Lookelo review-removal question count Searched: October 30, 2026 Article: /blog/how-to-get-a-fake-google-review-removed Purpose Find the review problem local business owners asked about most often in the last 30 days, and record what those questions had in common, to inform a guide for independent hardware, paint, lumber and building-supply store owners. This is original desk research: Lookelo selected, paraphrased and coded public questions. We did not contact posters, test Google's reporting tools, or measure how often reviews are removed. Sources and queries Reddit search through the Reddit API, restricted to posts from the past month, run October 30, 2026. Queries: google reviews disappeared google reviews removed business google review not showing reviews deleted google business profile subreddit:GoogleMyBusiness reviews subreddit:smallbusiness reviews disappearing subreddit:localseo reviews subreddit:GoogleMyBusiness review missing customer left review not showing google lost google reviews An earlier broad scan of small business, retail, ecommerce, Shopify and Google Business Profile communities (store websites, selling online, inventory, pickup, Google Business Profile) was used to choose the topic. Review problems were the largest cluster of owner questions in that scan. Eligibility Window: original posts dated September 30 through October 30, 2026 (UTC). Communities: GoogleMyBusiness, googlebusinessprofile, localseo, SEO, smallbusiness, smallbusinessowner and similar business communities. Include: an original post written from the business side (owner, staff, or a marketer acting for a business) that asks how to get a negative, fake or unwanted Google review on the business's own profile removed, or why a reported review is still live. Second group, counted separately: business-side posts asking why genuine reviews disappeared, were removed or never appeared. Exclude: customers asking about their own reviews; vendor or tool promotions; explainers and studies that ask nothing; posts about profile suspension or verification without a review question; reviews on another business's profile; a reporting-tool error with no review-removal question; posts outside the window. Deduplication: one post ID is one observation. Crossposts with identical text from the same author were merged (1wxlure into 1wxlya4, 1x0sy4u into 1x0sy0n, 1xf4phm into 1xf4p2c, 1x3xtek into 1x3xsxl). We did not establish that different accounts are different people. Retrieval The Reddit API returned full original-post bodies. Each of the 16 removal posts was also opened directly by post ID on October 30, 2026; all were live and not removed. Usernames and comment threads are not republished; questions are paraphrased. Codebook (removal group only, original post only, one researcher) reported_already: the post says the review was already reported, flagged or appealed. unknown_reviewer: the post says the reviewer is not a customer, or cannot be found in the business's records. several_reviews: more than one negative review arrived close together. escalation_ask: the post asks how to escalate, appeal, contact Google, speed up a decision, or what evidence helps. business_harm: the post says the reviews lowered the rating, calls, enquiries or Maps business, or undercut marketing spend. suspected_source: the post names a suspected author type (competitor, former employee, harasser, a customer demanding a refund). removal_offer: the post mentions a paid review-removal service or an unsolicited offer to remove reviews. 0 means not stated in the original post under these rules. Codes overlap. No independent second coder. Results Removal questions: 16 (14 owner or staff, 2 marketers). Missing-review questions: 13. reported_already 13; unknown_reviewer 8; several_reviews 7; escalation_ask 6; business_harm 5; suspected_source 4; removal_offer 3. Reproduce with docs/research/2026-10-30-fake-google-reviews/calculate.py. Search Console check Lookelo's own Search Console queries for July 27 to October 27, 2026 (top 300 by clicks) contained no review-removal queries. This topic was chosen from the Reddit sample, not from Lookelo's search data. Limits Reddit-only, international, search-selected, and coded by one person. None of the 16 removal posts came from a hardware, paint or lumber store. The counts describe this sample only. They do not estimate how often stores get fake reviews, how often Google removes them, or whether anything changed over time. Claims inside the posts, such as a reviewer not being a customer, are the posters' own and were not verified.