As COVID-19 continues to impact businesses around the world, many maps and local listing providers are changing how their search directories operate. New and updated features are enabling businesses to communicate more effectively with their consumers, helping share information about hours of operation, availability of goods and services, and more. We are staying on top of these changes and will continue to update this document. Below is a current list of the major changes and opportunities available now.
Google My Business
1) Update Special Hours
- Business who have changed their “Hours of Operation” or are “closed up to 14 days” should update their Special Hours
- This feature is available on GMB dashboard OR leverage Milestone Local to push this data.
- This feature is available for all Business verticals
2) Mark Business as Temporarily closed
- Business must be marked as closed if they will remain closed for an unprecedented time, do not have an open date or extend beyond 14 days.
- This feature is available on GMB dashboard.
- This feature is available for all Business verticals.
- As this can currently only be done manually in the dashboard, is not recommended for chain businesses; leverage special hours instead.
3) Attributes
- Attributes like Takeout, Dine-in and Delivery are being highlighted on Google maps and mobile devices for all dining and shopping categories.
- Adding these attributes can be done from GMB dashboard OR leverage Milestone Local to push this data.
- This feature is available for all Dining and shopping verticals.
- Businesses like restaurants can add “Curbside Pickup” or “Takeout Available” to their names without being penalized during this period. While outside of Google’s general rules, they are allowing it for the time being.
4) Google Post
- Posts are now available for all businesses – including chains – except for Hotels Category Business and is currently supported via API.
- Businesses can create a Google Post related to “COVID – 19 update”.
- This feature is available on GMB dashboard.
- New COVID-19 post is currently only available through the GMB dashboard (not API).
- COVID-19 posts cannot include images or videos, but will stay on the listing for 14 days, and is currently being displayed higher up on the knowledge panel result in mobile search than a standard post.
5) Special Announcement
- Business can add special announcement schemas on the website pages specific to the COVID-19 information like events rescheduled or cancelled, quarantine guidelines, shelter-in-place and more.
- This new schema mark-up is available but are not yet live on Google search.
