Google Places - Pending Review problems

[SBWeb]

Hi SEO experts:

We've been successfully placing our clients into Google Places until a few weeks ago - since then, they've all come up as Pending. They're all genuine business with bricks-and-mortar addresses the postcards have been sent to (they're all lovely people too, although I guess that won't have a massive effect) with some directory citations to back them up.

Could I please get peoples' opinions as to why this has changed?

My own opinions are:

a) Google's been inundated with requests which are taking a while to process:

b) an algo update is holding approvals up:

c) a consistent IP for all our clients is raising a spamflag.

What do you reckon, SEO friends? Help me save the hair I haven't yet torn out!

Ben

SB Web Consulting

[OlegKorneitchouk]

Have you waiting 15 days? I don't think it an algo update, and probably not IP related (there are many companies who do the same so G should recognize that multiple listings from one IP is not a problem). They may be backlogged but I would hope G would just hire more moderators.

I recommend posting your problem to the "Google and Your Business" forums - http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!categories/business/technical-issue

You can also send out a message to Google via - http://support.google.com/places/bin/static.py?hl=en&ts=1399021&page=ts.cs

[ElevateMP]

Hey Ben-

Typically places listings that get flagged and set to pending is due to some aspect of the listings that has caught the attention of Googles automated spam filtering system. Without seeing an example of your clients listing it's hard to speculate on what is triggering the pending but in most cases this has to do with

1. The title of your listing not being an exact match the title of the business.

2. Excessive keyword stuffing within the content of the listing.

3. Categories stuffed with keywords

etc.

If you want to post an example I can give you more feedback. The pending process can take weeks to months... not a fun place to be however, typically if you fix the errors and resubmit it will come off of pending status.

Google has forums to help businesses comply with the Google Places Guidelines

Hope that helps,

Mike

[SBWeb]

Thanks for making the point that Google would hire more to take care of backlog - hadn't thought of this (derp!) and helped me eliminate this from investigation. Thanks!

[SBWeb]

Thanks very much for this, was really helpful! I've been through my listings and found that my copy could be seen as a little spammy, so I've made it much more neutral and blank. I'm hopeful this will cure it! Thanks for your time and expertise