GMB Products GONE MISSING!

[BillKVMotorCo]

Has anyone else lost the Products button on their GMB page and, if so, have you been able to recover it? I still have it on my Toyota page, but it's gone from my Chevrolet, Buick, and GMC page. I spoke with Google and they claimed that it had something to do with the category of business, but I have discovered that to be bunk from several reliable sources. My category for my Toyota page is Toyota dealer and my other is Chevrolet dealer (my attempt at resolving the bunk issue), so that is obviously not it.

 

[Jeff Kershner]

I only manage our Mercedes-Benz dealer BUT have access to the group dealers. The Benz GMB page is untouched has the Products feature (with added products,) BUT both the Toyota and Nissan dealer's have been removed. They indeed had it prior. This feature was a beta offering at one point and not released to everyone right away. I can't recall if the other dealers had anything listed in the Products feature but maybe it was placed back in beta if it was not being utilized?

After some research, this has apparently been an ongoing issue.

"This is a known issue. Some listings just don't have the section and it's been like this for about a year. There unfortunately isn't a timeframe at the moment for when it will be fixed."

I hope this doesn't happen to me since I have over 2 pages of products listed.

 

[BillKVMotorCo]

That is similar to what I have found in my research, but I thought if anyone would at least be able to confirm that for me it would be someone here. Where is that guy that fixes Google?

 

[Alexander Lau]

That's because Google doesn't want consistency. In fact, they want inconsistency and that is part of their strategy. They want to jerk you around in order for you to buy into their ad platform(s). I don't think I am exposing anything groundbreaking in that statement. Anyone that sells GMB to dealers is always going to have a tough time. Nature of the beast.

 

[ChrisR]

That's because Google doesn't want consistency. In fact, they want inconsistency and that is part of their strategy. They want to jerk you around in order for you to buy into their ad platform(s). I don't think I am exposing anything groundbreaking in that statement. Anyone that sells GMB to dealers is always going to have a tough time. Nature of the beast.

Kind of perfect timing to disrupt GMB, around the time they will be rolling out pay to play GMB packages.

 

[Alex Snyder]

That's because Google doesn't want consistency. In fact, they want inconsistency and that is part of their strategy.

That's an interesting theory I have never considered before. I always chalked it up to a leadership team that liked to play the "throw it against the wall and see it if sticks game." The kind of thing that happens more and more as you get bigger and bigger.

But I am warming up to your theory, Alexander. They may just be smarter than I gave them credit for.

 

[George Nenni]

@ChrisR may be right, perhaps the new Google Guaranteed for autos, wrapped around Local Service ads. We helped set it up for a large non-autos account, not too tough, and the non-branded conversions at a competitive rate. Rumors are that LSA coming to GMB.

On GMB Products turned off, I have heard reports of frequent GMB Posts triggering turn-on.

 

[Alexander Lau]

That's an interesting theory I have never considered before. I always chalked it up to a leadership team that liked to play the "throw it against the wall and see it if sticks game." The kind of thing that happens more and more as you get bigger and bigger.

But I am warming up to your theory, Alexander. They may just be smarter than I gave them credit for.

Thanks. I really don't see this any other way. It goes back to my organic rankings theory and what I've measured over a period of 20+ years.

I'll say it again:

We can sit around and act like we're not trying to take advantage of Google's algorithm (would be a lie), but the fact of the matter, they change it up because SEO groups get VERY GOOD at manipulating it for organic ranking purposes. Google is quite happy fiddling with their algorithm for "best practice" reasons, but in reality, they just want to convolute the ranking equation process in order to get you to BUY more of their PAID AD space. Now that the space (itself) has been limited, it's even more competitive.