Some technical difficulties with his blog doesn’t stop Mike to get up early today and post his very interesting findings on an update in the Google Maps Help Center. The Google Maps Help Center now contains some guidelines for your business inclusion and also, what to do when you got kicked out of Google Maps for spamming. This report from Google corresponds well with my previous post about Google tightening its submission policies.
You can find the guidelines by clicking on the following link:
Google Help Center Guidelines for Local Business Center Submissions
Honestly, I still find the guidelines a bit vague, taken into account previous statements;
“be as descriptive if you can for your business in your business title’ doesn’t really correspond with “Represent your business as it appears in real life”. Or is this just my point of view?
Can I use “Italian Ice cream and Cappuccino Bar Bella Napoli” or should it just say “Bella Napoli” because I registered with chamber of commerce with that name?
In my opinion it should add up to the user experience and thus allowing the first one.
In the Help Center, Google is now also referring to the Google Maps group for Business Owners where they can report abuse of the Quality Guidelines.
Martijn, I was going to write a post about this very topic but you beat me to it
I agree with descriptive titles. Until Google stops bolding keyword matches, at the very least keywords should be used for increased clickthroughs, let alone rankings.
@David
I really have to agree with you on that one. Cutting down business titles doesn’t add up to any experience.
Of course you are always free to cover this story from your point of view. The ‘voice’ of local experts is needed to bring this topic to peoples attention.