Google announced the change on June 17th, 2022.
Starting June 30th, 2022, Google will require all law firms to have 5 Google reviews before they are approved to run a new Local Service Ad (LSA), also known as a Google Verified or Google Screened ad. Previously, law firms were only required to have 1 Google review to launch an LSA ad campaign.
Local Service Ads, Google’s pay-per-call lead advertising option, has become very popular in the legal community over the past two years. Due to the high ROI that lawyers have achieved from this platform, many law firms have tried some unethical tactics to get more visibility on the platform.
One technique that some law firms have used involves making multiple accounts for their firms under individual lawyers’ names rather than for the law firm as a whole.
After complaints from affected law firms, Google has flagged this practice as unfair and a manipulative misrepresentation. As a result, Google will try to combat the unfair practices through a more thorough vetting process. By increasing the review requirements, Google hopes to reduce the number of fake or misleading accounts.
Google announced the change on June 17th, 2022.
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