If you’ve recently noticed that your Google Business Profile (GBP) reviews are disappearing, you’re not alone. The internet has been ablaze for the last week or so as business owners are trying to figure out why they’ve been seeing their hard-earned reviews disappearing from their GBPs. Some have seen their review count drop by dozens, while others have fluctuated wildly, gaining and losing reviews seemingly at random.
So, what’s going on?
A Known Bug (But No Immediate Fix)
Google has acknowledged that this is a known issue with the review counts and claims to be working on a fix. In many cases, the reviews themselves haven’t actually been deleted, it’s just the displayed number that’s inaccurate. On Reddit and other forums, business owners are reporting major drops in their review count overnight.
We’ve seen this firsthand with our own clients:
- Appliance repair company – started with 1,001 reviews, dropped to 970, then dropped to 926
- Plumber – started with 200 reviews, dropped to 195
- Piano instruction business – started with 45 reviews, dropped to 40
Some businesses have seen their review count bounce back temporarily, only to lose them again. One of our plumber clients saw their count drop from 198 to 18, only to return to 198 later.
Another Factor: Inactive Google Accounts Getting Deleted
As we’ve mentioned before, Google announced that it will be deleting accounts that remain inactive for two years. In its support article on the topic, Google states that “all of its content and data can be deleted.” Most experts interpret this to mean that any reviews left by those accounts will also be removed.
However, a smaller group speculates that Google may simply disassociate the reviews from the original account and display them under a generic “Google User” label instead.
If the majority opinion proves correct, this will only add to the chaos because not only will review counts be inaccurate, but actual reviews may also start disappearing permanently.
What Can You Do?
Unfortunately, there’s no magic fix for this situation. But the best thing you can do is keep getting more reviews.
We know, it’s frustrating to hear the same advice over and over, but the only way to combat disappearing reviews is to keep earning new ones. If you’re not actively requesting reviews, now’s the time to make it part of your daily routine. For ideas on how to do this, check out this article from a while back where we put together a guide on getting more reviews: Reviews: Why You Must Get Them (And Tips for Getting More)
If you’re not using our ReviewStream service, you might consider it. It’s an easy, hands-off way to get reviews every month. You just feed it your list of client emails and it will ask them to leave a review each month.
Final Thoughts
Losing reviews is frustrating, but this isn’t the first time Google has had a glitch like this, and it probably won’t be the last. The best way to protect your online reputation is to keep your review count growing so that even if you lose a few, you’re still ahead.
