As a Internet marketer for many local area businesses, we at Comit, were delighted to read Mike Blumenthal’s blog post about Google +Local providing phone support for service-area businesses. Many of our clients are local area businesses that service their clients at a location other than their place of business. Google calls these businesses “Service Area Businesses”. If you’re a locksmith, plumber, electrician, or carpenter, you fall into this category and do not yet qualify for a Google + Business page as brick-and-mortar businesses do. With the migration to Google+ came many problems for businesses with maps listings, prompting Google to open up phone support. Here are the steps we’ve followed in order to speak to a Google representative:
- Login into the places account by going to this link www.google.com/local/add and enter your username and password.
- Type in this address into your address bar https://support.google.com/places/?hl=en-US&rd=1
- Click on “I’m having a problem verifying my listing(s)” under Fix a Problem
- Click on “I tried PIN verification for a single listing”.
- Click on “The status is not Needs Action.”
- Click on the word “postcard” under the next question, “Which verification option did you most recently use?”
- Click yes under “Have you waited 15 days?”.
- Next click the call us link.
- From there fill out the information and click “call me”. Once you have pushed that button, you’ll be called within 60 seconds.
We’ve called Google and spoke to a representative within the 60 second suggested wait time. He asked for the email associated with the account, and then looked over the problem I had, which was an Active status but with no impressions. Because this problem was out of his purview, he escalated the problem and assured me that they would have it resolved. We haven’t resolved the issue as of this writing; however, I am grateful that I was able to contact someone to attempt to have this issue resolved.
I would advise everyone to take a quick look at the Google +Local account for your business. With the changes that Google has been making to these listings and the amount of revenue these vital links create for local businesses, a quick review each month could provide a successful resolution to any problems you may have. And, now that you can call someone, all of the guess work can be eliminated with a 60 second wait time.
