Contractors compete for the same jobs on the same streets, and crews turn over. Sooner or later you may see a review that reads less like a customer and more like a grudge: a rival steering homeowners to another company, or a former employee settling a score on the way out.
Google has a rule for this. Its review policies treat content from people with a stake in a business, or in a competing one, as a conflict of interest. This guide explains what the rule covers, the cases that fall outside it, how to build a report that holds up, and how to reply in public without making things worse.
Table of Contents
What the Rule Says
Google wants reviews to come from honest, unbiased experiences. Conflict of interest is one of the reasons it gives for reporting a review, and Google describes it as a review from someone affiliated with the business or with a competitor's business. In plain terms, the people who gain or lose from your rating should not be the ones writing it.
The rule runs in both directions. It covers a rival posting one stars on your profile, and it covers you, your staff and your family posting praise on your own.
Reviews From Competitors
Rival attacks leave tracks. Watch for these:
- The review names another company and tells readers to call them instead.
- The reviewer's profile praises one rival and criticizes every other company in your trade.
- The complaint uses shop talk a homeowner would not, like model numbers, code sections or what a part costs wholesale.
- The name, photo or wording matches someone at a competing shop, or the review appeared right after you won a bid against them.
- Several accounts post similar complaints about you and similar praise for the same rival.
One of these can be a coincidence. Two or three together are the start of a solid report.
Reviews From Current and Former Employees
A tech you let go, a crew lead who left on bad terms, an office manager who quit: any of them can post on your profile. But a review about pay, hours or how the boss runs the shop describes working for you, not hiring you, and the person writing it is tied to the business. That is the kind of review the conflict of interest rule is about.
The same goes for relatives of your staff and for a former business partner after a split. If the reviewer's connection to the company is the reason they are writing, it belongs in a conflict of interest report.
When the former employee was also a customer
Now and then someone who once worked for you later pays you to fix their own furnace or roof. A review about that job describes a real customer experience. Judge it on what it says about the work, not on who wrote it.
Your Side of the Rule
The rule that protects you also binds you. Do not ask your crew, office staff, relatives or friends to post reviews of the company, and do not let a salesperson praise the business from a personal account. Do not answer a rival's attack by posting about them either.
Google can take those reviews down too, and a pattern of them can put the whole profile at risk, as our guide to suspended Google Business Profiles explains.
Gray Areas Google May Leave Up
Some reviews feel like a conflict but describe a real encounter with your business. Be honest with yourself about these:
- A homeowner who took your quote and signed with another company. They still dealt with your business, even though they never paid you.
- A neighbor of a job site upset about a truck across their driveway or a saw running at seven in the morning. They never hired you, but they describe something your crew did.
- Another trade you clashed with on a shared job, such as the drywall crew on a remodel you ran. Whether that counts as a conflict depends on the details, and Google decides.
A review like this can still be worth reporting if it also breaks another policy, such as harassment, profanity or personal details. When it does not, a calm public reply does more good than a report.
How to Build a Report That Holds Up
A conflict of interest report rests on the connection between the reviewer and the business, so gather that first.
- Match the reviewer to a person: a name in your payroll records, a face from a crew photo, or a profile that links to a rival's website.
- Screenshot the review, the reviewer's profile and any of their other reviews that point the same way, before anything changes.
- Report it under conflict of interest, not under a reason that only sounds stronger.
- Write down when you filed it and under which reason, then follow its status in the review management tool.
- If Google leaves it up and the tool offers an appeal, use it to state the connection in a few plain sentences, as our appeal guide explains.
How to Reply in Public
Reply while the report is open, because homeowners are reading your profile now. Keep it short and neutral. Something like: We have no record of a customer by this name or a job matching this description. If we worked for you, please call our office so we can make it right.
Do not name the person, do not say they were fired or share anything from their file, and do not call out the rival company. An accusation in a reply can look worse to a homeowner than the review itself.
Put the facts in your report and keep your reply calm. Never name who you think wrote it.
When to Bring In Help
Conflict of interest cases take more legwork than plain spam, because the connection has to be shown. Our Review Removal team reads the review and the reviewer's history, files the report under conflict of interest when the connection is there, and keeps following up until Google reaches a decision.
The quote comes on a short call, and you pay only after a review is removed. If the reviewer turns out to be a real customer, we say so and help you plan a reply instead. For reviews from bots and made up accounts, see our guide to fake Google reviews.
What to Do Next
- Check the reviewer against your customer records first.
- Look for the link to a rival or to your own staff, and save it.
- Report the review once, under conflict of interest.
- Reply in two or three calm sentences, with no names.
- Track the status and appeal with facts if Google allows it.
- Make sure nobody on your side reviews your company or a rival.
A profile with a steady stream of real reviews shrugs off the occasional attack. Our Local SEO plan, starting at $999/month, handles the profile, the website and local links. See HVAC SEO or roofing SEO for how that work looks in a trade.