Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Do ratings/reviews show up in Organic Search Results anymore?
-
I read about using schema or h1review to add markup that would get an individual person's review to show up in organic search, but it was from 2013. I did a few queries for keywords in my area, and none of the results had this. Then I did some queries for generic things like "best pizza in Tampa" and "coffee in tampa" and they didn't have it either. So, is this still something that can be done or not?
- I do see it when a review site like yelp comes up or in ads, but I'm specifically talking about organic search results from our website.
Thanks,
Ruben
-
Hi Ruben,
Back in 2014, Google stated that they don't want markup on testimonials on your website. You can read about this here and figure out how you'd like to proceed, given this policy:
This caused quite a bit of talk at the time, and I don't believe all sites are complying, but important to know.
Regarding third party reviews you are republishing on your site, I have not seen individual reviews coming up with stars on them for some time, but this seems to change so frequently. For example, up until recently, I was seeing Facebook listings coming up in Google's SERPs with stars on them. Now, that appears to have changed. So, I'm not sure what, if anything, you could do right now to get individual reviews posted on your website to show up with stars in the SERPs.
If anyone has seen a different pattern, please do share with Ruben!
-
Well we have both on our site. Some are pictures of hand written notes, and others are screenshots of reviews from places like google + and avvo. So, I can do either.
- Ruben
-
Hi Ruben,
Just to clarify, are you talking about testimonials you've collected from clients and have published on your website or are you talking about 3rd party reviews you've collected from other platforms and are re-publishing on your website?
-
I have been seeing review stars more and more for local organic positioning. When I click-through to see how they're getting those reviews, for the most part they are employing some kind of plugin that regenerates their Google Plus reviews (I question how legitimate most of these reviews are [especially for small businesses], but that's neither here nor there), or the reviews from a well-known aggregator (Health Grades or Demand Force, for example).
-
I agree with Josh on this one. There needs to be some reason Google should believe that the ratings on your site are legitimate. I can't be certain that third party sites like Yelp or Google+ are the source of that social proof, but it seems both plausible and fairly easy to detect for Google. It would be a sound place to start.
-
We are collecting reviews using ShopperApproved. When I do searches for many of our product queries the yellow stars and ratings scores appear beside our listings in the organic SERPs. Our listings in the SERPs look great compared to our competitors, and the results since getting those stars to appear have been kickass. If I was in a business like yours I would get in touch with ShopperApproved and ask them to start a service named "Client Approved". I believe that their model could be used to allow accountants, attorneys, etc. to collect reviews on the same platform, but just branding it as "client" instead of "shopper".
ADDED: SA has a widget that you can copy/paste into the code of your website and it will display random reviews, 4/5 star reviews or hand selected reviews. I believe that this social proof from past customers has really increased sales. We are showing random reviews rather than hand-picking.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
What is the best practice way to attribute a Google Review?
An example might be a local directory site, where multiple businesses are featured. To flesh out the respective business profiles, Google Reviews are included. Copying/pasting would be the definition of duplicate content. I wonder though if hyperlinking to the review itself would be enough? For a random example: "you literally have never had better ice cream. cutest shop in charleston sc" - Mandee Jalbert, Google Review Google doesn't appear to have a review embed option- am I wrong? If not, would the above attribution via the "Google Review" hyperlink be sufficient to head off any potential dings for duplicate content? Thanks! Stephen
Reviews and Ratings | Jan 6, 2021, 5:29 PM | PerfectPitchConcepts
Thanks for your thoughts! I feel like this might make for a good presentation at our SoundBoard conference someday soon.0 -
Any Success Getting Fake 5 Star Google My Business Reviews Removed From Competitors?
Hi, I am working on a competitor who is obviously building up fake reviews using a 3rd party service. I need to build more evidence. A majority of his reviews on Google My Business, they are done by reviewers with very few reviews (no profile pic), and that seem to review 3-4 companies in the Chicagoland area the exact same day. This happens again and again. It started about 1.5 years ago. Before that everything looks normal. Any idea how much proof I need to actually get those reviews and/or his company removed? I am working on getting access to a private group on Facebook where he talks about it. Thanks in advance!
Reviews and Ratings | Feb 20, 2020, 4:02 PM | vetofunk1 -
Aggregate Rating Markup for Local Restaurant
Hello Moz Community, I am finally getting around to creating markup for a bunch of the sites we work with using JSON-LD. I have a question specifically regarding adding review markup for a local restaurant. It's my understanding that putting the aggregate rating on the homepage never results in stars being shown in the SERP's. So what would be the best practice for taking advantage of all the great Google reviews we've accumulated over the years? These are reviews for the restaurant in general and not for any specific service or product. Should I create a reviews page on the site and use the markup there? Thanks for any and all suggestions.
Reviews and Ratings | Nov 28, 2017, 9:01 AM | robertsteck0 -
Google Reviews & Third Party Reviews
Hi We have a third party review provider, but were also looking at increasing our Google reviews. However after more research, should Google reviews only be used on local listings? For organisations which don't have a physical location to buy from - is the solution to use organisation schema, which incorporates 'reviews on other sites' with the hope Google may show your Feefo review count? When checking similar companies - all seem to have the organisation knowledge card and not the local Google My Business listing. Is it worth pursuing extra reviews on Google My Business or not? Thanks!
Reviews and Ratings | Jun 30, 2017, 6:08 AM | BeckyKey0 -
Paying for Reviews Penalty?
Hello, recently came across a company that has been paying people directly for reviews. I of course do not recommend this and realized the ethical implications and even the lawsuits that can come from this, but does Google have a manual penalty for fake reviews or do they just algorithmically discount ones that raise red flags? I have never really had to worry about this in the past. I know you can flag fake reviews to them on an individual basis, but does anyone have history of knowing specific situations where a company was manually punished for doing this? Just curious and I kind of wanted to give them strong documentation to knock it off. Thanks in advance.
Reviews and Ratings | Jun 12, 2017, 4:20 PM | jeremyskillings0 -
Do people receive notifications when you respond to their Google reviews?
If someone leaves a review of your business on your Google My Business listing, and you respond to that review, will they receive an email notification of your response to their review? We are working with a client who has unanswered reviews from several years ago, and though it's best practice to respond to all reviews, we didn't want to respond to reviews from 2013 if the person (who has likely forgot about their experience with the business in question) is going to get an email notifying them of our late response to their review. Thank you!
Reviews and Ratings | Mar 31, 2017, 9:39 AM | BlueCorona1 -
How does decimal rounding of reviews to stars work in ios appstore? Starting from which average review score to get full 5 star rating?
How does decimal rounding of reviews to stars work in ios appstore?
Reviews and Ratings | Jan 20, 2016, 3:48 PM | lcourse
Starting from which average review score to get full 5 star rating? Duolingo has a 5 star rating, but I doubt that they really have an all time review average larger than 4,75. In the google playstore their average of the android version is 4,6. Does anybody know how apple calculates the star ratings or has an URL reference where this is explained?0 -
Why are certain words formatted as bold in Google+ Reviews?
Hey guys, I noticed that certain words within reviews left on Google+ pages are being shown in bold text. The original reviews do not feature bold text, but when shown in snippets they appear. I attached a photo below for a college's G+ page. Any insight would be great! 0ZHfhnP
Reviews and Ratings | Apr 13, 2015, 4:42 PM | TomBinga11250