Google adds ‘Reviews from the web’ to critic reviews in local search results
Last month Google introduced best-of lists and critic reviews for local search. The idea is to aggregate useful information about places for local searchers. Google is now adding “reviews from the web,” which brings user-generated content from third party sites to the knowledge panel and prominent placement in mobile results.
At the time critic reviews were introduced in August, there was criticism that prominent review sites such as Yelp or TripAdvisor were seemingly not eligible to be included (and were being obscured by the new feature). Reviews from the web, however, is intended for sites like Yelp and TripAdvisor, whose content are generated by consumers rather than “critics” and “experts.”
On the desktop, “reviews from the web” will appear in the Knowledge Panel as critic reviews do. In mobile, they will appear above critic reviews and best-of-lists. The screenshot above, provided by Google, shows how it will look on a smartphone. Any publisher using Schema markup for reviews is eligible to be included.
In the first version of this, which will roll out globally over the next several weeks, there will be three sources as in the example above. The order will be determined by “relevance” according to Google. They will appear across numerous local verticals, according to Google.
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