illegitimate review detection, perhaps with the help of artificial intelligence.

This provides yet another reason why it is so crucial for businesses, even those without websites, to create a Google for Business Profile and to start to build up their reputation online through having their customers leave legitimate reviews that reflect the genuine service that is offered.

There will always be instances where your service wasn’t 100% and legitimate customers may unfortunately leave a less than ideal review to reflect this, that is natural, but by having a fair number of existing reviews in-place it will ensure that your reputation is correctly reflected online via the Google for Business (and other Review site) portals.

If you're interested to read more, we recently published an article on the importance of setting up and managing your Google for Business Profile.