Hi @Lordy_Lord
happy new year!!!
I did another couple of tests for the last 2 month, in 3 different countries, that would be around 200 reviews since the last post.
I wrote reviews with some friends I was with and even with random people I met in the same restaurant, cafe or hostel I wanted to give a review.
So all of them were able to write a review that went immediately online, of course mine not. 3 of us wrote exactly the same words same stars, 2 of them went online, of course mine not. (They changed it afterwards, because same wording wouldn’t be allowed)
Another test, 4 of us wrote absolutely a simply review, simply wordings and nothing complex, all of them got published right away, except mine. It’s obviously that its not a problem with, what we’re writing or how many starts we’re give, it has absolutely something to do with our profile, as our test would be a proof for that. Needles to say, that we only wrote reviews, only for venues we really have visited. All devices were a mix of iPhones and androids, all of them had their timeline and accurate location turned on.
I also meet a guy who has similar problems like us reviewers in this forum and it tend to be that this one of the reasons, as more reviews your write and as higher your score are, as more likely it is you’re running into that kind of problem.
You profile will got flagged, by the algorithm or some random dude at google and from now on you will have these kind of problems, that needs to be reviewed manually by some google guy.
It’s obviously that this flagged profile could be somehow reversed from your profile,
why that is not a solution, only google knows. But maybe they wont give people a kinda wild card, to protect other reviewers, could be that the spam accounts get also smarter and they would use that as a flaw then.
So I think the solution that google is offering right now, filling out these forms are the smartest solution for them.
Cos it’s simply easier for them to just force you to give up, in doing most likely nothing, except filling out that form and hope that someone on googles side will release your reviews but not unflagging your profile instead.
Or they hope you will finally give up, because of this silly way of solution, writing reviews that won’t be published at all and filling out forms every month to hope your work got published at the end.
I think because of the amount of people who are singing up to be a reviewer, there is also a constant flow of new participants and as long as your account is fresh, your reviews got published all the time, doesn’t matter how silly your reviews are. I checked a lot of reviews and some are clearly against the google policy, some are absolutely personal and some are totally silly.
I also talked to a lot of reviewers on my travels, and some have similar experience and knowledge, some did a bit more testing then me, cos that’s more in a grey area, of course its against the google rules and no one should do that.
I won’t do either, just sharing my experience.
So I think at some point the google AI got to aggressive with flagging accounts, and it would cost google to much resources and time, to fine tune the AI that it could work in a better way.
Because in the same way it flags innocent accounts, it will also flag accounts who deserve a ban. So the percentage might be higher in a good way for google, so they won’t change it, because that would mean more spam accounts again.
So they come up with that easy solution, force people to contact a google moderator, which worked at the beginning very good. Until they realized there is also a more cost less way to address that problem with the form, less resource binding.
People who will give up on the way, which is totally understandable, because what sense would it made to write reviews that never got published and only if you’re lucky after you filled out a form. This one would also be a solved problem for google, no tickets anymore and if it’s just a few people, compare to the bigger mass of people, so google can still afford it.
And even then, does every month a google guy will read through all your 100 reviews you wrote the last month? And it’s also a human failure possibility, this guy would let go though all your reviews, the next one won’t. And what if that google guy has a friend who has a shop you gave a bad review, would he publish your review? Everywhere where you have humans that is a possibility of work against the best interest of the participants.
And last but not least, it’s pretty much like, never address the problem and find a solution for that issue it’s only put a bandaid on the problem. Is that the new google way?!? Why not simply saying you have a problem, you won’t fix it? Unflagging is not an option? Anything would be more helpful, then let people in the dark and pretending it’s not a problem there.
Our tests proof, that there’s really something wrong with our profiles or the AI or even the human who’s doing their job or not?
