Google Auto-Updating Business Hours on 20 Million Listings

For a few months now google has been using automated phone calls to confirm that businesses are open when they say they are.

We’ve even seen examples of this showing up on listings:

Now we are hearing news that they intend to auto update the business hours of over 20 million businesses in the next 6 months.  This new approach using AI takes the data from phone calls, and combines it with other information it has gathered and uses that information to auto-update the hours.  Google states that they may gather information from many other places including:

Business signs – Google can read signs from streetview pictures, if you have a sign with your hours posted on it, it can be used to update the hours on your listing
User Traffic/Input – Based on live traffic to your business as well as surveys from maps users google can impact the information on your profile
Other information – Business hours listed on other websites could influence the hours listed on google

If your have your Google hours listed as 24 hours in order to entice customers to call at anytime you could be subject to a google auto-update.  In order to prevent these updates from happening you must stay on top of your listing and any changes made to it on a daily basis.  At Milemark Media we are full service including managing the intricate details of your google listing and optimization. Contact us today to discover your personalized legal marketing plan. You can reach us by phone at 866-598-6235 or through our contact form to get started.