There have been comments, posts, and even @MortenCopenhagen 's great idea appealing to Google to let us know whenever we’ve contributed a photo deemed worthy of being Featured or making the Cover of a location. @ErmesT even gave a bit of guidance to becoming featured in this post.
But how can we tell if we’ve gotten a cover photo? Either you get the awesome notification, or you notice your photo views jump up very quickly in a short amount of time (obviously stoked because you’re trying to climb the Leaderboards).
I was poking around today and noticed that you can easily tell if you’ve got the cover photo for a location when reviewing your photo contributions on your desktop.
A small, circular version of the Location’s cover photo is shown next to the place’s name in your photos list. It is easy to identify (maybe you’ll need to put your glasses on) that your photo is the one in the icon.
I was duped several times because of similar-looking shots, but I was quite surprised at how many locations have my photos as the cover. It would have been much more exciting to get a notification, but I’m still pretty stoked!
I hope this little discovery is helpful and motivating. Maybe everyone already knew this, and I’m just late to the party. But if you check your own photos, let me know if you found more Cover Photos than expected!
The only exception is when businesses have uploaded their logo which will then be shown in the circular image
All the best
Morten
PS: I will soon be sharing a new series on Storefront photography. This is basically a tutorial on how to up your chances of getting your photos featured (including getting the top cover photo spot).
@MortenCopenhagen , Right, and I wouldn’t want to interfere with a business actively engaged in their GMB profile or those paying for promotion. I’d be pretty frustrated if my Ads campaign led a lot of traffic to see a profile photo of our restrooms or even the Streetview photo!
Excited about the Storefront tutorials. I ran out and tested @TerryPG 's theory on 90 Degree Photos but can’t say I had consistent luck. Still makes for the most visually interesting views of buildings, though.
It’s a great idea @JustJake I and others have advocated for a long time to somehow let google show what are featured photos are. I used manually track how many featured photos I have,( used to run about 30 %) but unfortunately I have too many now to manually track now. And yes that’s how I tracked my featured photos but as you say only on desktop.
Thanks for trying the 90 degree shot , it seems to work about 33% of the time I use it. Try a 90 degree shot and a straight up shot, post both and see which one does best.
And @MortenCopenhagen please tag me when you publish that post about storefront photos , I have some great ideas as well and would love to learn more from you.
@JustJake You got me thinking, which is always somewhat dangerous, But taking great photos of storefronts is I think one is of the keys to to having people across the world and of course local viewing your photos, and of course increasing your photo Views( My favourite number)
So because you got me thinking (blaming you for this) I quickly checked some of my numbers and this does sound like I am bragging, ( which I admit part of me is)
I now have 124 photos that achieved over 1 million views, 6 of these are secondary photos of the POIs that are or were still featured photos, That leaves 118 photos are or were at one time the featured photo of the POIs,
89 of these 118 photos are still the featured photos and these are driving my photo views.
Sorry for sending you down the rabbit hole, @TerryPG .
I think your selection of locations has a lot to do with it (spitballing here) as many of these locations seem like logical navigation targets. That said, these popular locations get hundreds of photos, and for you to consistently land the top spots is really interesting. I wonder if there’s something in the algo that trusts photographers the same way it seems to start trusting editors.
Your number of 1mil+ viewed photos that are a year or newer is crazy. You’ll be in the billion-view club so soon.
Your trick is very much worth spreading the word about.
Here is how I use it when checking which of my pics got featured and which get the honor of being the cover photo.
If I see my photo in the mini circle => COVER PHOTO => Done
If my image is listed first => COVER PHOTO => Done
If my image is listed between #2 and #10 (both included) => FEATURED => Done
If not featured, I check the “By you” tab to make sure nothing went wrong when uploading the photo (a small percentage of photos get rejected for reasons I still can not explain). This should be done no earlier than 30 minutes after upload (normally I wait until 1 or 2 days after upload). If missing, then I delete the photo from my photo contribution list and try uploading it again.
I know this is somewhat crazy and nerdy, but I’m still learning a lot about what photoqualities the photo selection AI prefers.
@MortenCopenhagen that’s a great set of steps. I started reviewing recently posted photos last night and found one that was not showing up. I deleted it from maps and realized I’d already deleted it from my phone! Oops. It was time for bed anyway. Thanks for the idea, though, I’ll just have to hold onto my pictures a bit longer.
@JustJake and @MortenCopenhagen This is very interesting information. Do you have any idea what actually causes a photo to become the cover photo? Is it selected by the business owner, or does it just evolve over time as the public interacts with the photos of the place?
@tony_b , I’ve never seen the option to choose another photo as the cover on my GMB page, but we do services and don’t have many contributors. @MortenCopenhagen might have more information.
Going to let @MortenCopenhagen answer this because he has way more experience than me and has always been one of best guides to lead me into becoming a better guide, But If you research @AdamGT leaderboards the majority of featured photos or star photos are photos of storefronts with signage generally in the middle .
Business owners do have an option to suggest which photo the would like to see be their cover photo. I can’t describe exactly where. But the photo selection AI has the final say.
The photo selection AI use a lot of factors to select cover photos. They include (and are not limited to)
Clearly showing the entrance
Clearly showing the name of the place (name boad/sign) ee
Showing a little more than just the entrance and the name so new visitors can get help finding the entrance after navigating to the place for the first time.
Having lots of contrast, light and colors
No recognizable faces
Landscape orientation is preferred over portrait orientation
I have compiled this list from studying what photos get selected as cover photos. You can do the same.
I do need to put a bit more work into the detail of how I take photos and what I actually post. Many times it is just “click and run” as an opportunity presents itself. Not often is it a deliberate and carefully executed photo session.
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